Search Tips

This site offers search and browse access to records within two overlapping collection areas: 1939-1940 New York World's Fair Films and Northeast Historic Film's 1938-1940 Hidden Collections. 1939-1940 New York World's Fair Films include records for individual film reels held across three repositories: George Eastman House International Museum of Photography and Film, Northeast Historic Film, and Queens Museum of Art. Northeast Historic Film's 1938-1940 Hidden Collections include collection-level records for a selection of newly-described collections containing film reels from the 1938-1940 period, as well as item-level records for individual reels within these collections.

To use the simple search box at the upper right corner of the page, select either the "New York World's Fair Films" or the "NHF 1938-1940 Collections" search option from the drop-down menu and enter your search term in the box. The search engine will return records containing all of the words in the search box.

To search for records containing at least one of two or more search terms, use the OR operator between terms. To search for complete phrases, use quotation marks around your search string. To refine your search results, select "Filter Search" from the upper right of the results display page and select a filter term from the lists of subjects, people and organizations, NYWF features, and repositories.

To browse records within the two collection areas, select "Explore the Collections" from the main navigation bar. You may explore 1938-1940 New York World's Fair Films by selecting fair zones and features through the map of the fairgrounds, or by clicking through to the full results display, from which you may refine results by subjects, people and organizations, fair features, or repositories.

You may explore NHF's 1938-1940 films by browsing records for individual film reels or by browsing the collection-level records for collections containing 1938-1940 films. For collections, click through "collections containing 1938-1940 film reels" for the full results display. For individual film reels, click through "1938-1940 film reels" for the full results display, from which you may refine results by subjects, people and organizations, places, or collections.