More product, less process: Revamping traditional archival processing

American Archivist

Volumn 68, Issue 2, 2005, Pages 208-263

  Greene, Mark A ^a   Meissner, Dennis ^a  

^a NONE

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[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 79959286648     PISSN: 03609081     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.17723/aarc.68.2.c741823776k65863     Document Type: Article

References (117)

1. Best Value and Local Authority Archives, section on "Competition, " n.d. (c. 2003), http://www.bestvalueforarchives. org.uk/competition.htm (accessed 25 May 2004). The Best Value program is an overall effort to modernize and improve public services at the local level in Great Britain. The report continues: "The Archival Mapping Project shows that the cataloguing function of archive services is clearly not working properly. It revealed that 52% of local archives have large cataloguing backlogs, resulting in a denial of public access to collections of local and national significance, and only 8% have good coverage of their holdings."
2. T. R. Schellenberg, The Management of Archives (New York: Columbia University Press, 1965), 109.
3. Judith M. Panitch, Special Collections in ARL Libraries: A Report of the 1998 Survey (Washington, D.C.: Association of Research Libraries, 2001).
4. Jeff Suchanek and Mark Greene, unpublished results of survey conducted for the SAA Congressional Papers Roundtable.
5. The survey, summary results of which are included as Appendix A, was sent via e-mail in January 2004 along with a cover letter to all the members of SAA's Manuscript Repository and Description sections. A total of 1,107 surveys were e-mailed, and 100 were returned. Based on a 10% sample, it appears that approximately 110 individuals are members of both sections, reducing the true number of potential recipients to 897. Because each repository was asked to return only one survey, but may have had several individuals in the sections, the response rate cannot be calculated against the surveys sent-so far there has been insufficient time to determine how many repositories were sent the survey. The respondents included 64 C&U archives, 7 independent research libraries, 7 religious institutions, 6 state archives or historical societies, 5 county or local government archives or historical societies, 3 museum archives, 1 public library, 7 other. The holdings size represented by the respondents ranged from 125 feet to 104,000 feet; the average quantity of new material acquired each year ranged from 0 to 2,222. We are extremely grateful to those who responded to what was not a simple survey. In some instances, whole staffs worked together to gather the necessary data. An anonymous version of the entire data set is available for review at: http://ahc.vwyo.edu/nhprcresearch
6. For example, the National Council on Archives published British Archives: The Way Forward, in 2000, www.ncaonline.org.uk/materials/ britisharchivesthewayforward.pdf (accessed 17 September 2005)
7. which declared, "A programme of assistance to archive repositories to open up the large backlogs of valuable archives that are languishing inaccessibly in their strongrooms would revolutionise access to our archival heritage (p. 14)." Also from the U.K., see Chris Pickford, Southeast Regional Archives Strategy (2001), http://www.semlac.org.uk/docs/archives.pdf (accessed 25 May 2004), 12ff
8. and the National Council on Archives, Work Plan for 2002-04 http://www.ncaonline.org.uk/about-work- plan-for-20024.html (accessed 25 May 2004).
9. In Canada see, for example, "Department of Supply and Services-Provincial Archives of New Brunswick," Report of the Auditor General [of New Brunswick] (2001) 175ff, http://www.gnb.ca/oag-bvg/2001/chap8e. pdf (accessed 26 May 2004).
10. See also Report of the Director of the National Archives [of Ireland] for 2000, 26, http://www.nationalarchives.ie/about/ reports/DirectorReport2000.pdf (accessed 26 May 2004).
11. Ann D. Gordon, Using the Nation's Documentary Heritage: The Report of the Historical Documents Study (Washington, D.C., 1992), 46.
12. See also Karen Dawley Paul, The Documentation of Congress: Report of the Congressional Archivists Roundtable Task Force on Congressional Documentation (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1992), 6, 143
13. where a survey respondent is quoted as saying "there are too many unprocessed collections," and Bruce W. Dearstyne, "What Is the Use of Archives? A Challenge for the Profession," American Archivist 50 (Winter 1987): 82, who laments unprocessed collections found in the state assessment reports of California, Kentucky, North Carolina, and New York.
14. See Appendix B. The co-investigators attempted to contact a large number of users for this survey, specifically by posting to several H-NET lists in April 2004. However, with the exception of a message that accidentally made it onto H-DIPLO, they were told it was impermissible to post surveys without the express consent of the H-NET board of directors. Despite repeated attempts, the board has never taken up the request. This made our survey of users much smaller than it was intended to be, but we were still able to survey a broad set of users. We asked researchers at both the Minnesota Historical Society and the American Heritage Center to voluntarily complete the same survey form. MHS researchers are predominantly genealogists and lay researchers, and 27 responded; at the AHC, most users are undergraduates, and 7 responded. We received 10 responses from the impermissible posting to H-DIPLO, primarily faculty and graduate students. And we received 14 responses from a posting of the survey to NYHISTLED, a mixture of faculty, high school teachers, students, and lay researchers. As of 1 September 2004, then, we had received 48 user survey responses, from a fair cross-section of user types. This is not a scientifically valid sample, but it is nonetheless suggestive. Twenty-nine of the respondents had visited 2-5 repositories (another 12 had experience in 6 or more repositories), and 26 respondents had visited both manuscript repositories and institutional archives, so as a group the users are reasonably experienced. Twelve respondents said that they had been denied access to unprocessed collections at one or more repositories-that is an overall rate of 25%.
