About the National Union Catalog of Manuscript Collections (NUCMC)

The mission of the NUCMC program is to provide and promote bibliographic access to the nation's documentary heritage. This mission is realized by NUCMC production of cataloging describing archival and manuscript collections held by eligible repositories located throughout the United States and its territories. The program's mission is further realized by the provision of free searching, via NUCMC gateways, of archival and manuscript cataloging in OCLC WorldCat.

A free-of-charge cooperative cataloging program operated by the Library of Congress, the National Union Catalog of Manuscript Collections (NUCMC) creates online records in OCLC WorldCat on behalf of eligible archival repositories throughout the United States.

On the basis of information describing manuscript collections, NUCMC catalogers create bibliographic records in MARC21 (Machine-readable Cataloging) format describing the collection and establishing pertinent name and subject authority headings. If a repository is interested in publicizing its hidden collections but does not feel that it has the resources at the present time to cooperate with NUCMC in the production of collection-level records, NUCMC staff will be glad to work with the repository to produce a single, repository-level bibliographic record which will describe the repository's holdings in a general way and highlight special collection interests and strengths.

The benefit to you, as an eligible repository, is the provision of international access to information describing your collections. Researchers will know where to find your unique, one of a kind collections and be able to contact your organization to use the material for their research. Generally, the number of researchers using your collections will increase due to your increased exposure through inclusion in OCLC WorldCat.

The NUCMC Team uses descriptive information that you supply using our data sheet to prepare a catalog record for you. The team does not arrange and describe or write finding aids for your collections nor do we advise on the arrangement process. NUCMC's services are provided totally free-of-charge, as long as your institution qualifies as a participant.