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

Marion Prison and Inmate Interviews Marion Prison and Inmate Interviews
Call Number: V 637Format: DV CamCollection: Videos in many formats – both camera originals as well as reference materials
Excerpts of Inside USP Marion, features interview with political prisoner Sekou Odinga.
Interview with Sekou Odinga Interview with Sekou Odinga
Collection: Committee to End the Marion Lockdown
Black Liberation Army freedom fighter Sekou Odinga speaks on the politics behind his imprisonment at the Marion Lockdown.
The History of Marion Prison The History of Marion Prison
Publisher: Freedom ArchivesCollection: Committee to End the Marion Lockdown
This video, created by the Committee to End the Marion Lockdown in 1988, serves to provide historical context around the opening of Marion Prison in 1963.
G is Free G is Free
Publisher: Freedom ArchivesCollection: Geronimo Pratt
Approximately 10 separate news blitzes/interviews about Geronimo Pratt
Marilyn Buck introduces Wild Poppies Marilyn Buck introduces Wild Poppies
Format: mp3Producers: Freedom ArchivesCollection: Materials Recorded and Gathered for "Wild Poppies"
Bonus track from "Wild Poppies". Marilyn's greetings to CD listeners, phoned in to the CD release parties, with photos of Marilyn, other contributors and political prisoners.
Akinyele Umoja COINTELPRO 101 Extra Footage Akinyele Umoja COINTELPRO 101 Extra Footage
Call Number: C 10 136Collection: COINTELPRO 101 Raw Materials
Educator and activist - worked with the New Afrikan Independence Movement and founding member of New Afrikan Peoples Organization and the Malcolm X Grassroots Movement.
Muhammad Ahmad COINTELPRO 101 Extra Footage Muhammad Ahmad COINTELPRO 101 Extra Footage
Call Number: C 10 135Collection: COINTELPRO 101 Raw Materials
Muhammad Ahmad (formerly Max Stanford Jr.) was a pivotal figure within the Black Liberation Movement and struggle for Black Power in the 1960s and 70s; notably, he was the national field chairman of the Revolutionary Action Movement (RAM) and a direct target of J. Edgar Hoover's COINTELPRO. He is a professor at Temple University.
Priscilla Falcon COINTELPRO 101 Extra Footage Priscilla Falcon COINTELPRO 101 Extra Footage
Call Number: C 10 134Collection: COINTELPRO 101 Raw Materials
Priscilla Falcon is a Chicana activist and professor of Hispanic studies at the University of Northern Colorado. She is the widow of Chicano activist Ricardo Falcon, who was killed in a racially motivated altercation with a gas station attendant in Oro Grande, N.M. in 1972 en route to the La Raza Unida convention in El Paso. She is a lifelong activist for Chican@ and Mexican@ rights.
Ricardo Romero COINTELPRO 101 Extra Footage Ricardo Romero COINTELPRO 101 Extra Footage
Call Number: C 10 133Collection: COINTELPRO 101 Raw Materials
Ricardo Romero is a Chicano activist for immigrants rights who, in 1981, refused to testify before a Grand Jury, along with other activists, to provide information on the activities of political activist organizations. He is a lifelong activist for Chican@-Mexican@ liberation.
Roxanne Dunbar Ortiz COINTELPRO 101 Extra Footage Roxanne Dunbar Ortiz COINTELPRO 101 Extra Footage
Call Number: C 10 132Collection: COINTELPRO 101 Raw Materials
Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz grew up in rural Oklahoma, daughter of a landless farmer and half-Indian mother. Her paternal grandfather, a white settler, farmer, and veterinarian, had been a labor activist and Socialist in Oklahoma with the Industrial Workers of the World in the first two decades of the twentieth century. The stories of her grandfather inspired her to lifelong social justice activism. From 1967 to 1972, she was a full time activist living in various parts of the United States, traveling to Europe, Mexico, and Cuba. In 1974, she became active in the American Indian Movement (AIM) and the International Indian Treaty Council, beginning a lifelong commitment to international human rights.