Our collections cover many topics within the field of Cleveland history, with special concentrations on the history of the industrial history of Northeast Ohio, Cleveland journalism, and the built environment of the city. We are also home to the Library's collections of rare materials, as well as publications from the University Archives about CSU and its predecessor, Fenn College.

The Akron Railroad Club Archives
The archives consist of minutes of the club, 1943-1981 & 1992-1999, audio tapes of meetings & programs and a binder of membership registration forms.

Arthur & Edith Neiger Memorial Collection

Bain Murray Music Collection
Includes textual and musical works of and relating to composer, critic and teacher, Bain Murray dating approximately from 1939-1992.
~ Finding Aid for the Collection

Bill Roberts Editorial Cartoon Collection

CTS/APTATransit Data Summaries Group

The City Club Forum Tape Collection
The City Club has existed as a prominent Cleveland institution since 1912, serving as a meeting place for the exchange of ideas on public issues of local, national, and international concern. Its most visible educational function is the weekly City Club Forums featuring well-known speakers. Over the years the hundreds of distinguished personalities presented have included politicians, labor and business leaders, scientists, educators, clergy and entertainers.

The collection consists of over eight hundred tapes from 1963 to about 1980.

Clay Herrick Slide Collection
Donated by Clay Herrick, author of Cleveland Landmarks, this collection consists of some 100 pamphlets, brochures, books, and photographs. The most important element is some 6,000 slides; one-of-a-kind shots of various buildings in Cleveland.

Cleveland Local Business Collection
Collected by the Cleveland Chamber of Commerce from about 1940 to 1970.

Cleveland Performance Art Festival Collection
A major collection of material pertaining to the Cleveland Performance Art Festival.
~ PAF Finding Aid

Cleveland Press Collection
Hundreds of thousands of clippings and photographs from the "morgue" of the Cleveland Press, the last of Cleveland's daily afternoon newspapers. The Cleveland Press was published from 1878 until 1982.

Cleveland State University Music Department Performance Tapes
A collection 368 of audio tapes of programs sponsored by the Music Department of Cleveland State University. Performances by faculty, students and performing ensembles, 1965-1980

Cleveland Union Terminal Collection
The Cleveland Union Terminal Collection is the archives of the company that built the Terminal Tower, the union passenger station, the complex of office buildings, post office, department store and the infrastructure of tracks, bridges, signals, electrical catenary structures and yard facility buildings necessary to switch passenger coaches over from steam to electric and bring them in to the downtown area. This was a massive urban redevelopment project that foreshadowed the Rockefeller Center, in New York; gave Cleveland the second-tallest building in the world in 1930; and forever changed the face of Public Square and wide swaths of adjoining neighborhoods.

Contemporary Poetry Collection

Euclid Avenue Baptist Church Collection

Faragher Collection
Approximately 1,000 glass plate negatives and prints from the Faragher Construction Company and the Fairmount Nurseries, two companies in Cleveland in the early part of this century.

Gerald Adams Railroad Photography Collection

Great Lakes Industrial History Collection
The Great Lakes Industrial History Collection provides a resource where the public can gain an appreciation for the efforts and accomplishments of business and industry which led to the opening of the Great Lakes and the industrial development of adjacent regions and where visitors are inspired to continue the pursuit of inventiveness, ingenuity, and excellence.

Greater Cleveland Ethnographic Museum Collection
The Greater Cleveland Ethnographic Museum was created as a way to preserve and transmit elements of traditional life, especially the folk arts, to others in the community. While the museum was open, it captured the traditions of Cleveland residents by recording oral histories, collecting cultural artifacts, recording folk music, photographing traditional festivals and religious rituals, and showcasing their collections in their gallery at the Arcade as well as through traveling exhibits. The collection, itself, is comprised of digital records of several of the museums projects created from the personal collection of Annette B. Fromm, the personal collection of Carole Kantor, the Cleveland Press Collection housed by Cleveland State University Special Collections, and other holdings housed by Cleveland State University.
~ GCEM Finding Aid

Herbert Elwell Collection
Herbert Elwell, composer, critic, and teacher, was an important figure in Cleveland's musical scene. The archive is comprised of the composer's scores, discs, reel-to-reel tapes, manuscripts, articles, program annotations for the Cleveland Orchestra, and assorted letters and memorabilia.

James J. Nance Papers
Personal and professional papers of James J. Nance, local businessman and former chairman of the CSU Board of Trustees.

The Lewis Turco Collection
This collection was donated to Cleveland State University Library by poet, English instructor and CSU Poetry Center founder, Lewis Turco in July, 2004. The majority of the collection constitutes letters addressed to Lewis Turco by poets and writers associated with the Cleveland Poetry Center. Many of Turco's replies to these letters are also included. The letters and replies were written between 1962 and 2004.
~ Finding Aid

The Marquis de Lafayette Collection
A partnership between Cleveland State University and the Maison Française de Cleveland.

Montage Film Collection
A filmed history of the 60's and 70's with a Cleveland perspective.

Mystery Photo Album
A collection of 49 images from an early private photo album, showing scenes along the Cuyahoga River and Ohio Canal.

Naef & Joslin Photography Collection
A series of photographs of the of the bulk material handling equipment and other features at the port of Conneaut in 1900.

Newburgh & South Shore Railroad Collection
Includes hundreds of rolled drawings showing track plans, valuation maps and facilities drawings.

Nickel Plate Railroad Collections
Special Collections holds several collection about the Nickel Plate Railroad, consisting of files, drawings and images of the railroad, especially as it passes through Cleveland.

Northern Ohio Urban Systems (NOUS) Collection
Maps and reports about this major urban plan of the 1970s. NOUS was a major urban planning project developed by a group of leading Cleveland businesses and headed by Mr. Herbert E. Strawbridge, of Higbees Department Store.

Ray Osrin's Editorial Cartoons
Cleveland Plain Dealer Editorial Cartoonist.

Richard Bracy Hicks Memorial Collection

Sacred Landmarks Initiative Archives

Steamer William G. Mather Collection
Operational documents from 1925 to 1984, with over 400 photographs and slides.

Thomas L. Lewis Photographic Collection

Wilbur & Sara Ruth Watson Bridge Book Collection
Over one hundred and seventy-five rare books, some dating from the eighteenth century, and fifteen albums of photographs on historic bridges. The collection is considered one of the best of its kind in the country.

Wheeling & Lake Erie Collection

Dr. William O. & Naomi E. Walker Collection
More than four hundred books are included in this collection of Afro-American literature.