Contact the Center
Center for Southeast North Carolina Archives and History
UNCW Library, Discovery Hall, 2nd floor
5162 Randall Dr.
Wilmington, NC 28403
csencah@uncw.edu
910-962-7810
Visit the Center
Location
The Center for Southeast North Carolina Archives and History is located on the 2nd floor of Discovery Hall in the UNCW Library.
Hours
The Center is open from 10am to 2pm, Monday - Friday. Appointments are not required, but we strongly encourage visitors to contact us in advance of any planned research visit to discuss your research topic and confirm the availability of collections. Onsite research assistance may be limited.
Access Policies
Prior to visiting the Center, users should familiarize themselves with our access and use policies.
Databases
The databases below include primary and secondary sources related to surfing and surf culture broadly, though not necessarily directly connected to the state of North Carolina. Please note that some of these databases are proprietary and only accessible with a UNCW username and password or using a campus wi-fi network.
- America: History & LifeProvides a robust source of information focusing on the history and life of the United States and Canada. Selective indexing includes over a thousand journals dating back over 55 years. Find more information.
- ArchiveGridArchiveGrid is a collection of over two million archival material descriptions, providing access to detailed archival collection descriptions, making information available about historical documents, personal papers, family histories, and other archival materials. It also provides contact information for the institutions where the collections are kept. Archival collections held by thousands of libraries, museums, historical societies, and archives are represented in ArchiveGrid.
- Credo ReferenceCredo Reference is an online full-text library that covers all major subjects such as art, business geography, history, literature, music, psychology, social Sciences, and technology. It includes general reference resources such as dictionaries, bilingual dictionaries, thesauri, encyclopedias, and atlases, plus a wide range of subject-specific titles covering everything from art to zoology. It offers easy keyword searching across the database of resources so you don’t need to know the title of a specific reference book to get started. Search in hundreds of encyclopedias, dictionaries, thesauri, quotations, and subject-specific titles, as well as 200,000+ images and audio files, and nearly 200 videos.
- Digital Public Library of AmericaProvides access to millions of images, photographs, manuscripts, books, sounds, and more from libraries, archives, and museums across the U.S.
- Historical AbstractsHistorical Abstracts covers the history of the world (excluding the United States and Canada) focusing on the 15th century forward, including art history, world history, military history, women's history, history of education, foreign languages and literatures, and more. Find more information.
- JSTORArchive of selected scholarly journals in anthropology, art, art history, communication studies, criminology, ecology, economics, education, English, film studies, foreign languages and literatures, geography, geology, history, mathematics, music, philosophy, political science, public and international affairs, religion, social work, sociology, statistics, theatre, and other humanities and social sciences. Find more information.
- Life Magazine ArchivePresents an extensive collection of the famed photojournalism magazine, spanning from its very first issue in November, 1936 through December, 2000 in a comprehensive cover-to-cover format. Life Magazine featured many articles on surfing and surf culture at a national level throughout its history.
- Pop Culture Studies (Gale OneFile)Gale OneFile: Pop Culture Studies analyzes and contributes to popular culture by offering useful information for researchers in social science, history, art, and liberal arts courses.
- U.S. History (Gale in Context)Gale In Context: U.S. History is an engaging online experience for those seeking contextual information on hundreds of the most significant people, events and topics in U.S. History. U.S. History merges Gale's authoritative reference content with full-text magazines, academic journals, news articles, primary source documents, images, videos, audio files and links to vetted websites organized into a user-friendly portal experience. U.S. in Context is cross-searchable with World History in Context.
Websites
- UNCW Cape Fear Surfing ArchiveThe Cape Fear Surfing Archive was created in 2002 as a subset of Special Collections at UNCW Library to encourage donations of documentary materials related to the history of surfing in the region. This link provides access to an archived version of the Cape Fear Surfing Archive website, which includes information on local surf contests and surf shops, a list of known historical surfers in the Cape Fear region, and an original version of the timeline reproduced in this guide.
- Surfalorus Film Festival - CurrentSurfalorus, an offshoot of the Cucalorus film festival, is an annual celebration that showcases the year's best surf films. The festival happens during the Eastern Surfing Association’s annual year-end competition.
- Surfalorus Film Festival - ArchiveThe Surfalorus Film Festival has been held annually since 2012. This link provides access to archived versions of the festival's website from 2013 through 2022.
- Eastern Surfing AssociationThe ESA is the largest amateur surfing association in the world, founded in 1967. The organization hosts several regional annual surfing contests
- North Carolina Surfing Exhibit, North Carolina Maritime Museum, BeaufortInformation on a former exhibit curated by the North Carolina Maritime Museum in Beaufort that "lets visitors take the drop into North Carolina’s rich surfing past and ride the wave through its incredible historical journey to becoming a cultural and economic staple of the coastal community." Included in this website is a North Carolina Surfing Timeline.