Launching our first Archives Project campaign

Over the past 55 years San Francisco Heritage has collected and created a significant library of maps, photographs, slides, blueprints, city directories, context statements, manuscripts, and field survey material. The need to digitize and share these resources online—the "Archives Project"—has long been recognized.

After recent meetings with other institutions and experts familiar with digitization projects, including David Gallagher, creator of OpenSFHistory and SFMemory, we now believe a phased plan with the Archives Project is the right approach.

Undertaking the work on discreet collections within the archives will allow us to discover the best workflow, build our equipment needs over time, and generate interest and enthusiasm from donors and our community to completely digitize SF Heritage's special material.

What is our first collection?

We have chosen an exciting first initiative: more than 1,000 slide images documenting historic San Francisco architecture in the 1950s and 1960s. For reasons unknown, these slides were shot in an unusual stereoview format. Each slide is set with two transparencies of the same subject, shifted sightly to produce a sense of three-dimensional depth when put in a special viewer.

What do we know about these slides?

The photographer is unidentified so far, but the collection was obviously created to survey historic residential architecture in San Francisco. No addresses are written on the slides, but test scans and browsing through a special stereoviewer reveal mid-20th-century views of both well-known and unfamiliar 19th century homes, along with at least a few modern buildings such as the 1937 Richard Neutra-designed duplex at 2056–2058 Jefferson Street.

Identification will be greatly assisted using crowdsourcing after the slides have been scanned and posted online.

How you can help + project timeline

We are formally launching SF Heritage’s Archives Project by dedicating our Spring Appeal to this collection with a goal of raising $5,000 in April 2026 to scan, catalog, and post these interesting images online.

Both the left and right images of each slide will be scanned, preserving the ability to produce 3-D viewing in other formats, and the originals will be archivally housed.

Assuming we meet our funding goal, work is planned to begin in June 2026 and the project finished later this year. SF Heritage will host a VIP tour of the archives for significant donors to the project as well as a public program on collection highlights later this year.

Donations can be made using this link (You can also mail a check. just notate "Archives Project" and mail to SF Heritage, 2007 Franklin Street, SF, CA 94109). Any amount received over the target goal will be dedicated to the 2027 Archives Project. (To be decided. We have some good ideas and may have you vote to help us choose this fall!)