American Archives Month: 31 Ideas for Libraries and Historical Societies
October is American Archives Month, a time to celebrate the collections, stories and people who help preserve American history.
For libraries, historical societies, museums and community archives, it's also a chance to introduce more people to the remarkable material in their care, invite new contributions and encourage communities to take an active role in preserving their heritage.
But planning a month of activities can be a challenge, especially for smaller organizations working with limited budgets, small teams or volunteers.
The good news?
You don't need a major exhibition, a packed events program or a big marketing budget to make the month meaningful. Sometimes all it takes is an unidentified photograph, an interesting document or a question that encourages someone to share a memory.
That's why we've put together 31 practical ideas, one for every day of October. From sharing hidden treasures and engaging younger audiences to collecting oral histories and documenting the present, they're designed to bring your collections to life and invite your community to become part of the story.
Choose a handful that work for you, follow the calendar through October or use the ideas as inspiration all year round.
What is American Archives Month?
American Archives Month is an annual celebration held every October to raise awareness of archives, the work of archivists and the collections they preserve. Since 2006, the Society of American Archivists (SAA) has used the month to encourage organizations across the United States to make their collections more visible and connect with their communities.
For local libraries and historical societies, it's an opportunity to reach people who might never have visited an archive, and to show that local history belongs to the whole community. SAA also provides American Archives Month resources to help organizations take part.
31 Ideas for Libraries and Historical Societies
Free download: the 31 Days of Archives calendar
Get every idea on a printable two-page A4 calendar, with a box to tick off each day and the key national dates highlighted. Pin it up in the office or share it with your volunteers.
How to use this calendar
Pick a few, not all 31. Few small organizations will do every idea. Choose a handful and do them well.
Print the calendar. Download the free calendar, pin it somewhere your team will see it, and tick off each idea as you go.
Look for the fixed dates. A few ideas tie to national events: Electronic Records Day on October 1, #AskAnArchivist Day on October 14 and Halloween on October 31. Everything else can move.
Schedule your posts in advance. Batch-write a week of social posts at a time and let a scheduling tool do the rest.
Use the hashtags. Tag posts with #ArchivesMonth, and #AskAnArchivist on October 14, so your posts join the national conversation.
Ask for something back. The best Archives Month activity doesn't just show your collection. It invites people to add to it.
Week 1: Open the doors (October 1 to 7)
1Week 1 · October 1 to 7
Open the doors
Get your month started and show people what happens behind the scenes.
- Oct 1Check your digital files
- Oct 2Announce your month
- Oct 3Show the backroom
- Oct 4Meet the people
- Oct 5One object, one story
- Oct 6Then and now
- Oct 7Launch a mystery photo
October 1: Check on your digital files
In 2026, Electronic Records Day is on October 1, which makes it a fitting start to the month. Use it to ask a simple question: where do your digital photos and scans actually live? If the answer is a volunteer's laptop, a USB stick or a Facebook group, make a note. The Council of State Archivists is also hosting a free webinar that afternoon on how AI is showing up in Government archives.
October 2: Announce your month
Tell people what you're doing. A short post, newsletter item or library display saying "October is American Archives Month, and here's how you can get involved" sets expectations and gives you something to point back to. SAA offers a free downloadable graphic you can use.
October 3: Show the backroom
People love to see what's normally hidden. Share a photo of your storage shelves, your scanning setup or the box of donations still waiting to be sorted. It's honest, it's relatable, and it quietly shows how much work goes on behind the scenes.
October 4: Meet the people
Introduce the staff and volunteers who look after your collection. A photo and two sentences on what they do and their favorite item is enough. Our guide to working with heritage volunteers has more ideas for recognizing their work.
October 5: One object, one story
Pick a single item, such as a letter, a ticket stub or a school photo, and tell the story behind it. Who made it? Why was it kept? What does it tell us about your town? Stories travel further than catalog records. See why every collection has stories worth telling.
October 6: Then and now
Find an old photograph of a local street, building or view. Stand in the same spot today and take a matching picture. Posting the two side by side is one of the most reliable ways to get a community talking and commenting.
October 7: Launch a mystery photo series
Choose one photograph with unidentified people in it and ask your community for help. Repeat it every week. You'll be surprised how often faces are recognized! Read more on identifying people in historical photographs.
