he Anne T. Kent California History Room is an archive dedicated to collecting and preserving information on local, regional, and state history with a strong emphasis on the history and culture of Marin County. Resources include books, maps, photographs, oral histories, biography files, early Marin County voter registers, clippings and ephemera. In the early 1930s, County Librarian, Virginia Keating, started what was to become the California Room with a small collection of books kept in a locked case in the basement of the old Marin County Courthouse in San Rafael, the first home of the Marin County Free Library. Because so little had been written on Marin County history, Mrs. Keating also began collecting ephemera, photographs and other primary sources. The California Room is named after Anne T. Kent, who, in the 1920s, was instrumental in establishing the Marin County Free Library System and in 1974, with Carla Ehat, pioneered the California Room oral history program. Since 1962, the collection has been housed in the Frank Lloyd Wright-designed Marin County Civic Center. Thanks to the hard work and generous donations of generations of Marin County citizens, our archive has grown substantially. If you have material which you think would be of interest to our collection, please contact California Room Librarian, Laurie Thompson, at (415) 499-3661. Reference queries may be made via telephone, at (415) 499-7419. The California Room Digital Archivist, Carol Uhrmacher, can be reached at cuhrmacher@co.marin.ca.us.


Images of Marin County & California

Photographs from the Anne T. Kent California Room are now included on two California-wide websites: the University of California's Calisphere and the Online Archive of California. Collaboration with these two sites emanated from a Library Services and Technology Act grant awarded to the California Room in 2005. The University of California's Calisphere is a newly created site of primary source materials especially designed for use in California schools, grades K-12. It includes lesson plans and dozens of themed collections such as the California Gold Rush and the Transcontinental Railway. The Online Archive of California is a gateway to historical materials held in a variety of California institutions. Through its searchable database, visitors may access photographs, manuscripts, and works of art, or browse collections by theme or topic.


Browse California Room images on the Online Archive of California
Search for Marin County (or California) images on the Online Archive of California