FSU Facilities Records & Archive
FSU Facilities maintains its own archives, which contains campus aerial photographs, construction documents, campus maps, surveys, reports, and building key plans. More information about accessing these records is available at the above link.
"Bygone Architecture: FSU's Demolished Campus Buildings"
This StoryMap created by Ricah Marquez in FSU's Facilities Archives contains photographs, geolocations, and historical information on FSU's demolished buildings.
The virtual companion to the FSU campus Legacy Walk provides an online historic tour of the FSU campus, focusing on the university's history, architecture, artworks, and green spaces. A brief history and photographs are included of each location.
Exploring FSU's Past: A Public History Project
A website created by students in Dr. Jennifer Koslow's Introduction to Public History class in fall 2006. It includes a timeline of university history, brief histories on campus monuments and memorials, and walking tours on subjects from FSU Sporting Venues to Campus During World War II.
Living on Campus: Residence Halls at Florida State University Past and Present
A website created by graduate students in the Historical Administration and Public History Program in the 2019-2020 academic yea,r directed by Dr. Jennifer Koslow. The site traces the history of residence halls on FSU's campus. It includes collection items from the Heritage & University Archives organized into sets by building.
Florida State University Vertical Files Collection (HUA 2017-014)
The FSU Vertical Files Collection contains newspaper clippings, official records, meeting minutes, reports, correspondence, programs, brochures, flyers, schedules and calendars of events, and other memorabilia and ephemera. These materials were collected by Special Collections & Archives staff to house information about FSU's colleges, departments, organizations, buildings, athletics teams, and notable people in one easily accessible collection. It is a useful starting point for research on FSU subjects, building history, and faculty, staff, and alumni biographies.
University Communications Collection (HUA 2016-009)
The University Communications Collection contains vertical files, photographs, and audiovisual material from FSU's University Communications. The vertical files include press releases, news clippings, promotional material, and correspondence. Biographical information on faculty, staff, and alumni as well as building history are located in Series 2, Vertical Files. Series 3 contains photographs that also document notable people and places at FSU.
FSU Historical Photograph Collection (HUA 2016-003)
The FSU Historical Photograph Collection documents the history of the university in photographs from as early as the days of the West Florida Seminary. Series 2 contains photos of buildings and places on campus, Series 3 contains photos of faculty and administrators, and Series 4 contains photos of university presidents. Photographs of people and places are also included in Series 5, Negatives.
Florida Flambeau/FSView Photograph Collection (MSS 2006-012)
The Florida Flambeau/FSView Photograph Collection contains over 12,000 photographs created or collected by the FSView and Florida Flambeau staff members for use in the newspapers. Series 1 contains photos of faculty, staff, and administrators while Series 2 documents buildings and facilities on campus.
Reichelt Oral History Collection (HUA 2015-00R)
The Reichelt Oral History Collection contains sound recordings, transcripts, and administrative files documenting the activities of the oral history program in the FSU Department of History. Series 6: Florida State University Histories contains interviews with students, professors, staff, and former university presidents on FSU and Florida State College for Women (FSCW) topics, including the transition from FSCW to FSU, development of departments and curriculum, athletic programs, integration, student groups, campus life, Greek organizations, Odd/Even traditions the Tallahassee Branch of University of Florida, war years on campus, protests on campus, and FSU Panama City branch.
FSU Heritage & University Archives holds the papers of numerous former professors and administrators at FSU and its predecessor institutions. A selection of these collections can be browsed using the link above.
Digital Heritage & University Archives FSU Photograph Collection
The FSU Photograph Collection, part of the Digital Library, contains photos of people and places related to FSU and its history. The collection is searchable at the link above. For more information about searching this collection, see the Photographic Collections page of this LibGuide.
Faculty, staff, and alumni directories
Faculty, staff, and alumni directories are useful for researching notable individuals in FSU's history. In addition to the catalog, directories are located in multiple archival collections. Florida State University Publications (SCA 2023-002) contains directories dating from 1949-1994. Campus Directories (2019-055) contains volumes from 1938-1987. Florida State College for Women Faculty/Staff/Student Directories (UA 2006-019) contains volumes dating from 1941-1945.
Yearbooks are an excellent source for researching student life and the activities of students during their time at FSU. All of our yearbooks are digitized and available for full-text searching in our Digital Library (linked above). They are also available to browse in person in our Strozier Reading Room.
The first student newspaper, the Florida Flambeau, was founded in 1915 when FSU was known as the Florida State College for Women. The Flambeau combined with the rival newspaper, the FSView, in 1998, and was thereafter known as the FSView & Florida Flambeau. These newspapers are invaluable sources for events on campus and are available for full-text searching in our Digital Library. To search the Flambeau, use the advanced search feature. Select "Identifier" from the drop down box and enter "fsu_flambeau." Then create a second search field and enter your search terms.
Though they are not indisputable evidence of someone's graduation, commencement programs are important sources for helping to determine the date of someone's graduation. All programs in our holdings are available in the Digital Library at the link above.
Media guides are an essential source when researching an athlete or the history of athletics at FSU. The guides in our holdings for all sports are available at the link above.
Postcards in our holdings illustrate FSU buildings and Tallahassee locations throughout various eras and often in color. Though these are scattered throughout our holdings, the link above collects all of our digitized postcards in one location within the Digital Library.
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