This collection came to the Historical Society from the office of Donald S. Frey, an Evanston attorney who is a trustee and the executive secretary of the Foundation for Freedom and Democracy in Community Life, and chairman of FOR. He had been interested in civil rights, fair housing in particular, for many years, which probably explains the considerable amount of material prior to 1960 in the collection, Some of these early papers are concerned with the gathering of information, and some with the preliminaries to the formation of FOR.
However, most of the FOR papers deal with the period from 1960 to 1964. They consist of correspondence between the various members of the committee, and with other organizations and interested individuals. Of interest also are the transactions of FOR's administrative committees, FOR's publications on fair housing, the petitions sent to the Illinois legislature, and the questionnaires used for research purposes in 1963.
When processing began, there was no discernible organization to the original files, and consequently the processor set up an organization that seemed most suitable. This consists of the categories: (1) Administrative files, (2) Communications with other organizations, (3) Conferences (FOR), (4) Conferences and meetings of other organizations, (5) Fair housing law campaigns, (6) Fund-raising and publicity, and (7) Miscellany. Materials in each category are filed under subject headings, with the exception of categories concerning conferences, where a chronological arrangement seemed best.
The original papers also contained more than one hundred pamphlets used in gathering information on fair housing and other civil rights. These have been transferred to the Historical Society's library to be catalogued into its pamphlet collection. They may be found there under headings such as Fair Housing or Civil Rights. Material which had no direct connection with Mr. Frey's activities in behalf of Freedom of Residence in Illinois was returned to him at his request. This included files relating to the organization for World Peace Through Law, the Challenge to Christian Citizenship, the Episcopal Church, and the National Council of Churches.
