Donate items to our collections

What we collect

The Archives and Recordkeeping Act (2006) requires that we support the preservation of Ontario’s documentary memory. As part of our mandate, we accept private donations of records into our archival collection for long-term preservation, to be accessible to the public for generations to come.

Private donors to our archival collection include:

• individuals
• organizations and associations
• businesses

Types of materials we accept

We accept donations of many types of records, including:

• textual documents
• photographs and negatives
• films
• audio recordings
• digital records
• maps and plans

Visit our Government of Ontario Art Collection page if you are interested in donating art works.

Provincial significance

Potential donations are evaluated in large part for their “provincial significance.” We accept donations where the scope and content speaks in some way to Ontario as a whole, or parts and people groups of Ontario that are underrepresented in our current collection.

In addition, we prioritize donations that include, or will eventually include, the complete life or work of an individual, organization, association or business.

Donation offers that don’t meet these criteria may be better suited to another institution, such as municipal or community archives, corporate or academic archives, or other government archives. We may be able to refer you to another institution depending on the nature of your inquiry.

Steps to donate

There are seven steps to donate records to our collection.

1. Submit a donation inquiry. Provide the following information:

• your name
• location
• description of the records you intend to donate (types of records, physical extent, record formats, date range, etc.)
• condition of the records (fair, good, excellent, mouldy or musty)

2. Archivist initial review. If your donation fits within our collection mandate, we will conduct a formal appraisal for physical condition, completeness and provincial significance.
3. Recommendation to the Archivist of Ontario of formal acceptance of donation.
4. Drafting donation agreement. We will work with you to plan how best to transfer the donation to our facility.
5. Physical processing of donation, including re-housing and describing.
6. Uploading record descriptions to Collection Search.
7. Records are made publicly available according to the terms of the donation agreement.

Note: All donations must go through this process with an archivist. Anything sent to us without an agreement will not be considered.