Events
DORIS offers programs, tours, and activities related to our holdings. Join our mailing list to be the first to know about exhibition openings, upcoming events, recent blog posts, and much more.
Note: If you require an auxiliary aid or service in order to attend a DORIS event, please contact the Disability Service Facilitator.
Note: To request language interpretation services, please contact the Language Access Coordinator at least three (3) business days before an event.
Lunch & Learn: Fear City
Online (Zoom)
Thursday, October 9 - 1:00-2:00pm
Join the NYC Department of Records and Information Services (DORIS) each month for our virtual Lunch & Learn Series - an intimate conversation with agency staff and special guests focusing on the collections of the Municipal Archives and Library and the history of New York City.
On October 9, join Dr. Kim Phillips-Fein, the Robert Gardiner-Kenneth T. Jackson Professor of History at Columbia University, for an in-depth discussion about her book Fear City: New York's Fiscal Crisis and the Rise of Austerity Politics.
When the news broke that New York City was on the brink of fiscal collapse, few believed it was possible. Yet, the city was indeed billions of dollars in the red, with no way to pay back its debts. Fear City tells the remarkable story of the financial crisis that engulfed the city, permanently transformed New York, and reshaped ideas about government across America.
RSVP to join us virtually (via Zoom) by clicking here.
Open House New York: Drop In to View Our Ongoing Exhibitions
31 Chambers Street, New York, NY
Friday, October 17 - 9:00am-4:00pm
Visit 31 Chambers Street to view the NYC Department of Records and Information Services (DORIS)’ ongoing exhibitions:
New Visions of Old New York, located in Suite 109, is a collaborative exhibit by DORIS and the New Amsterdam History Center. Featuring an interactive 3-D map from the New Amsterdam History Center’s Mapping Early New York project alongside 17th-century records from the New York City Municipal Archives and Library, this dynamic exhibit examines the lives of women, enslaved people, and Native Americans and how they shaped the culture of the Dutch West India Company settlement that eventually became New York City.
Windows on the Archives, located on the lower level, showcases the incredible breadth of the City's documentary treasures in the Municipal Archives. Conceived by former Commissioner Idilio Gracia Peña, curated by consulting archivist Ann Phillips, and funded by the J.M. Kaplan Fund, this engaging exhibit displays copies of original records from our collections.
Revisiting the World of Tomorrow: The 1964-65 World’s Fair, located in the first-floor alcove, discover a captivating display on the 1964-1965 World’s Fair, featuring images from the Municipal Library and Archives’ collections. The exhibit showcases three key areas of the Fair—transportation, religion, and commerce—through original brochures and ephemera, offering visitors a nostalgic journey back to childhood memories.
Open House New York: New Visions of Old New York Exhibition Tour
31 Chambers Street, New York, NY
Friday, October 17 - 10:00-10:45am, 12:00-12:45pm
Join the NYC Department of Records and Information Services (DORIS) for a guided tour of the current exhibition New Visions of Old New York, which features an interactive 3-D map from the New Amsterdam History Center’s Mapping Early New York project alongside 17th-century records from the Municipal Archives. This dynamic exhibit examines the lives of women, enslaved people, and Native Americans and their roles in the culture of the Dutch West India Company settlement that eventually became New York City.
Note: These tours requires tickets, and ticketing opens on October 3 at 12pm.
Learn more and RSVP to join us by clicking here.
Open House New York: Hall of Records Tour
31 Chambers Street, New York, NY
Saturday, October 18 - 11:00-11:40am, 12:00-12:40pm
Transport yourself back in time with the NYC Department of Records and Information Services (DORIS)’s exclusive tour of the Surrogate’s Courthouse (originally known as the Hall of Records). Located in Lower Manhattan, this Beaux-Arts historical landmark is an example of the early 20th-century architectural movement, City Beautiful. Designed by John Rochester Thomas and completed in 1907 by Tammany Hall architects Horgan and Slattery, the building aimed to visually transform NYC, uplift the city’s communities, and inspire moral and civic virtue.
The guided tour led by Municipal Archives Digitization Specialist Matthew Minor takes participants through the building’s magnificent lobby and shares historical insights on the Palais Garnier-inspired grand staircase, mosaic ceilings, and interior sculptures.
Note: This tour requires tickets, and ticketing opens on October 3 at 12pm.
