About the Douglass Papers Project

The Frederick Douglass Papers archive at The Institute for American Thought contains few original document. Our archive is remarkable because it contains the largest collection of photocopies of documents held at numerous repositories all over the country, as well as photocopies of documents in private collections.

Scholars and students at all levels may conduct research in our archive by appointment only. To arrange a visit to our archive, contact us by telephone at 317-274-5834 or by e-mail.

Frederick Douglass, born into slavery in 1818, became an influential human rights activist of both the antebellum and post-bellum nineteenth-century world--one whose reputation endures still. The Frederick Douglass Papers Project originated in 1973 at Yale University. The project's primary aim has been to make the papers of this prolific African American figure accessible to a broad audience, much as similar projects were doing for the papers of notable white historical and literary figures. The heart of the project is the publication of fourteen volumes of Douglass’s writings, but the project has also begun exploring the use of electronic texts and of web sites to broaden access to the project’s resources. As such, the Frederick Douglass papers is one of the few major documentary editing projects in progress devoted to an African American figure, the others including the Martin Luther King, Jr. Papers at the University of California-Berkeley, the Freedman and Southern Society Project at the University of Maryland, and the Harriet Jacobs Papers at Pace University.

Currently, the project is completing the seventh volume of the four series set. The first series, five volumes of Speeches, Debates, and Interviews, was completed in 1992 and praised in The Journal of American History as “an important resource for Douglass scholars as well as all those interested in unraveling the intricate web of nineteenth-century reform.” (Carol V.R. George, “The Frederick Douglass Papers. Series One: Speeches, Debates, and Interviews. Vol. 1: 1841-46,” The Journal of American (Dec., 1980) 67:681-83.) Two of the three volumes of Series Two: Autobiographical Writings, Narrative (Yale University Press, 1999), and My Bondage and My Freedom (Yale University Press, 2003), have been completed. The third and final volume of Autobiographical Writings, Life and Times of Frederick Douglass, is currently in research and production. Of the third series, four volumes of Correspondence, the first volume is in production at Yale University Press, and the second is being prepared by the staff of The Frederick Douglass Papers for annotation research. The final series will consist of two volumes containing selections from Douglass's published works.