Digital Initiatives

Digital Collections

Through extensive collaboration with internal and external partners, the digital collections team seeks to create collections of born digital and retrospectively digitized materials unique to the Central Florida community. We invite you to explore our collections by clicking on the titles below.

Central Florida Memory

Central Florida Memory is a unique digital collection of material contributed by partner institutions to create a virtual place where visitors can discover what Central Florida was like before theme parks and the space program. Diaries and letters describe the region and how people survived day-by-day in this extreme and rugged environment. Maps, photographs, and postcards illustrate how the region looked in the early years and how it changed over time. Voters’ registration and funeral records and city directories provide demographic information that makes the picture of the Central Florida settler come into focus.

The Carey Hand Funeral Home Records

The University of Central Florida Special Collections holds the Funeral Home Records from 1891-1955. The records are used extensively for genealogical and historical research on Central Florida. The collection includes Undertaker’s Memoranda, Funeral Registers, Cremation Records, records for the Palm and Greenwood Cemeteries, as well as other materials relating to the generations of the Orlando mortuary business. The Undertaker’s Memoranda and Funeral Registers have been digitized and are available for users on Central Florida Memory. Enhanced metadata allows users to search the collection by name, gender, race, date of death, cause of death, parents’ names, and burial place.

Dick Pope Sr. Institute for Tourism Studies

This digital collection contains selected materials from the Dick Pope Sr. Institute for Tourism Studies. Publications for digitization were drawn from the Institute’s extensive collection of research for clients worldwide, covering an array of topics such as marketing, regional planning, event planning, and economic impact on a region.

Florida Heritage

The Florida Heritage Collection is an ongoing cooperative project of the State University Libraries (SULs) of Florida to digitize and provide online access to materials broadly representing Florida’s history, culture, arts, literature, sciences and social sciences. Contributions by the University of Central Florida Libraries represent more than 42,000 images. Information regarding image capture, conversion, cataloging, and metadata can be found on the Florida Heritage Collection Technical Aspects page.

Florida Historical Quarterly

The Florida Historical Quarterly, the academic journal of the Florida Historical Society, promotes scholarly research and appreciation for the peoples, places, themes, and diversity of Florida’s past. The Society is the oldest cultural institution in the state, tracing its origins to 1856. The Quarterly has served to expand understanding of Florida’s historical development and offers a broad spectrum of articles. Published four times annually, the Quarterly continues the tradition of high quality scholarly articles established and maintained by the Society. Browse the Florida Historical Quarterly Collection

Institute for Simulation and Training

Over 200 digitized IST documents are available electronically as PDF documents. The hard copies are housed in the collection at the John C. Hitt Library. Publications for digitization were drawn from the Institute for Simulation and Training‘s extensive collection of research related to modeling and simulation science. This unique compendium is supported in part by generous annual donations from G. Vincent Amico.

Special Collections

This digital collection contains a selection of materials from the UCF Libraries Special Collections. The Special Collections include manuscripts, books, art, and exhibits.

African American Legacy – The Carol Mundy Collection

This digital collection contains a selection of materials from the thousands of items relating to African American history in the African American Legacy – The Carol Mundy Collection, 1720-2010 housed at the John C. Hitt Library. The physical collection includes books, manuscripts, sheet music, pamphlets, journals, newspapers, broadsides, posters, photographs and rare ephemera which all speak to the black experience. While the collection is comprehensive both nationally and internationally, the collection does contain materials that relates to local African American history.

Civil War

The Civil War digital collection hosts materials made available to the Civil War in the American South. In recognition of the sesquicentennial of the start of the American Civil War, Civil War in the American South provides a central portal to access digital collections from the Civil War Era (1850-1865) held by members of the Association of Southeastern Research Libraries (ASERL). Civil War in the American South is a collaborative initiative to provide a single, shared point of access to the Civil War digital collections held at many individual libraries.

Digital Library of the Caribbean

The Digital Library of the Caribbean (dLOC) is a cooperative digital library for resources from and about the Caribbean and circum-Caribbean. dLOC provides access to digitized versions of Caribbean cultural, historical and research materials currently held in archives, libraries, and private collections. The University of Central Florida (UCF) Libraries contributes materials to the Digital Library of the Caribbean from our Special Collections. Many of the materials are from the William J. Bryant West Indies Collection (including ephemera, audio, artifacts, slides, and an artwork exhibit) which are listed on our finding aids. Subscribe to the RSS feed for the University of Central Florida’s newest items in dLOC.

