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.

Search Results

Campanile Action Campanile Action
Date: 5/17/1989Call Number: V 495Format: Hi-8Producers: Lisa RudmanCollection: Videos in many formats – both camera originals as well as reference materials
Bay Area Pledge of Resistance drops banner at Campanile Tower on UC Berkeley's campus. Interviewees seek to draw attention to the UC System's stake in the US intervention in El Salvador, exposing that the ROTC at UC Berkeley helps train the Death Squads in El Salvador.
Coit Tower Action Coit Tower Action
Date: 5/15/1989Call Number: V 496Format: Hi-8Producers: Lisa RudmanCollection: Videos in many formats – both camera originals as well as reference materials
Bay Area Pledge of Resistance occupies Coit Tower and unfurls banner in order to draw attention to the election of the ARENA party in El Salvador, the party which organized the death squads that killed thousands of El Salvadorians. Members of Pledge are carrying out this action to do the work the mass media doesn't in their coverage of El Salvador.
El Salvador Consulate Action El Salvador Consulate Action
Date: 11/16/1990Call Number: V 507Format: Hi-8Producers: Lisa RudmanCollection: Videos in many formats – both camera originals as well as reference materials
Pledge of Resistance leads other organizations including the Bay Area Religious Task Force, Center for International Solidarity with the People of El Salvador, and Trece to occupy the El Salvador Consulate in San Francisco, commemorating the anniversary of the brutal murder of six Jesuit priests and two women. Protesters drop a banner from the consulate's balcony and occupy the front offices, calling for an end to US backed Death Squad violence in El Salvador, the overthrow of the ARENA government, and an end to US intervention in Central America. Several members of the demonstration chain themselves to the desks and chairs in the office, while other protesters demonstrate outside of the consulate.