A key development in the history of the Latin American Library was the founding of the Tulane University Latin American Photographic Archive (TULAPA) in 1976. It was a visionary move to establish one of the first such archives in the country devoted exclusively to the region. The archive was established by Thomas Niehaus, Director of the Latin American Library, Tulane professor Humberto Rodríguez-Camilloni, and benefactors Steve and Abbye Gorin.
Rodríguez opened doors in his native Peru, arranging for the purchase of notable photograph collections, which grew substantially with the passage of time. In the last two decades, the archive was renamed the Image Archive to accommodate other visual formats such as design drawings and other artworks, rubbings of Maya stelae, and a growing number of born-digital collections. Displayed are selected images from the library’s extensive collections of 19th- and early-20th-century photographs.