Wednesday, November 19, 2014

Ohio Lesbian Archives

Yes, there really is such a thing as lesbian archives. There aren't very many in the United States but one such place is located in Cincinnati, Ohio in of all places, a church basement. It used to be located above a bookstore which is closed now. It recently celebrated its 25th anniversary, so this is a fairly new institution, which is all-volunteer run.

I'm not certain if it fits the strictest definition of an "archives" since they collect both published and unpublished materials as well as some three-dimension objects. The collection looks to be quite diverse, everything from newspapers to magazines to photographs. If you look them up on Facebook (search "Ohio Lesbian Archives") you'll find a photo of some of their materials on display at a special event.

I think the existence of places like this is a positive thing. Archives, and all public history institutions for that matter, tell stories about people. The stories of women and minorities have been ignored by historians for too long and it's only in the last few decades that historians have begun to pay attention. There is still a long way to go but I think there will be more archives in the future devoted to unprivileged groups ignored by traditional history.

Here's a link to their blog, which doesn't look to be updated very regularly: http://ohiolesbianarchives.wordpress.com/

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