Welcome

Welcome to the Historic Footage Project blog.

An alternate title for this blog would be: A Guide to the Motion Pictures Held Within the U.S. National Archives. This blog is designed to assist writers, researchers, historians, film and video makers, content producers, genealogists, and any others who may be interested, in locating the historically rich, celluloid-based, moving images preserved in the motion picture film holdings of the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA). These historic films are considered official records of the United States Government and are part of one of the world’s largest motion picture archives, with a treasure trove of over 360,000 reels. Approximately 95 percent of the films described in this guide are in the safekeeping of the Motion Picture, Sound, and Video Branch of the Special Media Archives Services Division, located at Archives II in College Park, Maryland. The rest are housed in the National Archive’s Presidential Libraries located around the country. These motion pictures are predominately documentary type films; but educational, informational, instructional, and newsreel categories also make up portions of the collection. There are a few theatrical titles too.

During the coming weeks, months (and hopefully) years, I hope to share with you what I've discovered over the last 20 or so years sleuthing around NARA for historical documentary films. I intend to relate some NARA history and how they got into the motion picture collection business, provide some specific examples of films and where they are buried within the film vault, and answer your questions to the best of my ability.

Please feel free to visit my website, www.pwstewart.com.
Til next time.
Phil