This fonds contains records related to Alan Sears’ personal thought and activism in socialist and 2SLGBTQIA+ circles during his early career, publications on those topics, and historical materials related to socialist politics in Windsor/Essex County.

Series I (Personal Files, 1982-1996) contains Sears’ personal notes, formal presentations, and article drafts, as well as agendas, membership lists, signed petitions, posters and flyers, a small amount of correspondence, and some research material in activist areas including socialism, labour, anti-racism and anti-apartheid, anti-war, Gay and Lesbian rights, AIDS, and funding for education. Most of the records relate to Windsor, with some Ottawa and Toronto items.

Series II (Publications, 1971-2002) contains periodicals and individual articles connected with Sears’ activist interests, and a history of Gay and Lesbian liberation written by Sears.

Series III (Scrapbooks & Ephemera, 1945; 1980s) includes two scrapbooks of press clippings from the 1945 Ontario provincial election, focused on the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation (CCF) party and Essex County, and stickers from a 1980s job action by postal workers.

Series IV (Photographs) contains images of t-shirts owned by Sears, highlighting slogans and images used in various activist causes.

This fonds contains records from the mid-1960s depicting the involvement of cosmetic company Beauty Counselors of Canada and its Sales Promotion Manager Doug Johnstone in branding Windsor, Ontario as the “City of Roses” (or “Rose City”). Most of the records were originally kept in scrapbook form by the company, and include news clippings, photographs of people and products, newsletters, and promotional ephemera. The rose campaign took shape under the direction of the Greater Windsor Foundation, a cross-sector initiative that sought to change what was then perceived as Windsor’s negative reputation. A 2011 email from Johnstone and 1960s newspaper articles explain this wider context. Although the records are focused on the rose campaign, some of the photographs and ephemera provide insights into both women’s work (as salespeople for the company) and women’s beauty culture in the 1960s.

This fonds contains materials created or collected by CARAL Windsor and affiliated organizations between 1968 and 1994. It has been divided into six series reflecting the group’s pro-choice activism during a tumultuous period of uncertainty around abortion legality and access in Canada. Series I to V contain records of day-to-day operations, advocacy, and resource sharing by CARAL itself, as follows: Series I - Administrative Materials; Series II – Correspondence; Series III - Publicity and Awareness; Series IV - National Office Materials; Series V -Resources. Series VI - Windsor Women’s Incentive Centre (WIC) contains a small number of records related to the WIC’s broader support for women’s issues in Windsor-Essex in the same time period.

This fonds contains personal, professional, and domestic records from the life of Joan Somers Sullivan in the later-20th and early-21st centuries. Series I (Personal Records) includes reminiscences about Joan, medical information, clippings related to community activitism (including traffic problems in Old Sandwich), and personal journals. Series II (Professional Records) features her resumé and qualifications, as well as administrative records, correspondence, public talks, research material, clippings, and publications connected with her pioneering effort to unionize legal secretaries in Windsor, Ontario during the 1970s. This includes talks for events held by the Faculties of Law at the University of Windsor and the University of Western Ontario, and articles published in the Windsor Woman women’s liberation newspaper and The Oyez Windsor law students’ newspaper. Series III (Domestic Records) contains recipes and household hints used in her later-life personal housekeeping, as well as lists of her annual Christmas baking.

This fonds contains documents and images created or collected by WAVE from the period 1974-1988. It has been divided into four series. Series I: Administrative Records includes meeting minutes and other details related to the organization’s activities, also correspondence between members of WAVE and several corporate organizations and media outlets regarding issues of pornography. Series II: Writing Campaigns contains letters written by WAVE drawing attention to issues of pornography. Series III: Resources features research articles, bibliographies, legislation, reports, slide shows, and a film discussion guide used by WAVE in their work. A number of these resources were produced by a similar New York organization. Series IV: Examples of Pornography in Pop Culture contains advertisements, magazines, and photography books to which the group objected.