The Arizona Collection

The Arizona Collection focuses on the experiences of people living and working in Arizona during the Covid-19 Pandemic. As we work to preserve a public record of this time, we invite users to share stories, pictures, documents, and other material that illuminates how the pandemic has impacted your life, your work, your family and your community.

What should you contribute? Anything you think might be of interest or use to future historians. We want to preserve the extraordinary moments, but also whatever ordinary objects and stories best represent the diversity of Arizonans' daily experiences during this historical event.

The Arizona Collection is part of a larger collaboration between Arizona State University (ASU) and the Arizona Historical Society (AHS), with consulting support from the University of Arizona (U of A). This project,  Journal of the Plague Year: Recording Arizonans' Experiences with the Covid-19 Pandemic, is partially funded by a grant from the Arizona Humanities Council.  The purpose is to encourage Arizonans to create and collect materials for the archive -- including photographs, audio and video diaries, memes, music, and journal entries-- to enable Arizonans to reflect together on their experience of the pandemic. 

The Arizona Collection is part of the broader Journal of the Plague Year digital archive. Inspired by Daniel Defoe’s novel of the same name, this archive also seeks to chronicle daily life during a pandemic. A Journal of the Plague Year was initiated by Catherine O'Donnell, Richard Amesbury, and Mark Tebeau in the School for Historical, Philosophical, and Religious Studies at Arizona State University. The Journal of the Plague Year is supported financially by the public history endowment at Arizona State University, a fund endowed by Noel Stowe.