Discovering Archival Collections at Stanford

Imagine being a student researcher looking for archival materials, often “the first draft of history,” but not knowing where to start. General information about titles and contents is available in online catalogues, while finding aids located elsewhere offer more details about the origins and organization of a collection. Neither are fully inclusive or descriptive of the information and visuals needed to conduct research. Stanford University Libraries looked to address this quandary by developing a software tool to help researchers and scholars find primary source materials.

ArcLight, open-source software supporting display and searching of encoded archival descriptions and finding aids, effects a breakthrough in discovery by helping researchers find and explore primary source materials more easily and efficiently. The application was conceived at Stanford and developed in long-term collaboration with other research institutions to improve archival visibility and access.

Archival Collections at Stanford, a new instance of ArcLight launched by a team of technical and subject specialists, is Stanford University Libraries' first comprehensive, local discovery service for finding aids. On the website, researchers can sort through Stanford’s growing detailed inventory of its archival collections, currently listed at 6,182. A search for archival collections related to such topics as civil rights and agriculture brings up 232 and 207 respectively. Users can then dig deeper into those collections to identify and examine items relevant to their study.

ArcLight

“We selected ArcLight as the Libraries’ case study for the Simplify Work at Stanford initiative launched in 2024,” said Michael A. Keller, the Ida M. Green University Librarian. “ArcLight connects researchers to resources more efficiently, so that they spend less time looking for archival materials, and more time looking at them. Its interactive features will enhance dialogue among students, faculty, and the librarians who can now more readily assist them,” Keller stated.

Originating at Stanford University Libraries and ten years in the making with other partner development organizations, ArcLight is gaining vast implementation at the university libraries of Princeton, Duke, Columbia, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, University of Michigan, Indiana University, and University at Albany, SUNY, and at state aggregators Connecticut Archives Online and the Empire Archival Discovery Cooperative. Adoption is also underway at Harvard.

Unlike books and periodicals, which are cataloged by title and issue, archival materials are typically measured in linear feet and inventoried in “finding aids” to the boxes, sometimes hundreds of boxes, in which they are contained. ArcLight streamlines the discovery process by placing finding aids into online catalogues, making them both searchable and visible in a single location often used and well-known by student researchers and scholars worldwide.

“We conceived and built ArcLight to meet two distinct needs. It gives expert archival researchers and historians a powerful discovery tool with all the affordances they expect and require; it also provides all the functions of a modern digital interface, with full text search, browse, and viewing digitized components without ever leaving the finding aid,” said Tom Cramer, Chief Technology Strategist, Associate University Librarian and Director for Digital Library Systems and Services. 

Before ArcLight, finding aids were not included in online catalogues, such as Stanford University Libraries’ SearchWorks, but in separately discoverable listings, such as those found in the Online Archive of California (OAC), a statewide aggregator of finding aids for archival collections. Thus, Stanford’s finding aids and the very existence of archives were effectively hidden from many users who were unaware of the Online Archive of California. In a major development over the summer of 2025, OAC adopted ArcLight as its new software platform, noting “...[ArcLight] stands as the most viable, tested, and durable replacement to the OAC’s current XTF system."

Archival Collections at Stanford

Stanford University Libraries’ recent rollout of Archival Collections at Stanford is a major milestone in the development of ArcLight. While the software has been ready for a while, the team underwent an intensive and deliberate process to ready the finding aid data and integrate the Archival Collections website into the Libraries’ current digital environment.

“Archival Collections at Stanford enables greater discovery and visibility of special collections through its integration with SearchWorks and digital object display in finding aids,” said Digital Library Services Manager Dinah Handel. “Now, we both maintain inclusion in the aggregate of California collections, as well as showcase our special collections via our internally managed tool that is responsive to library needs.”

The process is even more simplified now with the OAC’s adoption of ArcLight. From either website, researchers can submit requests for digitization or for in-person examination of materials in the Field Reading Room in Cecil H. Green Library, the Archive of Recorded Sound in the Music Library, the East Asia Library, and the Cubberley Education Library.

Audiovisual and born-digital materials can be presented within the context of the same finding aid. Examples can be seen in the Reese Erlich Jazz Programs and Interviews Collection, 1994-2017 and the Taube Archive of the International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg, 1945‑46, the complete, authoritative digital copy of the archive of the Nuremberg Trials hosted at Stanford University Libraries at the request of the International Court of Justice.

Archival Collections at Stanford allows visiting scholars to view digitized materials before arriving to conduct hands-on study and provides remote access to student researchers around the world. Stanford’s primary source materials are truly at their fingertips. Furthermore, ArcLight through its widespread adoption will simplify the research process both at Stanford and at Stanford University Libraries’ peer and partner institutions in the hope that innovations in library technology will enable greater discoveries and solutions.