Scope and Contents: The Toby J. McIntosh Papers comprise copies of documents from Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) files kept on Oberlin College student political activities in the 1960s and 1970s, and a small amount of related materials including an article on government surveillance at Oberlin written by Toby McIntosh for the March/April 1978 issue of the Oberlin Alumni Magazine.
The first folder contains a 1978 letter from an agent in the FBI to Toby McIntosh concerning his request for the release of nine documents under the provisions of the Freedom of Information Act, a copy of his article for the Oberlin Alumni Magazine on FBI surveillance at Oberlin, and miscellaneous, related materials. The other seven folders, representing the bulk of the collection, contain copies of redacted FBI documents and information collected by FBI personnel on Oberlin College students and faculty, and correspondence between intelligence officials dating from 1960 to 1975. They are arranged chronologically.
McIntosh’s copies of FBI documents spanning the era of Civil Rights activism and the Vietnam War document strategies employed by the United States government to compile information on Oberlin student leaders and the college administration’s response to student protest. His papers provide rich sources that highlight Oberlin student leadership in supporting Civil Rights and opposing the Vietnam War.