Grant-funded digital collection now available

The Amplifying Black Voices in Iowa Digital Collection is now available online for research. The digital collection is a collaborative project of eight libraries, archives, and museums across Iowa: the African American Museum of Iowa, Des Moines Public Library, Fort Des Moines Museum and Education Center, Grinnell College Libraries, Grout Museum District, Iowa State University Library, Nodaway Valley Historical Museum, and State Historical Society of Iowa. The digital collection provides unified access to selected materials from each of the contributing repositories that elevate the histories, shared experiences, and achievements of Black communities throughout the state of Iowa.  

The materials selected for the collection include newspapers, printed material, oral histories, video and audio recordings, photographs, personal papers, and artifacts representing the varied experiences of Black Iowans in their professional and personal lives. Priority was given to first-person accounts and materials authored or created by Black voices.The materials were created between the 1890s and 2020. 

Black newspapers, particularly The Iowa Bystander (1922-1972) and New Iowa Bystander (1973-1980), comprise a significant portion of the collection. Early issues of the Iowa State Bystander (1894-1916), which have already been made available online via the Library of Congress’s Chronicling America initiative, are included with richer metadata. The Iowa Bystander is one of the oldest Black newspapers west of the Mississippi. This project brings together the digitized versions of this significant title through much of the 20th century. 

Other archival materials include two volumes of The Sepia Record; material about the United Grand Hall Lodge of Iowa (PHA); publications documenting Black businesses in Iowa; publications of the NAACP; information and photographs related to Black officers at Fort Des Moines; protest posters from Waterloo from 2020; recordings and related documents from the 1985 documentary Black Des Moines: Voices Seldom Heard; written transcriptions of interviews of former residents of Buxton, Iowa; photographs from Page County; materials from Black churches; and various oral histories, among other items.  

The digital collection allows users to browse collections items, search across collections, and view the digitized materials. Users can also interact with the collection using timeline and map features.  

The collection will be of interest to students, researchers, genealogists, and any member of the public interested in learning more about the history of Black Iowans.

The project was supported by a Digitizing Hidden Collections grant from the Council on Library and Information Resources (CLIR). The grant program is made possible by funding from the Mellon Foundation.