Goodness, sounds like you have a large task ahead! Take some aspirin for
the hurting head, and start to work. As you get organized about it, it will
seem less onerous.
I'm not a trained archivist, but I've dealt with some very large unorganized
paper collections. I'm not sure of all the nuances of your situation, and
archivists on the list might have better solutions, but I think you would
carefully start working your way through whatever the existing order is.
Hopefully the previous person at least left stuff in some sort of groups,
boxes or such, and you should pay attention to and retain existing order and
grouping as much as possible so you don't loose relationship clues. You
probably will begin to see patterns in how the previous person organized and
stored things which may provide clues, such as chronology, to matching with
deeds.
First, sort boxes of deeds and correspondence you mention and alphabetize by
name so you'll be more likely to recognize groups of deeded items if you
come across them.
Then start on the material. Depending on how well the previous person kept
groups of things from one individual together, you will keep the groupings,
or, if there is no apparent retention of original groupings, start to gather
items that obviously have some relationship (such as a bunch of papers with
individual or family name or everything from a particular event or
community). Set up temporary file folders or boxes so they can be added to
if you find more. Pencil key words on the folders.
As the files and boxes kind of 'firm up' as a group, give each group a basic
number that can later have decimals added if you want to later record some
items individually. Figure out any sensible way that works with your
existing system. Number the folders or boxes and use the Archives tab in
Past Perfect to begin record keeping for each group. (You'll see in the
first screen a place to put if the 'item' is a folder, item or series and
the description is for the whole group of items.) You might create a number
that becomes recognizable as meaning "found in early archives without
number". For all those that do not match a deed, you could use a term such
as 'Early Archives" as the Collection name, to save having to create
hundreds of new accessions. For instance, if you used a unique accession
number such as "0000-01" as the accession number for the whole unknown
collection, you would then add to it, -- 0000-01-001-- for the object ID
number for the first folder or box, and so on. If you later find a deed,
you can edit to add a donor's name ("Source" in PP) but it would be good to
keep the same ID number as a record that this group was originally found
without attribution in case there's later a question about it (there's a
place to record previous numbers should there have been one).
Match up what you can. Matching will be easier after the groups are in PP so
you can do word or associated name searches. Hopefully some matches will
turn up. You may never match everything up with deeds of gift, but at least
you can get them into some kind of retrieval system. In the fourth tab in
PP ' conditions of Access' under legal status, I think you would put
'unknown' or 'no deed' for all those that can't be matched up.
As for the photos -eventually you'll want to catalog them separately, but
until all possible relationships are discovered, it might be best to leave
them with the group they are found with. (But pop them into a mylar sleeve
for protection from the other papers.)
Good luck --and just keep thinking what a service you are doing for future
curators and researchers!!
Lucy Sperlin
Patrick Ranch
Chico, CA
_____
From: Museum discussion list [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf
Of Pamela Elbe
Sent: Wednesday, July 06, 2005 2:25 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Accessioning archival materials to museum collection
I'm looking for suggestions on how to handle a significant amount of
archival materials (personal memoirs, military records, correspondence) and
photographs donated to my museum over nearly a decade (late 1980s to
mid-1990s) from hundreds of individuals. The then-archivist had the donors
sign deeds of gift giving title and applicable rights to the museum, but he
never assigned accession numbers for these donations (but he did assign
accession numbers for 3-D objects). In some cases where the donor gave both
archival materials and three-dimension objects he obtained two deeds-one for
the archives and one for the 3-D collection.
Here's my problem: there is no good way to keep track of what we have deeds
for and what we don't as far as the archives are concerned. I currently
have my accession files for the museum collection (all of which are in our
collections database) and then boxes of deeds and correspondence for all of
the stuff that was never formally accessioned (none of which are in our
database). We use PastPerfect for the 3-D collection and plan to
(eventually) have all of museum collections-3-D, archival, photographic-in
PastPerfect. This won't be a problem for all of the material that was
acquired mid-1990s to present because everything has been assigned an
accession number and there is only one deed of gift per donation, but I need
to figure out how to handle all of the material that wasn't formally
accessioned.
My instinct is to assign accession numbers as I work through these files,
but this will end up being a couple of hundred accessions when all is said
and done. Is this a good or bad idea? Any suggestions? There are so many
little, tangential problems (never having had a complete database, multiple
files, no clear policy. you name it) in addition to the big problem
mentioned above that it makes my head hurt.
Pamela Elbe
Collections Manager and Archivist
National Museum of American Jewish Military History
1811 R St. NW, Washington DC 20009
p: 202.265.6280 x201
f: 202.462.3192
http://www.nmajmh.org <http://www.nmajmh.org/>
Don't miss our new exhibition, Reconnaissance and Recollection: Military and
Civilian Photographs from World War II-the photographs of Sy Weinstein.
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