The Champaign County Historical Archives at The Urbana Free Library is pleased to announce a newly processed collection now available to researchers. The Stephen Storch Photography Collection has been rehoused thanks to a grant from the Illinois State Historical Records Advisory Board. The Stephen Storch Photography Collection contains photographs and negatives taken by local photographer and Urbana High School teacher, Stephen Storch. Storch photographed a wide variety of local events, from family photos, graduations, weddings, and bar and bat mitzvahs, to sports teams and company events between 1968 and 2000. One of the events he regularly photographed was the Cotillion Ball, which is still in existence. The Cotillion celebrates local African American high school students. Images from the Cotillion have been digitized and many are available to view, organized by year, on our Flickr account.
The collection contains over 80,000 negatives and a small number of photographs. Patrons are encouraged to view an alphabetized index of Storch’s photography subjects to search by name. This collection significantly increases the visual representation of our local community over a span of 30 years.
If you have any questions, please contact archives staff at archives@urbanafree.org or 217-367-4025.