Photo Collection Info

MOHAI’s library, archive and collections will close to the public on Friday, April 20, 2012 in preparation for their move to a new home at the Georgetown Resource Center. As a result, requests for image prints will be temporarily on hold, starting on Monday, April 9, 2012. The photo collection will resume full operations in early June. Stay tuned for more details.

The Museum of History & Industry has a collection of more than 3 million photographs! Our collection spans the history of photography, from delicately rendered nineteenth-century daguerreotypes to digital images created yesterday. The geographic scope is strongly centered on Seattle and King County, with some coverage of Washington State and Alaska. Many of these pictures are original negatives from the files of newspapers or from commercial photography studios, providing in-depth coverage with multiple images of the same subjects.

Several thousand of these photographs are available online; to learn more or to view collections in person, please make an appointment with the library by emailing library@seattlehistory.org or call (206) 324-1126.

Sami people on reindeer drive, Seattle, 1898