When astronomer Elizabeth Griffin attended the annual International Astronomical Union meeting three years ago in Manchester, England, she issued a challenge to the assembly: Rescue photographic observations. For nearly a century, until digital detectors became common in the late 1980s, star spectra were routinely recorded on photographic plates. But the three million or so plates across the globe are at risk of disappearing owing to neglect and natural disasters. Griffin's challenge is now under the auspices of an IAU working group and the World Spectra Heritage, a nonprofit organization that is attempting to raise $1.5 million to digitize spectrographic plates.