Special Collections and Archives (SCA) seeks rare and unique historical documentation related directly to Las Vegas, the Southern Nevada region, the gaming industry worldwide, and sexual entertainment and economies. We collect personal, organizational, and corporate records documenting the history of labor, land use and environmental preservation, innovators and civic leaders, political issues and movements, and social and cultural activities.
Our collecting is format neutral, focusing on content over medium. Documentation is not limited to traditional physical formats such as correspondence, diaries, financial records, or photographs, but may also include born-digital material or information conveyed via the web.
Materials donated to SCA are made available for researchers to use in our reading room and may also be used in instruction or exhibits in the library and online.
For more information about SCA’s collecting priorities, expand the menus below.
Details on transferring UNLV records to the University Archives are available on our university records transfer page.
SCA collects material that documents the work of entertainers and the entertainment industry in the Southern Nevada region, past and present, with a focus on the Las Vegas Strip. Collecting priorities focus on identifying and pursuing materials that fill existing gaps in SCA’s holdings, such as 21st century entertainment offerings and the wider breadth of entertainment in Las Vegas beyond the Strip.
High priority (Actively seeking, minimal existing documentation in our holdings):
- Personal papers of show producers and performers, records of productions, costume and set designs, and publications representing new forms of Las Vegas entertainment from the 21st century, including residencies, Cirque du Soleil, and interactive shows such as those produced by Spiegelworld.
- Personal papers documenting the work of performers from underrepresented groups.
- Records of dance and theater companies from the Las Vegas and Southern Nevada region.
- Records of musical festivals and shows held in Las Vegas and Southern Nevada.
- Records of the film industry in Las Vegas, specifically its 21st century growth.
Moderate priority (Seeking, strong documentation in our holdings, but gaps remain):
- Costume and set designs related to 20th century Las Vegas Strip performers and shows.
- Personal papers of Las Vegas Strip performers and producers from the 20th century including musicians, showgirls, dancers, magicians, and speciality acts.
- Publications and ephemera related to 20th century Las Vegas Strip entertainment.
- Records of shows performed on the Las Vegas Strip in the 20th century.
Low priority (Not actively seeking, robust existing documentation in our holdings):
- Collections that document entertainment or cabaret shows where there is only a partial connection to Las Vegas.
Text for accordion
SCA collects material that documents the history of the LGBTQ+ communities in the Southern Nevada region, with a focus on individuals, organizations, and events. Collecting priorities focus on identifying and pursuing materials that fill existing gaps in SCA’s holdings such as collections documenting trans and lesbian communities and other LGBTQ+ identities.
High priority (Actively seeking, minimal existing documentation in our holdings):
- Personal papers and organizational records documenting LGTBQ+ members of underrepresented groups in Las Vegas and the Southern Nevada region.
- Personal papers and organizational records documenting the transgender community in Las Vegas and the Southern Nevada region.
- Personal papers and organizational records documenting the lesbian community in Las Vegas and the Southern Nevada region.
Moderate priority (Seeking, strong documentation in our holdings, but gaps remain):
- Personal papers and organizational records documenting the gay community in Las Vegas and the Southern Nevada region
Low priority (Not actively seeking, robust existing documentation in our holdings):
- Personal papers of LGBTQ+ individuals or records of organizations where only a portion of their work or activities took place in Las Vegas and the Southern Nevada region.
SCA acquires collections documenting the legal brothel and sexual entertainment industries in Nevada, the lone state in the United States where brothel prostitution is legal in some counties. Though sex work is not legal in Las Vegas or Clark County, the city has capitalized on its reputation for vice and licentiousness to attract tourism to the Southern Nevada region such that its moniker “Sin City” is now core to its cultural identity.
SCA did not actively document the sexual entertainment industry prior to 2023, unlike other industries that form the backbone of the region’s economy. Collecting priorities focus on identifying and pursuing materials that fill in the subsequent gaps in the documentary record.
High priority (Actively seeking, important foundational materials for building the collecting area):
- Personal papers and organizational records documenting Southern Nevada brothels, sex work, and sex workers from statehood through the 21st Century.
- Business records documenting other adult entertainment establishments in Las Vegas and the Southern Nevada region, such as adult entertainment stores, sex toy manufacturers, and strip clubs.
- Personal papers of pornography performers and creators with strong ties to Las Vegas and the Southern Nevada region.
- Political papers documenting the legalization and regulation of the brothel industry in Nevada.
- Collections documenting both pro- and anti-sex work/sexual entertainment activism.
Moderate priority (Seeking, important materials for a robust collecting area):
- Personal papers and organizational records documenting the brothel industry, sex work, sex workers, and the broader sexual entertainment industry in Northern Nevada [see comparison to other repositories below].
- Personal papers and organizational records documenting the sexual technology industry.
- Personal papers and organizational records documenting human sexuality education.
Low priority (Not actively seeking, possibly an area for future prioritization and growth):
- Personal papers and organizational records documenting sex work, sex workers, the pornography industry, and other adult entertainment industries in the Western United States.
- Human sexuality and pornography collections assembled by individual donors from disparate sources and based around format or subject matter.
SCA acquires collections documenting the history of the Southern Nevada region, with particular emphasis on the Las Vegas metropolitan area and including business and industry, politics, and culture. Our regional area of coverage includes parts of central Nevada including Goldfield, Tonopah, and Ely. Collecting priorities focus on identifying and pursuing materials that fill existing gaps in SCA’s holdings.
High priority (Actively seeking, minimal existing documentation in our holdings):
- Personal papers and organizational records documenting underrepresented communities in the Southern Nevada region.
- Personal papers and organizational records documenting the growth of the cannabis industry in the Southern Nevada region.
