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Re: Archival statistics - not the usual reference kind



Melissa (and fellow listers):

This query sounds like the phrase, "How long is a piece of string?"
Nevertheless, however difficult it may be to actually quantify an answer
from any particular angle, let me share the following.

In my past life with the archival and artifact collections unit of the
California State Railroad Museum, we were called upon by the now-defunct
Southern Pacific Transportation Company (since absorbed by the Union Pacific
Railroad) to make repeated trips to its former San Francisco headquarters
building and nearby warehouses to sort, receive and transport thousands of
cubic feet of its historic business and railroad engineering records.

Bear in mind that SP, like many San Francisco-based businesses, had to begin
from "ground zero" to rebuild its records base from the horrible fire of
1906. Nevertheless, the amount of paper that particular entity created until
its dissolution was enormous!

        CSRM decided early-on in the process to take not much more from San
Francisco than perhaps 2% of that which was made available by SP, which all
told amounted to around 2000 cf. None of this amount includes materials
received prior to 1980, or from other SP resource locations.
        The greater portion of whatever CSRM could not take (and much was
not particularly useful, or was redundant) was shredded or went to
landfills, although limited but significant historic materials were conveyed
to other historical preservation groups and archival or library facilities
around the vast SP system.

        Kevin V. Bunker
        Student Assistant
        CA State Archives

> ----------
> From:         Melissa Mannon[SMTP:melissa@MANNON.ORG]
> Reply To:     Archives & Archivists
> Sent:         Friday, November 03, 2000 12:56 AM
> To:   ARCHIVES@LISTSERV.MUOHIO.EDU
> Subject:      Archival statistics - not the usual reference kind
>
> Dear colleagues,
>
> I am looking for statistics related to accessing and caring for historical
> records.  Specifically, I would like to know how much of our country's
> archival material is estimated to be sitting in attics and basements in
> need
> of a persistent archivist's help - How much personal material, corporate
> records, government records?  How much valuable archival material is
> estimated to have been destroyed over our country's history?  How much
> time
> do researchers or caretakers of historical records spend looking for
> materials in a disorganized storage setting as opposed to an organized
> archives?  I'm not sure anyone has gathered these kinds of statistics and
> realize some are pretty obscure.  I didn't find any info. in the Archives
> List archives.  I've also searched Library Lit. and the Web.
>
> As a consultant, I am working toward convincing the powers that be of the
> need to devote more monetary resources and attention to archives.  I'd
> like
> to get some hard and fast statistics to assist with an article that I'm
> writing on the subject.
>
> Thanks as always for your assistance!
> Melissa
>
> Melissa Mannon
> Archivist
> Archives and Information Consulting Services
> www.mannon.org/archives
>
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>

A posting from the Archives & Archivists LISTSERV List!

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      In body of message:  SUB ARCHIVES firstname lastname
                    *or*:  UNSUB ARCHIVES
To post a message, send e-mail to archives@listserv.muohio.edu

Or to do *anything* (and enjoy doing it!), use the web interface at
     http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/archives.html

Problems?  Send e-mail to Robert F Schmidt <rschmidt@lib.muohio.edu>