If you have yearbooks from Chicago institutions that would add to the Chicago History Museum’s collection, please check the Yearbook Finding Aid for the school and the years. If we do not already have copies, then you can fill out the Online Collection Donation Form.
More information can be found on the Collections Donations page.
In the search box in ARCHIE, the online catalog, type in the name of the school and the word "yearbook." Be aware that searching for the formal name of the yearbook might yield multiple results since many yearbooks are named after class colors or mascots (e.g., "Red and Black" or "Eagle").
The finding aid lists the school's street address and the years of available books and is helpful for subject studies when seeking information on specific neighborhoods, cities, or time periods.
The Chicago History Museum relies on subject headings authorized by the Library of Congress to organize its catalog records. This controlled vocabulary facilitates the uniform access and retrieval of items in libraries and archives worldwide.
Researchers can search headings in CHM's online catalog ARCHIE either in the general keyword search, by limiting the "All Fields" to "Subject," or by using the Advanced Search.
Note: This list is not comprehensive, but meant instead as a suggested starting point.
Over time, many high schools and colleges have changed names or buildings. If you cannot find a school by its name, check the finding aid to see if it changed names.
The name that schools give their yearbooks might have changed over time (e.g., the Fenger Annual, became the Fenger Courier, which became the Courier.) If searching for the book's name does not yield results, try the school's name.
Yearbooks in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries did not always list faculty or students alphabetically, and group photographs did not always provide captions with names.
Some of the earliest yearbooks in the collection were not published at the time of graduation and instead were part of a class reunion (the Chicago West Division High School published their yearbook in 1895, on the anniversary of the classes' ten-year reunion.) These books included more biographical information about the alum, such as the college or university the student attended after school, the individual's occupation, current address, and names of the graduate’s spouse or children, if applicable.
Depending on the search year, if the collection does not have a book for the year an individual graduated, check the following years to see if the school included an alum section. Alum sections were popular in yearbooks in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The use of alum sections started to fade around the 1930s and 1940s but was briefly reintroduced by some schools during World War II to honor former students in the armed forces.
In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, many schools admitted students twice a year. Students could begin in the fall or spring semester, and the school held graduation twice a year, winter and summer. This admission schedule means that yearbooks from this time might have multiple sections of seniors, possibly two sections of graduating seniors, and the senior students still taking classes.
Some schools only published yearbooks for graduating students.
In the catalog and finding aid, a one-half fraction after the year designates a mid- or half-year publication, such as "1916 ½."
Since individual schools set admission schedules, some schools published books with February and June graduates from the same calendar year, and others published with June and February graduates from consecutive calendar years. If the school and years you are looking for include a ½ fraction, keep search years flexible and include a year before or after to account for when a student or graduate might be listed.
It was not until around the 1970s that most Chicago grade and high schools solidified a primary enrollment date in the fall and held a single graduation at the beginning of summer. However, colleges and universities still admitted students on a rolling basis.
Related collections include:
Additional places outside of the Chicago History Museum to look for yearbooks, family or individual history, and information on educational history in Chicago include: