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Help needed



Good afternoon again!

I am once again in need of the collective wisdom of the list.

A county historical society in a nearby state has been given a very large
(by our standards) collection of records from a major manufacturer that was
formerly based in their county. One of our directors has been in touch with
them about the collection, and the folks there apparently do not have the
staffing, the space, the time or the expertise in the subject matter of the
collection to do anything with it. He has asked them to consider
transferring the collection to us, and they seem to be open to the idea.

Here's where it gets difficult. Aside from expertise in the subject matter
of the collection, we are just as unable to take this on as they are. We
would have to rent space to store it (which can be done), but otherwise we
can do nothing with it. I have been told to write the society a letter
expressing our interest in the collection. My first problem is how to
express that interest in light of the fact that it will simply go into
storage until we have a bullding finished here, probably two to three years
from now at least.

My second problem is a bit dicier. I am expected to use my title as
archivist as bragging rights - "We have a full time archivist, so we should
have your collection," to put it a bit crassly. If I worked in the
collections full-time, that would be fine. But I have a problem making such
a claim when, over a given month, 40% of my time is spent in anything but
archival work.

I can usually be fairly tactful and diplomatic in my writing, but this has
me stumped. Any ideas or advice?

Best wishes,

Thomas Berry, Archivist
Historical Construction Equipment Association
16623 Liberty Hi Road
Bowling Green, Ohio 43402
Phone 419-352-5616
Fax 419-352-6086
tberry@wcnet.org
http://www.hcea.net

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