Week 2: Invite people in (October 8 to 14)
2Week 2 · October 8 to 14
Invite people in
Bring your community in to share, transcribe, record and ask questions.
- Oct 8Family history drop-in
- Oct 9Transcription challenge
- Oct 10Record an oral history
- Oct 11Community scanning day
- Oct 12Share your most underrated item
- Oct 13Collect questions
- Oct 14#AskAnArchivist Day
October 8: Host a family history drop-in
October is widely celebrated as Family History Month too, so the two fit together naturally. Offer an afternoon where residents can bring names, dates and questions. Even if you can't answer everything, showing people where to look builds lasting goodwill.
October 9: Set a transcription challenge
Share one page of a handwritten diary, letter or minute book and ask volunteers to transcribe it. It's a great way to test the waters for remote volunteering. Once transcribed, the text becomes searchable, so the page can be found by anyone looking for those names.
October 10: Record one oral history
Ask a long-standing resident to talk for ten minutes about a place, a job or a local event they remember. A phone is all you need. Our guide to capturing oral histories in your community walks you through five easy approaches.
October 11: Run a community scanning day
Invite people to bring in their own photographs to be scanned and returned the same day. You grow your collection, they go home with digital copies, and everyone understands a little more about why preservation matters. Make sure you have a simple consent form ready.
October 12: Share your most underrated item
Choose a photograph, document or object that rarely gets attention and explain why it deserves a closer look. Then invite your community to share their own overlooked treasures. If you'd like a national audience too, SAA's theme for #AskAnArchivist Day 2026 is the most underrated item in your collection, with submissions accepted until October 12.
October 13: Collect questions
Warm up for tomorrow by asking your followers what they've always wanted to know about your archive. How do you decide what to keep? What's the oldest thing you have? What should I do with my grandmother's photos? Save the answers for October 14.
October 14: Take part in #AskAnArchivist Day
This is the big national moment of the month. Answer the questions you collected, invite new ones, and tag everything #AskAnArchivist. You don't need a professional archivist on staff. Anyone who cares for your collection can answer with honesty and enthusiasm.
Week 3: Show what's possible (October 15 to 21)
3Week 3 · October 15 to 21
Show what’s possible
Show people how to use your collection, and where they can help.
- Oct 15Demonstrate a search
- Oct 16Name the gaps
- Oct 17History for young people
- Oct 18Mark a local anniversary
- Oct 19Pitch local media
- Oct 20Partner with a neighbor
- Oct 21Turn a photo into a design
October 15: Demonstrate a search
Pick a common local surname or street name and show, step by step, how someone could find it in your collection. If the honest answer is "they'd have to ask us", that's useful to know. Try our 10 questions to test how searchable your archive is.
October 16: Name the gaps
Every collection has holes. Maybe you have plenty on the 1920s but almost nothing from the 1990s, or lots of civic records and very few everyday family photos. Share a short "what we're missing" list and ask people to help fill it. Our guide to what to digitize first can help you prioritize.
October 17: Bring history to young people
Run a weekend story time, craft session or scavenger hunt using copies of archive photos. Children who see their own street in a 100-year-old picture often go home and ask their grandparents questions, which is exactly the conversation you want to start.
October 18: Mark a local anniversary
Look for something that happened in your town on or around this date: a building opening, a flood, a parade or a first day of school. "On this day" posts are quick to produce and remind people that local history happened to people like them.
October 19: Pitch a story to local media
Local newspapers, radio stations and community newsletters are always looking for stories. A surprising photo, a mystery you're trying to solve or a call for contributions all make good pitches. SAA's American Archives Month page includes tips on what makes a story newsworthy.
October 20: Partner with a neighbor
Team up with a school, church, business or another heritage group for a joint post or small event. Partnerships double your audience and often uncover records sitting in someone else's filing cabinet.
October 21: Turn a photo into something new
Use an archive image to create a poster, postcard, bookmark or social graphic. Design tools make this quick, and YourArchive's Canva integration lets organizations send archive content straight into Canva to design with.
Week 4: Build something that lasts (October 22 to 31)
4Week 4 · October 22 to 31
Build something that lasts
Turn a month of activity into something your community keeps.
