Welcome Back!

The Archives Committee is delighted to announce the re-opening of the Canadian Quaker Library and Archives (CQLA) on May 2, 2022. The continued closure of the Pickering College campus due to the pandemic requires continued limitations of access to the CQLA to everyone but Michelle Tolley, the CYM Archivist. However, this access is allowing work to be done and enables the receipt of deposits of Canadian Quaker records! Michelle can be reached at .

For anyone seeking information regarding our library or vault holdings, updated inventory lists can be found at quaker.ca/archives/our-collection. For those requesting genealogical information, we recommend a visit to www.ancestry.ca (there is free access at many public libraries), as our earliest records are available there.

Many transcriptions of those early records, historic journals, and much more are also available on the Canadian Friends Historical Association website.

Your gateway to the history of Quakers in Canada

The Canadian Quaker Archives, composed of the Arthur Garrett Dorland Reference Library and the vault, are located at Pickering College in Newmarket, Ontario.

On this website you will find information about the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) in Canada from the 1700s onwards. This includes indexes to our collection as well as transcriptions of the early records of Quaker Meetings.

More transcriptions, newsletters and information on Canadian Quakers may also be found on the website of the Canadian Friends Historical Association.

Genealogists will also find our early Quaker records on www.ancestry.ca.

The Canadian Quaker Archives welcomes inquiries from researchers and genealogists. The Archives Committee will answer as soon as possible. Visits are currently suspended due to covid restrictions at the Pickering College campus but will be welcomed by appointment once this is possible.