The Science Fiction and Fantasy Research Database, developed at Texas A&M University, loaded the updated database on 31 December 2006. The database “provides indexing to articles, books, news reports, obituaries, motion picture reviews and other material about science fiction and fantasy.” There is “some coverage of horror, gothic and utopian literature,” but neither fiction nor book reviews are included.
The database provides author, title, and subject listings of more than 75,000 individual items. It’s the electronic equivalent of a card catalog, with no content other than the index information (to access the content, a visit to the library is necessary). According to Curator Hal W. Hall, the database is based “heavily upon the Science Fiction and Fantasy Research Collection in the Cushing Memorial Library and Archives and collections in the Sterling C. Evans Library at Texas A&M, with the substantial assistance of the Interlibrary Loan department of the University Libraries.” Material acquired for indexing from other sources is archived in Science Fiction: Collected Papers, the research file of compiler and sf curator Hal W. Hall.”
In addition to the database files, the Cushing SF Collection houses more than 25,000 books, “some 90% of the science fiction and fantasy magazines published in English, and manuscripts and papers of many science fiction and fantasy writers. The total collection numbers over 43,000 published items, and several hundred linear feet of archival material.”
The database is publicly accessible at library.tamu.edu/cushing/sffrd. The collection, in the Cushing Library, is open weekdays at Texas A&M University, College Station, Texas.