- Personal papers and organizational records documenting environmental history unique to the region, including the history of the Nevada Proving Grounds, Yucca Mountain, water conservation, and clean energy infrastructure.
- Personal papers, organizational records, and printed/promotional material documenting the development of professional sports in the region.
Moderate priority (Seeking, strong documentation in our holdings, but gaps remain):
- Personal papers, organizational records, and printed/promotional material documenting local politics and regional public policy (not to infringe on the University of Nevada, Reno’s mandate as the state repository for congressional collections).
- Personal papers and organizational records documenting the history of the broader region, including rural areas, metropolitan suburbs, and developing communities.
- Personal papers of prominent regional journalists.
- Personal papers of local labor activists and organizational records of prominent union locals (not to infringe on collecting mandates of national unions or other labor collections).
Low priority (Not actively seeking, robust existing documentation in our holdings):
- Personal papers, organizational records, and single items documenting pre-incorporation Las Vegas (pre-1905).
- Personal papers, organizational records, and single items documenting early Las Vegas and early statehood (roughly 1864-1950).
- Personal papers and organizational records documenting the railroad, mining, and ranching industries in the region.
- Personal papers, organizational records, and printed/promotional material documenting religious denominations and communities.
SCA collects visual materials in a variety of formats including architectural plans, schematics, drawings, and artist renderings; the working papers of artists; still photography of all types and sizes; moving images, including films, video, audiovisual, and timelapse; drawings; sketches; graphic design work; and maps. SCA collects these formats solely for the information they contain and not to document the history or art of any particular medium.
As a general rule, SCA does not collect gallery-ready artwork. We may consider some works if the informational value is a strong aspect of its artistic expression and care and access is possible through established procedures.
SCA collects materials from and about prominent artists in line with our collecting areas as well as materials from community organizations formed around artistic practice. Any artwork included in these collections must be unframed or unmounted.
High priority (Actively seeking, minimal existing documentation in our holdings):
- Architecture:
- Personal papers from the industry’s leading architects, as well as records of individual projects (realized and unrealized), with particular emphasis on the influence of the gaming and hospitality industry and the temporary nature of the Las Vegas metropolitan landscape.
- Art:
- Working papers of prominent local artists.
- Photography:
- Works of photographers, professional and amateur, whose original work documents our collecting scope.
- Documentary photography projects created by the curator for visual materials.
- Moving images:
- Audiovisual works from creators that are related to our collecting areas, that are not commercially available, and where the copyright is clear.
Moderate priority (Seeking, strong documentation in our holdings, but gaps remain):
- Architecture:
- Personal papers of architects and records of projects focusing on desert environment and solutions, including mid-century modern and desert modern architecture.
- Art:
- Records of regional art-related organizations.
- Photography:
- Works of notable photographers whose original work mainly focuses on our collecting areas, but may also have work that falls outside of those areas.
- Photography collections related to our collecting scope that come from various sources of known provenance and can reasonably be made available.
- Moving images:
- Original audiovisual works related to our collecting areas that contain high value documentation, but can only be made available onsite in the reading room.
Low priority (Not actively seeking, robust existing documentation in our holdings):
- Architecture:
- Papers of architects and records of projects documenting Las Vegas planned communities, particularly those based on the Irvine California Master Planned community, as well as records of counter trend projects.
- Art:
- SCA may consider materials documenting art-related events.
- Photography:
- Photography collections of unknown provenance documenting our collecting areas, but that we may only be able to make available in the reading room until the work enters the public domain.
- Well known or famous photographers who call Las Vegas home, but whose work may not be related to our collecting areas.
- Moving images:
- Audiovisual works related to our collecting areas of all types will be considered.
- Commercial works related directly to our collecting areas that may be difficult to find may be collected, but only viewed within the reading room.
SCA acquires collections documenting women’s impact and influence in Southern Nevada, with a particular emphasis on the Las Vegas metropolitan area. Collecting priorities will focus on identifying and pursuing materials that fill existing gaps in SCA’s holdings, with particular emphasis on the papers of individuals with intersectional identities.
High priority (Actively seeking, minimal existing documentation in our holdings):
- Personal papers of individual women or records of women’s organizations reflecting underrepresented or marginalized groups in Las Vegas and the Southern Nevada region.
- Personal papers of individual women or records of women’s organizations whose work reflects involvement in activism, labor, and politics in our region.
Moderate priority (Seeking, strong documentation in our holdings, but gaps remain):
- Records of local women’s organizations whose work and projects focus solely or primarily on civic and community affairs in Las Vegas and Southern Nevada.
- Personal papers of women whose professional life and career was only partially focused on Las Vegas and Southern Nevada.
Low priority (Not actively seeking, robust existing documentation in our holdings):
- Records of the local chapters of national women’s organizations
As a general rule, we do not collect:
- Collections outside the scope of this policy, nor certain formats for which in-house expertise does not exist.
- Framed items, though we may de-frame items before inclusion in a collection.
- Government records that should be part of municipal, county, or state holdings.
- Materials that duplicate other holdings either in our institution or in others.
- Materials that would be permanently restricted.
- Partial collections when major portions of the collection have already been deposited elsewhere.
Three-dimensional items, including but not limited to art, glassware, clothing, hotel/casino ephemera, gambling equipment, plaques, trophies, sports equipment, tapestries, computer equipment, and photography equipment.
SCA primarily acquires collections through donation. Each donor is required to sign a deed of gift transferring physical ownership of the collection to SCA. SCA will not accept collections without a deed of gift and does not accept loans or long-term deposits of collection material. The donor must sign a deed of gift within 60 days of deposit, or SCA will return the collection.
SCA may, on occasion, purchase collections. We will only acquire collections if we can commit to responsible, long-term stewardship of the material.
Curators are available via email to discuss potential donations and answer your questions.
Donating materials to a repository