Donating personal papers

The Mass Observation Archive welcomes enquiries about donating personal paper collections. Over the years, many people have donated small collections to the Archive and we have been very pleased to accept collections produced by people in accordance with the traditions of Mass Observation.

We place an emphasis on personal writing and collections in contrast to printed or published material which is usually available in other libraries and archives. We also prefer unedited material written at the time, and not re-written later.  The kinds of material we would consider includes:

• Personal diaries
• Personal letters
• Annotated scrapbooks
• Photograph albums

Since the Archive was established at Sussex we have accepted material from all over the UK created between 1900 to the present day. To ensure an appropriate balance of material in the Archive, we now review our acquisitions policy on an annual basis. For more information about our current policy please get in touch.

Collections policy

Mass Observation Archive Collections Policy