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Re: Ethics of Copies
Erik & Colleagues:
A variant of this predicament occured twice over between my former employer
and 1) the Smithsonian; 2) the Allen County Museum in Ohio.
Two distinctive and immense collections were in need of preservation,
consisting of 1) rare locomotive technical drawings from a prominent
domestic locomotive manufacturer and 2) glass plate and film negatives from
a major railroad carbuilder. In both cases, the collections were so large as
to be unaffordable for any institution if left whole/intact.
My former employer and the two other institutions split the collections
roughly in half. All cooperators then prepared an itemized finding aid/union
list which was interchanged gratis. This way the public is able to research
from the collection as a whole, and each institution gains visibility and
promotes shared resources. Furthermore, each institution maintains its own
reproduction permits/standards and fee schedules (which are also appended to
the exchanged finding aids and periodically updated).
To my mind, this method seems preferable than the releasing of a collection
in whole or in part to what might be perceived as a "hostile" or competitive
entity, however noble the new institution's purposes might be.
Perhaps the company town/mining museum authority could receive copies of a
limited number of plans and historic documents for exhibition purposes, with
a fair-use or restrictive-use covenant in place. In further exchange, the
new museum might do well to agree to a referral program whereby your
friend's collection is easily surveyed and accessed by researchers (perhaps
by intermediary or other discrete means).
My 2 cents worth...
Kevin V. Bunker
Student Assistant
CA State Archives
> ----------
> From: Erik Nordberg[SMTP:enordber@MTU.EDU]
> Reply To: Archives & Archivists
> Sent: Wednesday, January 31, 2001 11:12 AM
> To: ARCHIVES@LISTSERV.MUOHIO.EDU
> Subject: Ethics of Copies
>
> I'm hoping that some of you might be able to offer some advice for a
> colleague who is off-list. He is in a rather delicate position concerning
> use of, and copying from, his manuscript holdings.
>
> He has a large collection of architectural / oversize engineering drawings
> that document a company-built mining town. A new organization has been
> established to preserve and interpret the history of this town. This new
> institution has acquired a surprising amount of money, space and staff for
> preservation of historic structures, interpretive programs -- and also to
> develop a museum / archives facility at the site.
>
> The problem is that this new institution has approached my colleague about
> copying large portions of his collection that pertain to buildings still
> standing in the town. In some cases, they have simply said "we need
> copies
> of everything about these ten buildings -- copy them and send the invoice
> along." They claim that they need them to carry out ongoing structure
> rehabilitation work -- which he agrees is a legitimate use of the copies.
> His superiors, however, fear they simply plan to use the copies to build
> their own collection of town-specific archival material.
>
> I've told him about standard professional courtesy in "not depositing
> copies at other institutions," but this is an unusual case where the
> copies
> will have lasting utility to the new museum. The drawings were preserved
> because of their evidentiary value -- now there is a primary need for
> them.
> Yet, on the other hand, he doesn't want to run the risk that the new
> museum's archives will retain the copies and provide reference access as
> part of their "public" collections. My colleague is within an hour's
> drive
> of the site.
>
> How does he assist them in their work without undermining the uniqueness
> of
> his collections? We keep the stuff so it can be used, right?
>
> Thanks in advance,
> Erik Nordberg
> Michigan Tech
>
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A posting from the Archives & Archivists LISTSERV List!
To subscribe or unsubscribe, send e-mail to listserv@listserv.muohio.edu
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>