German Broadcasting Archive

The German Broadcasting Archive (Deutsches Rundfunkarchiv, or DRA) is a non-profit foundation of civil law based in Germany. Jointly supported by the ARD consortium of public broadcasters and Deutschlandradio, it serves as a central repository for the auditory and audiovisual heritage of German broadcasting. The institution operates from two locations: Frankfurt am Main and Potsdam-Babelsberg. Its collections encompass essential and significant portions of Germany's broadcast history, reflecting the development of radio and television from their earliest days, with particular strengths in the archives of the ARD and the broadcasting entities of the German Democratic Republic (GDR).

On November 11, 1950, the directors of the ARD broadcasting institutions agreed to establish a joint sound archive. The institution was officially founded on January 1, 1952, under the name Lautarchiv des Deutschen Rundfunks (Sound Archive of German Broadcasting), with its seat at Hessischer Rundfunk in Frankfurt am Main. In February 1953, it gained approval as a foundation. Initially focused on audio, its mandate expanded in 1962 to include the documentation of television productions. Since 1974, the DRA has co-published the specialist journal Rundfunk und Geschichte with the Studienkreis Rundfunk und Geschichte. Following German reunification, the DRA assumed trusteeship of the radio and television archives of the GDR in 1992, a role made permanent in 1994, and administered the DRA Scholarship for research into GDR broadcasting and media history from 1994 to 2002. The 2010s brought significant restructuring; in 2011, the ARD directors declined to renew the contract of then-director Hans-Gerhard Stülb, appointing Michael Crone as interim head before jurist Bernd Hawlat assumed leadership in early 2013. The archive's annual budget has remained nearly constant at 12 million euros since 2005, representing less than 0.2 percent of broadcasting fee revenues in 2010.

The DRA holds extensive collections of sound and image documents, written records, printed media such as books and magazines, and material witnesses. The Frankfurt am Main location focuses on contemporary history and music recordings from the dawn of sound recording, including historical sound carriers like phonograph cylinders, foil records, shellac and vinyl records, and piano rolls. It also archives written records and printed publications on the program and corporate history of German broadcasting before 1945, the GDR, and the ARD. The Potsdam-Babelsberg location houses the audiovisual legacy of GDR radio (1945 to 1991) and television (1952 to 1991), comprising approximately 180,000 film cans, 120,000 video cassettes, 10,000 DVDs, and roughly 450,000 word and music sound carriers. The archive is gradually digitizing its holdings. Its databases are available to public service broadcasters as well as for scientific, research, educational, and cultural purposes. Private individuals and commercial entities may access the collections for a fee where legally permissible. The DRA also oversees the Central Record Cataloging (ZSK) for ARD and ZDF.

A major component of the DRA's holdings is the comprehensive audiovisual estate of GDR broadcasting, which includes the radio archives from 1945 to 1991 and the television archives from 1952 to 1991. This material formed the basis for the 2020 online archive offering ARD Retro, where the DRA contributed digitized videos from the Deutsche Fernsehfunk under the theme Retro Spezial DDR, focusing particularly on early television broadcasts from the 1950s and 1960s. Additionally, the DRA curates the ARD radio play database, which documents the history of German radio plays. This database contains records of productions produced by or with the ARD, as well as historical radio plays from the Reichsrundfunkgesellschaft during the Weimar era and radio plays from GDR radio.

The DRA's second location, initially established in Berlin-Adlershof following the 1992 absorption of the GDR archives, was permanently relocated to a newly constructed building in the state capital of Potsdam. This new facility was inaugurated on December 6, 2000. It is situated on the grounds of Rundfunk Berlin-Brandenburg (rbb) within the media city of Babelsberg, replacing the former Berlin-Adlershof site to better house and manage the substantial audiovisual collections inherited from East Germany.

The German Broadcasting Archive operates at its two sites in Frankfurt am Main and Potsdam-Babelsberg. It is jointly owned and supported by the ARD member broadcasters, which include Saarländischer Rundfunk, Rundfunk Berlin-Brandenburg, Südwestrundfunk, Hessischer Rundfunk, Bayerischer Rundfunk, Mitteldeutscher Rundfunk, Norddeutscher Rundfunk, Radio Bremen, Westdeutscher Rundfunk, and Deutsche Welle, alongside Deutschlandradio. Beyond physical preservation, the DRA maintains an active digital presence. Following a major website relaunch in 2018, it introduced a new thematic portal in 2019 featuring multimedia dossiers on broadcasting history. The institution also collaborates on the ARD-Zeitlupe event database to assist editorial departments and publishes an annual preview of historical anniversaries on its website. Access to its collections is provided for public broadcasting, research, and educational purposes, with commercial and private access available for a fee.