Learn more and RSVP to join us by clicking here.
Open House New York: Tour of Municipal Archives at Industry City
147 41st Street, Brooklyn, NY 11232
Saturday, October 18 - 1:00-2:30pm
The NYC Department of Records & Information Services (DORIS) invites visitors to tour the Municipal Archives’ storage and research location in Sunset Park. Opened in October 2021, the $22 million state-of-the-art facility is the City's most significant investment in its Archives since the establishment of DORIS in 1977.
Join archivists Cynthia Brenwall, Katie Ehrlich, and Brian Ferree for a 90-minute behind-the-scenes tour of the space and a look at unique archival artifacts, from Mayoral scrapbooks and gifts to photos and historical records of city life!
Note: This tour requires tickets, and ticketing opens on October 3 at 12pm.
Learn more and RSVP to join us by clicking here.
Lunch & Learn: Urban Histories, Local Voices - A Conversation on NYC Chinatowns
Online (Zoom)
Tuesday, October 28 - 1:00-2:00pm
Join the NYC Department of Records and Information Services (DORIS) each month for our virtual Lunch & Learn Series - an intimate conversation with agency staff and special guests focusing on the collections of the Municipal Archives and Library and the history of New York City.
On October 28, we welcome Dr. Tarry Hum, Professor Emeritus at CUNY and 2025 Caring Across Generations Fellow, and Marc Kirkeby, historian, writer, and former contributor to our For the Record blog, for a conversation about the evolution of infrastructure, demographics, and community life in two dynamic neighborhoods: Sunset Park, Brooklyn and Flushing, Queens.
Dr. Tarry Hum is the author of Making a Global Immigrant Neighborhood, Brooklyn’s Sunset Park (2014)and lead editor of Immigrant Crossroads: Globalization, Incorporation, and Placemaking in Queens, NY (2021). Her research focuses on immigrant urbanism and growth coalitions, transnational capital, and urban and community planning.
Marc Kirkeby’s work has appeared in The New York Times, The New Yorker, NY Daily News, and Rolling Stone. Visit Archives.NYC to explore Marc’s 2017 Sunset Park Series.
RSVP to join us virtually (via Zoom) by clicking here.
Lunch & Learn: On the Turtle's Back
Online (Zoom)
Wednesday, November 12 - 1:00-2:00pm
Join the NYC Department of Records and Information Services (DORIS) each month for our virtual Lunch & Learn Series - an intimate conversation with agency staff and special guests focusing on the collections of the Municipal Archives and Library and the history of New York City.
On November 12, join Dr. Camilla Townsend, the Board of Governors Distinguished Professor of History at Rutgers University, for an in-depth discussion of the prize-winning book On the Turtle’s Back: Stories the Lenape Told Their Grandchildren she co-authored with Nicky Kay Michael.
The Lenape tribe, also known as the Delaware Nation, inhabited the region now comprising eastern Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware, and parts of New York, Connecticut, and Maryland for centuries. However, America’s independence from the British displaced the tribe west to Indiana, then Missouri, and finally the territory that became Oklahoma. The Lenape could not carry much from their ancestral homeland, but they ensured their stories were preserved and passed down through generations.
On the Turtle’s Back is the first collection of Lenape folklore. Originally compiled by anthropologist M. R. Harrington over a century ago but never published until now, the book features stories told to Harrington by a Lenape couple as well as more recent interviews with Lenape elders. Together, the stories welcome you into their rich and wondrous imaginative world.
RSVP to join us virtually (via Zoom) by clicking here.
Lunch & Learn: The Menace of Prosperity
Online (Zoom)
Tuesday, November 18 - 1:00-2:00pm
Join the NYC Department of Records and Information Services (DORIS) each month for our virtual Lunch & Learn Series - an intimate conversation with agency staff and special guests focusing on the collections of the Municipal Archives and Library and the history of New York City.
On November 18, Daniel Wortel-London will discuss his new book, The Menace of Prosperity: Economic Development and its Discontents in New York City, 1870–1981, which explores how generations of New Yorkers have struggled with the promises and perils of economic development.
Spanning New York City’s post–Civil War boom to the 1970s fiscal crisis, Wortel-London will reveal how NYC’s strategies for economic development often led to instability and inequality rather than shared prosperity.
RSVP to join us virtually (via Zoom) by clicking here.