Digital Collections

Also check out:
• Digital Collections @ MPL, a blog featuring MPL’s digital collections.
• Milwaukee Public Library's Finding Tools - a collection of library indexes.

Historic Recipe File
These clipped recipes form the nucleus of the Historic Recipe File digital collection. Many of Milwaukee’s favorite foods appear in the recipes in this collection. This collection provides a fascinating glimpse into the local and ethnic foods that were popular in Milwaukee from as long as 50 years ago.

Horace Seaman Wisconsin Infantry Collection
The Horace Seaman Wisconsin Infantry collection is made up primarily of photos from Colonel Horace M. Seaman’s service with the Wisconsin National Guard. The majority of the photos come from his service with the 4th Wisconsin Infantry in the Spanish-American War of 1898.

Milwaukee County Marriage Certificates
In the 1960s a box of marriage certificates created between 1822 and 1876 was found at the Milwaukee County Courthouse. The certificates and accompanying documents were filmed in 1966. The Milwaukee Public Library owns a set of these microfilmed marriage certificates. The Milwaukee County Genealogical Society arranged to have the records refilmed, adding location citations, and volunteers created alphabetical indexes for bride and for groom.

Milwaukee Historic Photos
The collection represents the start of the process of making historic photos of Milwaukee available online. The photos from this collection are from the Milwaukee Public Library’s historic photograph collection.

Milwaukee Leaders
The Milwaukee Leaders Collection began in 1989, as a photo exhibit at the Martin Luther King, Jr. Milwaukee Public Library Neighborhood Library.

Milwaukee Mayors
The collection is an adaptation of a volume of images and information collected by library staff to form the Biographical Sketches of the Mayors of the City of Milwaukee.

Milwaukee Road Archives
The collection includes indexes to the small selection of employee records that are part of the archives of the Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul & Pacific Railway, which designated MPL as their official archives in 1981. Other material housed in the Milwaukee Road Archives includes corporate records, photographs, and drawings.

Milwaukee Waterways
These photographs are from the Port of Milwaukee, Milwaukee Public Library Historic Photo Collection, and the Great Lakes Marine Collection of Milwaukee Public Library and the Wisconsin Marine Historical Society. A matching grant from the Wisconsin Coastal Management Program helped preserve these photographs and make them available on line.

Remember When
A popular feature of The Milwaukee Journal from 1963 through 1994 prepared by library staff to highlight Milwaukee's past as preserved in the Historic Photo Collection.

Shipshape
Information on more than 10,000 Great Lakes vessels dating from 1815 to the present. A database of the Great Lakes Marine Collection of the Wisconsin Marine Historical Society and the Milwaukee Public Library.

Special Collections Finder
The library has many special collections. These special collections exist both within MPL’s various archives and as part of several reference departments housed at Central Library. The finding aids housed in this digital resource describe MPL’s special collections materials. At this time not all of the special collections and archival materials have finding aids, and more finding aids will be added as they are created and as new collections are added to MPL’s holdings.

Wagons of Milwaukee Businesses
The Wagons of Milwaukee Businesses album came to the library from the estate of Theo. Habhegger, a Milwaukee manufacturer of short turn wagons. The album consists of 37 sepia-toned photographs of wagons, mostly belonging to various Milwaukee area businesses, from the early 20th century.