- Oct 22Make a 60-second video
- Oct 23Thank your donors
- Oct 24Pop up somewhere new
- Oct 25Celebrate local businesses
- Oct 26Count what you’ve achieved
- Oct 27Review your permissions
- Oct 28Your town’s item for the 250th
- Oct 29Open a year-round call
- Oct 30Tell a spooky story
- Oct 31Wrap up and say thank you
October 22: Make a 60-second video
String together eight or ten photographs with captions or a short voiceover. A short video can make a collection easier to explore for people who might never open a catalog or visit a reading room, and it introduces historical material to new audiences. Adding captions means it works for people watching without sound, too. For more ideas, see how to turn your archive into videos, stories and shareable content.
October 23: Thank your donors
The people who gave you their family photos, scrapbooks and recordings made your collection possible. Thank them publicly, with their permission, and share one item each of them contributed.
October 24: Pop up somewhere new
Take a small display to a farmers market, a coffee shop or a school fair. Print a few enlarged photos and add a QR code linking to your online collection, so the conversation carries on after people walk away.
October 25: Celebrate local businesses
Old shopfronts, advertisements and staff photos are a reliable crowd-pleaser. Tag the businesses that are still trading. They'll often share the post, and sometimes they'll dig out records of their own.
October 26: Count what you've achieved
Pause and note your numbers so far: posts, reach, comments, new contributions, volunteers recruited, questions answered.
October 27: Review your permissions
Before you share more, check that you have the right to. Were items donated, loaned or uploaded? Did oral history participants agree to their recordings being shared online? Our guide to consent, copyright and permissions in community archives covers the main questions.
October 28: Join the 250th conversation
Nationally, SAA's 250 for the 250th project invites archives of every size to contribute one item that helps tell the story of America. Although submissions for this are now closed, you could run your own version locally. Ask residents to nominate one item that represents your community's contribution to American history, then share the nominations and the stories behind them.
October 29: Open a year-round call for contributions
Don't let the month's momentum fade. Set up a simple, permanent way for people to send in photos, documents and memories, whether that's a web form, a drop-off box or a dedicated online archive. Tell people about it while they're still paying attention.
October 30: Tell a spooky story
Local legends, old Halloween costumes, abandoned buildings and unsolved mysteries make perfect seasonal content. Keep it light, check your facts, and invite people to share the ghost stories they grew up with.
October 31: Wrap up and say thank you
Share a round-up of the month: what you posted, what came in, and what you learned. Thank everyone who took part and tell them what happens next. Then save your plan. Next October, you'll be starting from somewhere, not from scratch.
Beyond October: where does it all go?
By October 31, your organization may have identified dozens of people in historical photographs, collected new memories, digitized previously unseen material and connected with residents who want to contribute.
But where does all that new information go?
If it stays scattered across social media comments, email inboxes, spreadsheets and individual computers, much of its long-term value could be lost. The names someone added under a Facebook post, the story a volunteer recorded on their phone, the photos scanned at your community day: each is easy to lose once the month is over.
Scattered
- Facebook comments
- Email inboxes
- Spreadsheets
- Volunteers’ phones
- Laptops and USB sticks
Saved
One searchable collection
- Photographs
- Documents
- Oral histories
- Names and faces
- Community uploads
YourArchive helps libraries and historical societies bring their collections and community contributions together in one searchable digital space. From identifying people across historical photographs to recording oral histories and inviting residents to contribute their own material, it provides a way to turn the activity generated during American Archives Month into a lasting community resource.
Planning your Archives Month? Talk to the YourArchive team about giving your collection, and everything your community adds to it, a permanent home.
FAQs
When is American Archives Month?
American Archives Month takes place every October in the United States. It has been promoted nationally by the Society of American Archivists since 2006.
When is #AskAnArchivist Day 2026?
#AskAnArchivist Day 2026 is on October 14. Archives and archivists answer questions from the public on social media using the #AskAnArchivist hashtag.
When is Electronic Records Day 2026?
Electronic Records Day usually falls on October 10, but in 2026 the Council of State Archivists is marking it on October 1.
Does your organization need a professional archivist to take part?
No. Public libraries, historical societies, museums, schools, churches and volunteer-run community archives can all take part. You don't need to be a member of SAA or have a trained archivist on staff.
What's the easiest way for a small organization to celebrate?
Choose 5-10 ideas from this calendar that match your time and collection. Good low-effort starting points are a mystery photo post, a "then and now" comparison and answering questions on #AskAnArchivist Day.