The Archives’ online database provides access to detailed descriptions of our holdings, and scans of many of our photographs and maps. You can access the database on any web browser using any device.

Want to explore our collection but don’t know where to start?
We’ve created a quick start guide to help you search the Archives of North Vancouver database like a pro!

GET STARTED
To begin your online exploration, navigate to the MONOVA website monova.ca, and in the drop-down menu, select Archives and then click on the Online Database link on the right side of the page. The direct url to the Archives database is: https://eloquent.dnv.org/nvma/public. A page will open that looks like this:

As you can see you can search our database by:
“Keyword”, “Date”, “Inventory Number”, and “Media Type”.

You can also refine your search to view only digitized materials by checking the box “Scanned images”. This option will restrict the search to photographs, maps and documents where a low-resolution scan is available to view.

Tip: If you hover your cursor over the “?” beside the search box title it provides a brief explanation on how to search using that field.

KEYWORD
Searching by Keyword is the easiest place to start, enter a keyword in the top box, and click the search button and begin your online exploration! You can search by Keyword by entering words found almost anywhere in the descriptive record, including subjects, names, and places.

Did you know search operators can be used?

Wildcard * is used to truncate search terms. Example: mount* will find mounts, mounted, mountains, mountaineer, mountaineering, mountaineers.

AND, OR, NOT logic statements can be used to retrieve synonyms or variant spellings, or to filter undesired results. Example: mountain* and women (or woman) will find records containing references to women or a woman

Exact phrase. Use quotation marks to search for exact words or phrases. Example: “Mount Seymour” will only find records where this name appears exactly as entered. The results would differ using “Seymour Mountain”.

Looking for a specific address? Try looking for specific street addresses by typing in the abbreviated formats such as Lonsdale Ave or 1617 Grand Blvd or 230 E 3rd St.

Tip: Start with simple searches. Try not to complicate things by adding too many limiters in your search.

DATE
Looking for items from a specific time period? Enter a four digit year such as 1945 or a range of years such as 1939…1945 (finds records between 1939 and 1945), 1939… (finds records from 1939 and after), or …1945 (finds records from 1945 and earlier).

INVENTORY NUMBER
When images are displayed or shown on social media there should be an NVMA image number associated with it. If you have that number you can perform a search based on a record’s inventory number, or its related inventory number(s).

MEDIA TYPE
Using this field allows you to restrict the search to a specific type of material like photograph, sound recording, or map.

BROWSE
If you are not sure what you are looking for you can also “browse” the database alphabetically by Collections, Names, and Subjects.

If you click on one of the Collections, Names or Subjects, the database will respond with all the related archival records, such as photographs, interviews, maps, correspondence etc.

Tip: If you get lost, you can always go back to the Database Search page and click “Help” to open a handy “cheat sheet” with all the tips listed above.

SAVE LIST

The results of your search are displayed in pages of 50. You can scroll down each page and move forward and back from page to page using the intuitive icons. Click on any item to see all the descriptive information, such as date, scope and content, it’s location and any access restrictions.

Once you have found what you are looking for, there is an option to help you organize your search results. You can save specific results by clicking on “Save to List” at the top of the item description page (see image above). As you select and add resources from the search results to your list, they are saved and can viewed as a list, see button at the top of the screen. The list feature allows you to save selected items for future use, view list details in a separate browse window, print, or request by email your list of archival records to be retrieved or reproduced by our reference desk staff. When you click on “Request” the database will ask to open your email program on your device to send the email request.

Why wait any longer?
The only limitation is your imagination!!