Harrison “Buzz” Price Papers

This digital collection contains selected materials from the Harrison Buzz Price Papers. The reports in digital format are a small percentage of the collection, selected for their research use by the faculty of the Rosen College of Hospitality Management. The entire collection of the Harrison Price Papers contains hundreds of research reports, proposals, speeches, and collected research materials on a variety of projects he conducted between 1955 and 2003.

PRISM: Political & Rights Issues & Social Movements

PRISM: Political & Rights Issues & Social Movements, a collaborative digitization project of the libraries and special collections departments of Florida Atlantic University (FAU), and the University of Central Florida (UCF), is comprised of materials focusing on a wide range of political and rights issues and social movements including topics such as socialism and communism, class struggle, Marxist economics, religion, world pacifism, anti-racism, anti-Semitism, civil rights, women’s rights, workers’ rights, world labor movements, world economics, capitalism, the demise of colonialism, Cuban politics, the “ban-the-bomb” movement, war efforts, the Vietnam War, and the United Nations. Spanning from the mid 19th century to the late 20th century, the pamphlets and monographs provide insight into the prevailing leftist and liberal views of the times from countries all around the world; from the United States to Korea and India to Canada.

Special Collections Finding Aids

This database contains guides to over 120 physical collections that are housed in University of Central Florida Libraries Special Collections & University Archives department. Each collection has a unique finding aid which includes detailed descriptions of the collection and an outline of its content.

Theses and Dissertations

This collection includes Honors in the Major (undergraduate) Theses, Masters Theses, and Doctoral Dissertations, and other similar projects completed at UCF. Records for print-only, retrospectively scanned, and electronic works are included—digital copies are included where available.

If your thesis or dissertation is one of the print-only works, you can help us make it available online for use by researchers around the world. If you would like to grant permission to the Library to digitize your work, fill out and follow the instructions on the distribution consent form.

UCF Community Veterans History Project

As part of RICHES of Central Florida, UCF intends to record, archive, and make accessible oral history interviews of Central Florida veterans. Diversity is a main focus for this project since there are many different subgroups under the group veterans, all with important stories. While the histories will be largely archived and made available through the UCF library, a portion will be contributed to the ongoing Veterans History Project based out of the Library of Congress.

University Archives

The University Archives, housed with the Special Collections, holds publications, records, photographs and other materials on the University of Central Florida, formerly Florida Technological University from its beginnings in 1963 to the current day. Materials are selected, preserved, and made accessible for their enduring historical and administrative value to the University. These records may be paper-based, or in other formats such as photographs, audio, or film; they are appraised for their content.

Central Florida Future

Semi-weekly student newspaper of the University of Central Florida (UCF). It started in 1968 upon the opening of Florida Technological University (FTU), UCF’s predecessor, and ceased publication in August 2016. Initially it was called “FuTUre” and published weekly. The words “Central Florida” were added around the time the school changed to UCF. It is available in microfilm (1968-1986, library call number LD1772.F9 A1438), online (September 2001-August 2016, at http://www.centralfloridafuture.com) and in University Archives (1968-August 2016).

Pegasus Yearbooks

The Pegasus 1970 yearbook was the first volume of its short run of seven, ending in 1982. A Silver Anniversary (25th) edition named The Knight was published in 1989 by UCF’s Student Government Association. Of special note is Pegasus 1971 which includes unique cover art, interesting staff photos, and a signed, limited edition print in every volume. There is also playful photography in the junior class portraits of Pegasus 1981.

UCF Catalogs

Originally the Bulletin, the undergraduate catalog for Florida Technological University was printed each year, occasionally with supplements to reflect changes in curriculum or class offerings. For the academic year 1982-83, the first volume of the Graduate Catalog was printed and continues to be produced alongside the undergraduate version.

University Photograph Collection

Collection contains photographs that were taken for use as publicity material for the University of Central Florida. The images document all aspects of university life including annual events such as commencement and homecoming, special events, portraits of faculty, students, alumni, and visitors to the university including speakers, performers and government officials. Buildings on both the main campus and regional campuses are shown during construction and after completion. Instructors are shown teaching and researching and students are shown studying in laboratories and classrooms. A guide to the physical collection is available at University Photographs, 1965-2006.