Finding ASU History
Did You Know?
While the bills to establish ASU and UA were ratified by the 13th Arizona Territorial Assembly on the same day in 1885, ASU (then known as the Arizona Territorial Normal School) was the first institution of higher education to open for business in Arizona in February 1886!
Alumni Magazine Issues
Online Research Tools
Search descriptions of approximately 20% of the Archive's books and periodicals.
Search guides to archival collections located all over
Note: Viewing almost all archival collections requires an appointment 5 days in advance because they are stored off-campus.
Electronic index to Archives photographs, “Info” files, “Bio” files, and "Small Manuscripts". For photo descriptions with thumbnails attached, add "digital photographs" to your search terms!
Electronic index to articles in the State Press, ASU Insight, and ASU Insight West, 1987-2014. All editions are available by appointment in the Wurzburger Reading Room at Hayden Library, Tempe campus.
Digital Material Highlights
We encourage you to browse all of our digital materials through our online repository PRISM. PRISM brings together ASU Library’s many unique library and archival collections, including digitized historic photographs, maps, oral history recordings, rare texts and publications, and a wide variety of reformatted videos and films.
Some highlights of the University Archives are outlined below:
A general history of ASU delivered in streaming video using vintage motion picture film, video, photographs, and music primarily from the University Archives collections. 16 minutes.
A history of Homecoming at ASU delivered in streaming video using vintage motion picture film, video, photographs, and music primarily from the University Archives collections.
Amateur silent motion pictures made by "Varsity" Bill Bailey of the Arizona State University campus (then Arizona State Teacher's College) and the Varsity Inn in 1937 and 1938. The films depict student recreation, campus scenes especially on University Drive and College Avenue, Homecoming parades, and football games at Goodwin Stadium. Boxing and track are also depicted.
Agnes Smedley Collection and Exhibition Archive
Photos, manuscripts, and other materials from the collections of Agnes Smedley, and the famous radical's biographers, Stephen and Janice MacKinnon.
Joyce Finch Oral History Project
Twenty-five interview transcripts regarding members of the United States Cadet Nurse Corps and abstracts of the interviews produced by Elsie Szecsy.
Martin Luther King at Arizona State University
Martin Luther King Jr.'s speech entitled "Religious Witness for Human Dignity" was presented at Goodwin Stadium, Arizona State University on June 3, 1964. Introduction by ASU President G. Homer Durham. This recording is followed by a brief recording of King's remarks to NAACP supporters at the Tanner AME Church in Phoenix earlier in the same day. Related photographs and correspondence from President Durham are included.
In these recordings, KCAC’s Bill Compton interviews Ted Mote of the Arizona branch of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and Professor Morris Starsky. Topics of discussion include freedom of speech and expression and the suppression thereof, particularly on college campuses; prisons, treatment of prisoners, the perceived rising crime rate, and the use of police forces as tools of oppression and/or repression; the Arizona branch of the ACLU, social movements in the United States and the need for mass movements to counter injustice and authoritarianism; the Morris Starsky case; the Vietnam War; and the freedom, intimidation, and manipulation of the press.
A comprehensive history of ASU with over 300 downloadable publication-quality photographs.
U.S. Congressman Harry Mitchell Oral History Project
Video recordings of interviews with Congressman Harry Mitchell and six members of his Washington and Arizona staff. Interviews were conducted between December 2010 and April 2012 by Dr. David Berman of Arizona State University. Staff interviewees are Reed Adamson, Elizabeth Higgins, Chris Quigley, Robbie Sherwood, Alexis Tameron and Matt Weisman.
The History Of Arizona State University
This collection features photographs, documents, and audio and visual materials that chronicle the history of the institution. Additional materials include statistical lists and compilations of data for enrollment and building data.
Hardcopy Tools
Two card files produced by the Office of the President to index ABOR minutes, 1945-1970; 1970-1984. Must be retrieved from storage, Ask an Archivist for call number UE ASU 2.2 M669.
The ASU Library acknowledges the twenty-three Native Nations that have inhabited this land for centuries. Arizona State University's four campuses are located in the Salt River Valley on ancestral territories of Indigenous peoples, including the Akimel O’odham (Pima) and Pee Posh (Maricopa) Indian Communities, whose care and keeping of these lands allows us to be here today. ASU Library acknowledges the sovereignty of these nations and seeks to foster an environment of success and possibility for Native American students and patrons. We are advocates for the incorporation of Indigenous knowledge systems and research methodologies within contemporary library practice. ASU Library welcomes members of the Akimel O’odham and Pee Posh, and all Native nations to the Library.
