Archives Found

Those of you who visit the site (versus reading along via feed reader) may notice a few changes. I completed several major WordPress upgrades on Sunday (from 2.2.3 to 2.8.1– gulp!), and hopefully that will fix some of the attendant issues that have been plaguing Archives Found headquarters. The layout, blogroll, links and theme here haven’t changed for awhile, and I’ll probably be monkeying around with that over the next few days. Please let me know if you’re having trouble with leaving comments, or with anything else on the site– you can send me an email (archivist at archivesfound.com).

As a result of my post on the certified archivist exam, I’ve been receiving some email about study groups for the CA exam in August. I’m not taking the exam this year (I’m already a CA), but for those who want to study, I understand that there are forums over at the ACA website for that purpose. If you’d like to link up with someone, that’s probably the best place to do so. There are fourteen test sites this year, and so I’d guess that there are a lot of potential “study buddies” out there.

Something I’d like to mention on the personal front– I’ll be leaving my archivist job at the end of August, and starting in the doctoral program at Pitt in the fall.  Never fear, dear readers– I’m certain that I will still have things to talk about here. In fact, as I’ve started to clear out my inbox, I’ve found that I have lots and lots to talk about– as soon as I have time. Fingers crossed for at least one new post this week, and for a few more prior to SAA- Austin. Thanks for reading along!

A common thread that connects archivists to collections is a love of history. “Duh,” you’re thinking. I mean, how original, right? But we might better ask: where does that interest originate? In a culture of change and disposability, how can we further make the argument that history matters? How can we foster the same historical interest in future generations? How can we better share our collections, our knowledge, our love of history with others?

Well, how did we get here in the first place?

One of my earliest school memories is a trip to the Bennington Museum, which was across the street from my elementary school. There’s no telling when the visit took place, but my class went to the museum somewhat bi-monthly over the five years that I attended there. I’m guessing that my first visit was somewhere around 1985, but the date doesn’t really matter. What does matter is the extent to which my imagination was piqued by the artifacts in the museum and by the stories behind them.

After seeing the Bennington Flag (also known as the “Fillmore Flag,” after the donor family) and the flag of the Green Mountain Boys, I started to become interested in Vermont history and the Revolutionary War. While reading everything I could find on these topics, I also talked my parents into taking me to visit many other New England museums. (I may have also wanted to dress up as Ethan Allen for Halloween. But I digress.) While the historical accuracy of the storied Bennington flag may now be the subject of some disagreement, what is indisputable is the impact that these items and their carefully curated stories made on at least this impressionable youth.

How can we make this happen with archives? What sort of evaluation are we doing in our repositories when it comes to intended audiences for exhibits, collections policies, and scope? How are we marketing ourselves, and how are the collections being used? Is the result different from the intent?

How are you marketing yourselves? What have the results been? I’ll be talking about American Archives Month and our results in the next post, and I encourage you to think about that as well. What do you think the point of AAM is, and does it help your institution? How?

Library of Congress Web archive of September 11, 2001

The September 11 Web Archive

Last Saturday, the world of bibliographic control lost a giant, and librarians everywhere lost a friend and mentor. Professor Allen Smith will be remembered by me as a gentle man of many talents, with a wicked sense of humor about the subjects he taught, and about life.

From the notification that was sent out to Simmons students, adjuncts, and alums:

In his life at Simmons, Allen’s contributions were many and his dedication was great. Allen joined the GSLIS faculty in 1978, served as Associate Dean from 2006 to 2007, and was recognized just this past spring for 30 years of service to the College. He lectured in reference, humanities, oral history, and computer programming, and was devoted to those he taught. To many of his students, the words “bibliographic control” will forever live on in their memories, despite the decades it has been since they sat in the seats of C101.

A man of many hats, Allen was a blacksmith (he put himself through graduate school shoeing horses), a folklorist, a librarian, an author, and an expert on the Appalachian dulcimer.

A former student has set up a wiki of Allen-related quotations, and others are swapping Allen stories on Facebook, through email, or by phone.

May all of us have such a huge impact on those we teach and serve.

Today marks my one year anniversary at this job, as well as the beginning of my second year of post-graduate, full-time employment as an archivist.

“I’d like to thank the academy… ”

Really, in a lot of ways, I’m so glad that I took the leap and moved across the country to take this position. While my responsibilities and job focus have shifted in many ways over the past twelve months, I’ve been able to take leadership roles in a number of situations that probably wouldn’t exist in a “lone arranger” position or a smaller repository. I think that my background, graduate school experience, and attitude have helped me to thrive here. Best of all, this is a great fit for me, and an ideal first archivist/records management position.

Happy anniversary to me!

This morning’s brief NYT article about the death of one of the last known survivors of the Titanic made me pause for a moment. Not because I’m a Titanic buff (I’m not, though I do find the story to be fascinating), but because of the mention that the deceased was one of the last two survivors of that fateful journey, a representative of the past. As time marches onward, memories fade and we begin to lose more and more “eyewitnesses” to history. Within my lifetime, the last Holocaust survivor, the last soldier present on D-Day, and others will slowly go “into that good night.” I’m not ready for that to happen yet. As an archivist charged with preserving history, I feel that I am always looking for ways to stave off a time when firsthand accounts are no longer available in the flesh. Of course oral histories look to fill that gap, but are there other things that we can do as keepers of the record to preserve the immediacy of speaking with someone who was there at Normandy? How can we, without overinterpreting or overemphasizing, better bring an accurate sense of the past to the present? What are the best ways to capture these things now, before the opportunity is lost?

I haven’t been around here as much as I’d meant to be, and that’s partly because I’ve been trying too hard. I’ve been struggling to try to keep life and other non-related things outside of the blog, and it’s not really working for me all that well. Additionally, I’ve been having a hard time keeping my “inner editor” in check, but hopefully any readers (and I don’t think there are many) will forgive some rough posts. My life- related journal has been bearing the brunt of the postings lately, and I’m going to attempt to create and maintain more of a balance between the two.

I accepted an archivist position that is, so far, the perfect fit for me. I probably won’t be talking much about job specifics (at least not yet), but I intend to be much more active in here regarding issues that affect and are of interest to archives users and archivists. I have a few projects in the works that I’m planning to discuss here very soon.

So, it’s been awhile. (Vast understatement: it’s been about 10 months.) Fortunately, I don’t think anyone actually reads this except for me… so at least I haven’t left anyone hanging.

Big developments: I finished my masters degree in December, and I’m searching for a job.

Things that are making me think right now:

My freshman college roommate/best friend from college just had her second child. My best friend from high school (well, his wife) just had their first. My brother and his wife have a 6-month old. All of them have homes, and mortgages, and at least a facade of stability. What about me?

Well, Mr. M. and I are renting a small apartment in Boston, and hoping that I’ll find a magnificent job that I love and that will help pay the bills. While I like my current job, it’s a grant, and won’t last for too much longer. Homeownership here is uncomfortably out of reach for us in any realistic sort of way, at least at this point in time. As for the kid question– while we get it ALL of the time, I don’t know how close we are to a non-negative answer. Does that mean that we’re unstable, un-adult, un-American? or just normal?