AT the height of the civil rights movement, two black musicians, a double bassist and a cellist, accused the New York Philharmonic of racial discrimination. It was July 1969, and soon the case, which had been brought before the New York City Commission on Human Rights, was making headlines. The National Urban League called on the orchestra to put affirmative action in place.

The orchestra at the time had a lone black member, one of just a handful in the nation’s five biggest orchestras. In the next months, the Philharmonic contacted music schools, the Ford Foundation and people in the music industry in an almost frantic search for black candidates. It compiled a seven-page list of “Negro Musicians” and summoned several in for special auditions.

The effort is detailed in one tiny part of a mass of archival material made public on Thursday by the New York Philharmonic, the first phase of a project to put most of its vast archives on the Internet.

This phase encompasses the Bernstein years, running from 1943 — when he made his last-minute debut as a substitute for an ailing Bruno Walter — to 1970, the year after his formal tenure ended. During that period the orchestra opened its doors to women, toured extensively, moved to Lincoln Center and entered the television age. The first release will include 1.3 million pages when finished next year. The next two phases will cover 1842, the founding year, to 1908; and 1909 to 1943.