Meek-Eaton Black Archives at FAMU in Tallahassee, Florida

The Meek-Eaton Black Archives Research Center and Museum, known as MEBA, is Florida A&M University's archive and museum of African American history, housed in the 1908 Carnegie Library on the FAMU campus in Tallahassee.

The Florida Department of State describes MEBA as home to the largest repository of African American history and culture in the southeastern United States, with more than 500,000 archival records and 5,000 museum artifacts, and says approximately 160,000 people visit each year. The same release calls the building a nationally designated historic Carnegie Library and the oldest brick building at Florida A&M University. A 2025 FAMU News release adds that MEBA is one of only a handful of federally designated repositories for African American history and culture.

The archives are spread over more than one building. FAMU's MEBA home page says the Black Archives comprises three facilities: the Carnegie Library, the Union Bank and an Expansion Facility. Its motto, from founder James N. Eaton, is that African American history is the history of America.

The Black Archives grew out of a 1971 Florida Legislature mandate to create a state repository of source material on African Americans, and FAMU dates the institution itself to 1976.

FAMU's About page quotes the mandate: a repository to serve the state by collecting and preserving source material on and about African Americans from ancient to present times. The page lists Joseph Lang Kershaw, Sr. and Arthenia L. Joyner under the heading The Vision: How it Started, and a 2025 FAMU News release says the archives was created in the early 1970s after the legislative efforts of Joe Lang Kershaw, Sr., with founder James N. Eaton, Sr. leading the new institution in Tallahassee.

The Department of State and FAMU both give 1976 as the founding year. The state historical marker at 445 Gamble Street says that in 1976 FAMU President Benjamin Perry, Jr. designated the Carnegie Library as the home of the Black Archives Research Center and Museum. The archives are named for Eaton, a former FAMU history professor and the founding director, and for the late U.S. Congresswoman Carrie Meek, according to the Department of State release.

The Carnegie Library at FAMU opened in 1908 as the first Carnegie library built on a Black land-grant college campus, paid for by a $10,000 gift from Andrew Carnegie.

The 1978 National Register nomination says the college's main building, Duval Hall, which held the library, burned in December 1905, and that in July 1906 President Nathan Young reported $10,000 had been obtained from Carnegie, on the condition that the college stock the library with books. The completed library was dedicated in February 1908. FAMU's Carnegie Library page says the two-story brick building had electricity, indoor plumbing and city-supplied water, and the state marker says it was the first brick veneer building on the campus, built at the former location of Highwood Plantation.

FAMU says the Black Archives houses more than 500,000 individual archival records, including manuscripts, rare books, journals, magazines, maps, newspapers and photographs.

FAMU's MEBA home page says some of those holdings are unique resources not available at other research facilities, and its Learn page posts finding aids and digital objects, a patron registration form for research and archival access, and an image use license request form. The same page says FAMU and the Black Archives are assessing past and current descriptive practices, with particular attention to remediating outdated or harmful language in collection records.

Exhibits change over time. A 2025 FAMU News release announced Beyond Black Beauty, an exhibit on African American beauty, identity and resistance curated by director Timothy Barber, which opened to the public on Saturday, April 12, 2025, at the Tallahassee museum. The release says the hair-care brand Mielle invested $50,000 in direct funding to the exhibit and to support the research of a FAMU history professor.

The Meek-Eaton Black Archives has operated the 1841 Union Bank on Apalachee Parkway in Tallahassee as a second site since 1995, according to the Museum of Florida History.

The Department of State calls the Union Bank Florida's oldest surviving bank building. Its release says the building was moved in 1971 from the west side of Adams Street, between College and Park Avenues, to its current site just east of the Historic Capitol Museum, and first opened as a museum in 1984 after restoration. The Museum of Florida History says the Department of State's Division of Historical Resources refreshed the building in 2023 with paint, wood and stucco repairs and accessibility upgrades.

When the bank reopened on February 10, 2024, its new exhibit on the building's history was a collaboration between the Museum of Florida History and MEBA. The state museum's Union Bank visit page now lists the Union Bank Museum at 219 Apalachee Parkway as open Friday and Saturday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., with free admission and group tours by appointment at (850) 245-6400.

Timothy Barber is the director of the Meek-Eaton Black Archives, and FAMU announced on October 8, 2025, that MEBA had won a $500,000 grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services.

The FAMU News release says the award came through the IMLS Museum Grants for African American History and Culture program and was MEBA's second IMLS award in three years. Barber said it would advance phase two of the archives' 21st Century Access Program, expand digital access and support a multi-year internship program for FAMU students in Tallahassee. The grant also supports collection care, digitization initiatives such as MEBA Digital, educational programming and public engagement.

FAMU's MEBA news page describes MEBA Digital as a digital archive platform with two portals, EXPLORE for artifacts and LEARN for archival holdings and finding aids, making the Tallahassee collections accessible worldwide.

FAMU's visit page lists the Meek-Eaton Black Archives as open Tuesday through Friday and on Saturdays, with no admission fee and self-guided tours, though another FAMU page gives Monday through Friday hours.

The visit page asks visitors to call in advance and notes that museum entry closes one hour before the listed closing time. Groups of 10 or more should call (850) 599-3020 to schedule a group tour, and reservations go to blackarchives@famu.edu with a tour request form. Visitors and groups coming to the FAMU campus in Tallahassee must obtain a parking decal from Parking Services, which enforces parking 24/7.

The archives are also a stop on the step-on guided tours of the City-run John G. Riley Center & Museum, which lists the Meek-Eaton Black Archives with Smokey Hollow, Frenchtown, Old Lincoln High School, the Old Capitol, the Union Bank and the Knott House Museum.

Last verified: October 18, 2026, against FAMU's MEBA home, About, Learn, visit, news and Carnegie Library pages, two FAMU News releases from 2025, the Department of State's Union Bank release and Carnegie Library marker, the Carnegie Library National Register nomination and two Museum of Florida History pages.