While the primary mission of the Pennsylvania State Archives is to preserve historic documents in their original format, digital scans have been made of select records to facilitate online research. These scans are available from several sources:

ARIAS (the Archives Records Information Access System)
This resource offers images from digitized microfilm that index and summarize the military service of Pennsylvania soldiers during the following wars and time periods:

• Revolutionary War Military Abstract Card File
• Militia Officers' Index Cards, 1775-1800
• Civil War Veterans' Card File, 1861-1866
• PA National Guard Veterans' Card File, 1867-1921
• Spanish American War Veterans' Card File of United States Volunteers
• Mexican Border Campaign Veterans' Card File
• World War I Service Medal Application Cards

Our Documentary Heritage 
Our Documentary Heritage is a teaching tool that presents images of historical documents from various time periods. Along with the images are narratives placing them in a regional, state, or national context, as well as transcriptions of each record if appropriate and helpful links for further research.

Land Records 
Images of registers, indexes, and surveys from our Record Group 17, Records of the Commonwealth Land Office, provide a wealth of readily available information to both genealogists and property historians. Current series available are:

• Connected Draft Maps 
• Copied Surveys, 1681-1912
• County Maps and Atlases from the 1850s-1870s
• Depreciation Land Register, undated
• Donation Land series, [ca. 1781-1839]
• East Side Applications (Register), 1765-1769
• Last Purchase Warrant Register, 1784
• Luzerne County Certified Townships Register, undated
• Melish-Whiteside Maps, 1816-1821
• New Purchase Register, 1768
• Old Rights Index for Bucks and Chester Counties, 1682-1740
• Original Purchase Register, 1682-1762
• Patent Indexes, 1684-1957
• Patent Tract Name Index, [undated]
• Philadelphia Old Rights (Index), 1682-1745
• Warrant Registers, 1733-1957
• Warrantee Township Maps
• West Side Applications (Register), 1766-1769

Vital Statistics

• The Department of Internal Affairs' Record of Marriages, 1885-1891, is available for viewing online.

Military Records

• War of 1812 Soldiers' Index
• Register of Civil War Volunteers, 1861-1865

Coal Mining

• Databases of Coal Mining Accident Registers, for both the Anthracite and Bituminous Districts, are available for viewing online.

Farm Census, 1927

• The Department of Agriculture's Farm Census for the year 1927 is available for viewing online.

Slavery and the Underground Railroad

• Selected Records

Photographs

• The Guide to Photographs at the Pennsylvania State Archives (Pennsylvania Historical & Museum Commission, 1993) written by Linda Ries (to purchase a copy of this work, please visit Shop PA Heritage) , contains descriptive information for the estimated 350,000 photographs contained in the Archives' collections in the Archives collections up to 1993. Numerous additonal images have been added since that time. For more on current photograph holdings contact archivist Michael Sherbon at 717.772.5070 or msherbon@pa.gov for more information.
• Several series of archival photographs have been digitized in their entirety. To date, one of these series is available for viewing on the internet: Aerial Photographs and Index of the 1940 Aerial Survey of Pennsylvania, 1937-1942, produced by the State Planning Board under the Department of Commerce (Record Group 31).
• Another photograph collection, Manuscript Group 219, the Philadelphia Commercial Museum Photograph Collection, [ca. 1840-1954] is not yet available over the Web, but can be viewed in the Archives Search Room.

Audio Recordings
The State Archives has several series of audio recordings, including oral history interviews and the radio programs of Pete Wambach.

If you need further assistance, you may contact an archivist at ra-statearchives@pa.gov