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, specifcally AND/+, NOT/-, and OR operators. 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.
Welcome to the Freedom Archives' Digital Search Engine.The Freedom Archives contains over 12,000 hours of audio and video recordings which date from the late-1960s to the mid-90s and chronicle the progressive history of the Bay Area, the United States, and international movements. We are also in the process of scanning and uploading thousands of historical documents which enrich our media holdings. Our collection includes weekly news, poetry, music programs; in-depth interviews and reports on social and cultural issues; numerous voices from behind prison walls; diverse activists; and pamphlets, journals and other materials from many radical organizations and movements.

Government Repression

This collection contains materials broadly related to government repression. Sub-collections include COINTELPRO - containing both materials on the FBI's program to destroy Left Movements as well as the National Taskforce for COINTELPRO Litigation and Research who led the struggle to expose COINTELPRO attacks on the Black Liberation struggle; Covert Action - a periodical documenting CIA abuses and misdeeds and US military intervention; and Grand Jury - containing materials focused on the use of grand juries as a tool of government repression of Left movements.

Subcollections

  • Cointelpro
    Cointelpro
    This collection contains material on the FBI program COINTELPRO (Counterintelligence Program). This program served to disrupt, destroy and infiltrate many progressive organizations during the 60s-70s in the U.S.
  • Covert Action Information Bulletin
    Covert Action Information Bulletin
    CovertAction Information Bulletin investigates and exposes CIA, FBI, NSA, military operations, and other forms of US imperialist intervention.
  • Grand Jury
    Grand Jury
    This collection contains materials pertaining to the use of grand juries to repress political movements. Resources include historical context, what to do if the FBI shows up and principles of non-collaboration.

Documents

Ward Churchill COINTELPRO 101 Extra Footage Ward Churchill COINTELPRO 101 Extra Footage
Call Number: COI 10 131Format: Video ClipCollection: Cointelpro
Ward Churchill is a prolific American Indian scholar/activist, Ward Churchill is a founding member of the Rainbow Council of Elders, and longtime member of the leadership council of the American Indian Movement of Colorado. In addition to his numerous works on Indigenous history, he has written extensively on U.S. foreign policy and the repression of political dissent, including the FBI’s COINTELPRO operations against the Black Panther Party and the American Indian Movement.