RESEARCH
Five ways to do research with us.
Students, scholars, journalists, family historians, novelists, and the merely curious — the Library & Research Center is here to support your work, free of charge.
POPULAR TOPICS
Start where most researchers start.
Eight subject-area entry points into the archive — each tile lands you on a curated set, an editorial thread, or a standing collecting initiative.
GENEALOGY
Family history & vital records
City directories, probate, church and cemetery records — the documentary substrate of a name.
Open the genealogy guide →
MILL CREEK VALLEY
The bulldozed neighborhood
248 photographs, oral histories, and Sanborn maps from the demolished neighborhood that anchored Black St. Louis until 1959.
Enter the thread →
PHOTOGRAPHY
Mid-century commercial photography
The Sievers Studio archive — banquets, retirements, civic events, hotel ballrooms.
Browse 2 records →
ST. LOUIS CIVIC LIFE
Press photography of public events
Spelling bees, parades, school events — civic ritual captured for the newspapers.
Browse 1 record →
AFRICAN AMERICAN HISTORY
AAHI collecting initiative
A standing institutional commitment to who is in the archive — oral histories, family papers, congregational records.
Read the initiative →
MILITARY & VETERANS
Loyal Legion Portrait Albums
Studio portraits of Civil War veterans who joined the Loyal Legion in the decades after the war.
Browse 1 record →
BUSINESS & COMMERCE
Mid-century commercial archive
The Edward H. Goldberger Collection — Shell Oil, Anheuser-Busch, the trade-association dinners.
Browse 1 record →
NEWSPAPERS & PERIODICALS
St. Louis printed record
Bound volumes of The Pioneer and other St. Louis school and community periodicals.
Browse 1 record →
Online research
Finding aids, digital exhibits, and curated research guides — start here if you can't visit in person.
Start here →
In-person research
Request a Library & Research Center appointment. Reading room hours, what to bring, how to register.
Start here →
Collections Hub
Curatorial directory by subject area — Costume, Manuscripts, Photographs, Cartography, Oral History.
Start here →
Remote research assistance
Email and mail requests for those who cannot travel. A research librarian responds within 10 business days.
Start here →
Genealogy & family history
Tracing families through city directories, probate, church and cemetery indexes, and the named-collection runs that anchor a generation.
Start here →
Build a research paper
Curate an ordered selection of collection records with your own notes. The example starter paper assembles five Mill Creek records into a working bibliography; fork it or start your own.
Open the example →