About Research Collections
The Archives and Special Collections holdings include a wide range of materials—from manuscripts (e.g. faculty papers, division records, Caltech presidential records) and photographs to audiovisual materials, books, fine art, and artifacts.
While the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) was founded by Caltech researchers in 1936, the Archives and Special Collections is not the official repository of JPL's archival material. For information on JPL's collections, see the JPL Archives.
- Additional ways to access our collections
- Online Archive of California: Collection guides from throughout California
- ArchiveGrid: Finding aid index from over 1,400 institutions
- Consortium for History of Science, Technology and Medicine: Member institution catalog
- JSTOR: Digital collections
- Calisphere: Digital collections from throughout California
Digital Public Library of America: Digital collections from across the United States - Internet Archive: Digitized audio and video from archival collections sponsored by California Revealed
- YouTube: Digitized film reels from archival collections, including Theodore von Kármán
Collection Guides
Search the archives catalog of collection guides, inventories, and finding aids that describe the faculty papers, institutional records, photographs, artifacts, and audiovisual material available for research.
Digital Collections
Browse digitized collections online. Collections include the Caltech Images Collection, an assortment of over 10,000 photographs, negatives, and drawings from various Caltech Archives collections. Also available are the nearly complete manuscript collections of Donald A. Glaser, George Ellery Hale, and Paul MacCready.
Oral Histories
Access the transcripts of over 200 interviews of members of the Caltech community. A portion of physical copies of oral histories can only be viewed in the Archives reading room and are non-circulating. For additional interviews, see the Caltech Heritage Project.
Campus Publications
Browse titles published by and for the campus community, including course catalogs, student newspapers, and Big T yearbooks. The printed editions of the publications can be viewed in the Archives reading room.
Books
Use LibSearch to discover the collection of rare books and contemporary books related to the history of science and technology at Caltech. Books and all other materials from the Archives and Special Collections are non-circulating.
Web Archive
Access websites created by Caltech, its faculty, and students through the Internet Archive’s Archive-It. The Archives began regularly capturing Caltech’s web presence in 2017.