Search Help

How does this work?
There are many ways to search the collections of the Freedom Archives. Below is a brief guide that will help you conduct effective searches. Note, anytime you search for anything in the Freedom Archives, the first results that appear will be our digitized items. Information for items that have yet to be scanned or yet to be digitized can still be viewed, but only by clicking on the show link that will display the hidden (non-digitized) items. If you are interested in accessing these non-digitized materials, please email info@freedomarchives.org.
Exploring the Collections without the Search Bar
Under the heading Browse By Collection, you’ll notice most of the Freedom Archives’ major collections. These collections have an image as well as a short description of what you’ll find in that collection. Click on that image to instantly explore that specific collection.
Basic Searching
You can always type what you’re looking for into the search bar. Certain searches may generate hundreds of results, so sometimes it will help to use quotation marks to help narrow down your results. For instance, searching for the phrase Black Liberation will generate all of our holdings that contain the words Black and Liberation, while searching for “Black Liberation” (in quotation marks) will only generate our records that have those two words next to each other.
Advanced Searching
The Freedom Archives search site also understands Boolean search logic. Click on this link for a brief tutorial on how to use Boolean search logic. Our search function also understands “fuzzy searches.” Fuzzy searches utilize the (*) and will find matches even when users misspell words or enter in only partial words for the search. For example, searching for liber* will produce results for liberation/liberate/liberates/etc.
Keyword Searches
You’ll notice that under the heading KEYWORDS, there are a number of words, phrases or names that describe content. Sometimes these are also called “tags.” Clicking on these words is essentially the same as conducting a basic search.

Independent Collections

These collections were produced by independent journalists. Many of these recordings make up the bulk of the original collection of the Freedom Archives.

Subcollections

Documents

Claude Mann: Covering the FSM Claude Mann: Covering the FSM
Call Number: CE 693Format: 1/4 7 1/2 ipsProducers: Colin EdwardsCollection: Colin Edwards Free Speech Movement
Claude Mann is a news reporter from Channel 2 in Oakland. Claude recounts his experiences at the FSM protests at Sproul Hall in early October 1964 and then on December 2nd and 3rd 1964. He talks about the atmospheres of those protests, the mood of the students and answers questions about student provocateurs. He details what he saw at the December 2nd and 3rd sit-ins and arrests and comments on whether or not the aisles were blocked, whether or not the police were unnecessarily rough, his feelings on mainstream news coverage of the FSM, the issue of branding the leadership of the FSM as communists and the absence of Black students from the arrests and sit-ins. Mann’s commentary around the press coverage of the events is especially interesting as Colin and him discusses differences between print and tv journalists and their coverage, limitations of coverage and the attitude of reporters towards the FSM.