The ArQuives — Kanadas LGBTQ2+ Archive

The ArQuives (renamed from the Canadian Lesbian and Gay Archives in 2018) is Canada's national LGBTQ2+ archive and the largest independent LGBTQ+ archive in the world after New York's Lesbian Herstory Archives. It was founded in June 1973 at 145 Front Street West as a project of Kevin Orr, Ron Dayman and other members of The Body Politic collective. It has operated continuously for 52 years. Holdings comprise 25,000+ books, complete runs of virtually every English-language North American queer periodical since 1953, roughly 1.2 million periodical issues total, 8,000+ personal-papers collections, and — the archive's most-cited holdings — the complete records of The Body Politic (Canada's founding gay newspaper, published 1971-1987), the Right to Privacy Committee (1981-1985), the Coalition for Lesbian and Gay Rights in Ontario (1975-2000), and hundreds of individual Canadian activists. Since 1995 The ArQuives has occupied a purpose-fitted three-storey Victorian townhouse at 34 Isabella Street, one block east of Church-Wellesley Village. The building holds a research reading room open by appointment, an art gallery on the ground floor with rotating exhibitions, an archives storage vault in the basement, and a public library on the second floor with 25,000+ browsable books. Open Tuesday-Friday 13:00-19:00 for drop-in reading room; wider access by appointment. Free admission (donations welcome). Wellesley subway is a five-minute walk. The exhibition gallery rotates roughly four shows per year and is worth a visit even for the non-researcher.