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The collections of printed and recorded media at the Eastside Heritage Center can be divided into three categories:
- the Archives and Manuscripts Collection
- the Photo Collection, and
- the Oral History Collection
The Archives and Manuscripts Collection of the EHC contains both published and unpublished material.
 Published material includes newspapers, school annuals, books, films and articles covering the history of the Eastside. The Eastside Heritage Center has a particularly extensive collection of issues of the Lake Washington Reflector, a local gazetteer which ran from 1918 through 1934 and On the Ways, a newsletter printed by the Lake Washington Shipyards during and after WWII. We have a near complete collection of Bellevue High School Annuals, as well as a substantial number of Sammamish High School yearbooks.
 Unpublished material refers generally to the documents generated by people and businesses during their normal, day-to-day activities: diaries and journals, correspondence, scrapbooks, and business and administrative records. A few of the organizations that have donated records to the EHC are:
- Springwood and Hunt's Point Garden Clubs
- Bellevue Elementary School PTA
- Nokomis Club (Friends of the Redmond Library)
- T. R. U. S. T. (Tolls Represent Unfair State Taxation)
Also, the EHC has recently received the records of Norwood Village, Inc. and the Overlake Service League. These records are being processed and should be available for research by January 2007.
 The Colman Diaries, written by Clarissa Colman and her daughter-in-law Margarete Mitchell Colman between the years 1886 and 1910, are among the most highly prized documents in our collections. These diaries have been photocopied and are available for research. However, due to their size (some 1100 pages), we suggest that researchers focus their attention on a particular topic, for example: Native Americans, a specific family, a year.
The Eastside Heritage Center's Photo Collection numbers in the thousands and contains images from the 1880s through the present day. Subjects are numerous: families, roads, homes, businesses, and vocational and recreational activities. The bulk of the images come from Redmond, Bellevue and Kirkland, but the collection also contains material from other local communities such as Sammamish, Issaquah, Monohan, and many other towns that no longer exist or have been annexed by larger communities.
For a good introduction to our photo collection, you can view 800 of these images on the web at King County Snapshots.
To purchase an image, contact the Archivist at 425-450-1049 or email  .
The Oral History Collection contains almost 200 sound and video recordings of interviews with citizens who lived and worked on the Eastside. Many of these interviews were collected as part of research projects dedicated to preserving the history of a particular topic, region, or business. Examples include the Eastside Women Project, the Lake Hills Project, and the Lake Washington Shipyards Project. Many interviews are available in transcribed (printed) form.
Our research facility is at the Winters House, located at 2102 Bellevue Way, SE. The archivist is available to help you on Tuesday from 9:00am to 2:30pm, and on Thursday and Friday by appointment. We ask that you call (425) 450-1049 at least 24 hours before you wish to visit the research center. This gives us time to prepare for your visit (pull out the records in which you are interested, make sure that nothing needs last-minute preservation work, etc). Furthermore, if it turns out that the Eastside Heritage Center does not have information on your subject, by calling ahead you save yourself a trip, and we may be able to direct you to a more appropriate facility.
There is a $10 Access to Collections fee. This fee helps to buy materials to preserve the collection and also covers staff time.
We welcome your donations. Please check out our Donations page.
Please view our Links Page, which lists all the local historical societies.
If you are looking for vital records (including birth and death registers and marriage licenses), please visit the Washington State Archives website.
Other Questions? Please contact the archivist at
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