The broadcast archive of William F. Buckley Jr.'s television series Firing Line is at the Hoover Institution Archives. Firing Line was broadcast from 1966 to 1999, first as an hour-long program and later as a half-hour show, with occasional specials and two-hour debates. The Preface to the program catalogue explains the program's broadcast history, format, and numbering system. All programs are described and program guests are identified in a searchable database.

The Firing Line collection includes videotapes of 1,505 shows, as well as transcripts, still photographs, preparation materials, and other items. Although the material available for each program varies, it is all described in the collection guide.

The Hoover Institution is preserving the original videotapes onto modern video formats (see the slideshow). Priority for preservation is given to the most endangered videotapes and on recommendations from users. More than 500 videotapes have been reformatted. Of these, more than 120 are available for purchase from Amazon ($10/episode) with five-minute video clips available on YouTube. The lower-quality clips on YouTube are not indicative of the high-quality videos available for purchase on DVD. Those preserved programs that are not available on Amazon may be purchased by special order ($20 plus shipping). The 500 plus reformatted programs can be viewed in their entirety in the Hoover Archives reading room. At this time, the non-reformatted programs cannot be viewed by researchers.

If you have questions about Firing Line, please contact the assistant archivist for Visual Collections.

Firing Line videos, transcripts, photographs, and other materials are copyrighted by the Board of Trustees of Leland Stanford Junior University; they may not be published or reproduced in whole or in part without the express written permission of the director of the Hoover Library and Archives. Send requests for permission to the director of the Hoover Institution Library and Archives, Hoover Institution, Stanford, CA 94305-6010.

Support for preservation been provided by the Mericos Foundation and the National Television and Video Preservation Foundation.

© 2011