Our Research Centre is open for self-guided research including access to a wide range of Archive and research resources from 10am to 5pm daily (closed Christmas day).
Download our detailed Research Guide here.
The following resources are available from the Research Centre:
Family history
If you have ancestors who settled in Otago or Southland, use the Otago and Southland Early Settlers (OASES) database to find out more. OASES is a digital genealogy catalogue which draws upon more than 300 primary sources and comprises data on more than 160,000 people with Otago/southland connections and or ancestry.
Portraits
Search a manual index of over 7,000 photographic portraits held in our Archive. Please ask a Visitor Host for access to view digital images from the index.
Early Dunedin photographs
We have a collection of more than 4,000 individual photographic prints which are organised by subjects such as streets, suburbs, transport, and public events.
Please ask a Visitor Host for access to an index and to view images of this collection.
Passenger lists
The Research Centre holds indexed transcripts of newspaper shipping columns and lists of assisted immigrants to Otago.
Archives New Zealand is the official repository for all of New Zealand passenger lists though unfortunately Otago’s provincial era immigration passenger lists do not survive.
Military
Search military records held by The Auckland War Memorial Museum Tāmaki Paenga Hiravia their Online Cenotaph website.
View the Dunedin Roll of Honour that has been created by Toitū from a wide variety of sources.
Thomas Burn's visitation book
View a copy of the earliest informal census created by Reverend Thomas Burns which records residents of Dunedin from 1848 to 1858.
Reference library
Browse our selection of books on local history.
Railway images
View a selection of railway images from our Rockliff and Emerson collections