15. The archival literature documenting the vastness of late twentieth-century records and manuscripts is itself vast. The four best-known articles are F. Gerald Ham, "Archival Choices: Managing the Historical Records in an Age of Abundance," American Archivist 47 (Winter 1984): 11-22;
16. Helen Samuels, "Who Controls the Past?" American Archivist 49 (Spring 1986): 109-24;
17. Leonard Rapport, "No Grandfather Clause: Reappraising Accessioned Records," American Archivist 44 (Spring 1981): 143-50;
18. David Bearman, Archival Methods,"Archives and Museum Informatics Technical Report, vol. 3, no. 1 (Spring 1989): 1-5.
19. Megan Desnoyers, "When Is It Processed?" Midwestern Archivist 7 (1982): 7. To a remarkable extent, Desnoyers identified and proposed practical solutions to the problems of status quo processing; sadly her article has been largely ignored in the subsequent literature.
20. North East Regional Archives Council, An Archives Strategy for the North East of England (2001) 21 http://www.nemlac.co.uk/resources/Archives%20Strategy. pdf (accessed 25 May 2004).
21. Oliver W. Holmes, "Archival Arrangement-Five Different Options at Five Different Levels," in A Modern Archives Reader, ed. Maygene F. Daniels and Timothy Walch (Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Service, 1984), 177
22. (originally published in American Archivist 27 [January 1964]:21-41).
23. See also, T. R. Schellenberg, "Archival Principles of Arrangement," in A Modern Archives Reader, 158
24. (originally published in American Archivist 24 [January 1961]: 11-24).
25. Kathleen D. Roe, in her manual Arranging & Describing Archives & Manuscripts (Chicago: Society of American Archivists, 2005), 34-35, notes, however, that item-level arrangement and description was the norm in manuscript repositories until the 1950s.
26. Ruth B. Bordin and Robert M. Warner, The Modern Manuscript Library (New York and London: The Scarecrow Press, 1966), 44.
27. Contrast this to David Gracy, Archives and Manuscripts: Arrangement and Description (Chicago: Society of American Archivists, 1977), 12:
28. The file unit level is the lowest at which archivists in larger repositories work, simply because the quantity of material they face affords no time for further attention to any one record group. Curators, on the other hand, generally feel obliged to complete file unit arrangement." This distinction, which we regard as inaccurate and unhelpful, is also apparent in Kenneth W. Duckett, Modern Manuscripts: A Practical Manual for Their Management, Care, and Use (Nashville: American Association for State and Local History, 1985), 118-30.
29. Regarding arrangement, he advises extensive background research before beginning and then careful unpacking and reading of all the collection materials. His approach is strictly item level, and he even suggests procedures for preparing formal note cards for each item or group of items. Frederic Miller, Arranging and Describing Archives and Manuscripts (Chicago: Society of American Archivists, 1990), 69, too, draws significant distinctions between archival and manuscripts approaches to arrangement-for the former he states that it is usually necessary only to verify existing order, whereas for the latter the norm is to create order to the item level.
30. Helen W. Slotkin and Karen T. Lynch, "An Analysis of Processing Procedures: The Adaptable Approach," American Archivist 45 (Spring 1982): 157. They also state, "The most important consideration is a clear arrangement of folders within carefully delineated series."
31. Paul Brunton and Tim Robinson, "Arrangement and Description," in Keeping Archives, 2nd ed., ed. Judith Ellis (Port Melbourne, Vic.: Thorpe, 2000), 230-39.
32. St. Johnsbury Athenaeum Archives, Archives Processing Manual, draft 2 (May 2001), http://www.vermont- archives.org/boards/vhrab/processing.doc (accessed 10 May 2004).
33. Bordin and Warner, Modern Manuscript Library, 42.
34. Lucile M. Kane, A Guide to the Care and Administration of Manuscripts (Nashville: American Association for State and Local History, 1966), 38.
35. See, for example, Richard Strassberg, Manual of Manuscript Processing Procedures [for Cornell University Libraries] (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Libraries, 1973), 20-21.
36. Karen T. Lynch and Helen W. Slotkin, Processing Manual for the Institute Archives and Special Collections M.I.T. Libraries (Cambridge, Mass.: Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1981), 15-16;
37. Miller, Arranging and Describing Archives and Manuscripts, 33.
38. Schellenberg, Management of Archives, 111-12.
39. Miller, Arranging and Describing Archives and Manuscript, 88
40. agrees: "A [descriptive] program that is comprehensive as well as integrated will describe all of the repository's holdings at some minimal level for administrative control even if not for full intellectual access. It will therefore include unprocessed records as they are described at the time of accessioning. . . ." As does Sharon Gibbs Thibodeau, "Archival Arrangement and Description," in Managing Archives and Archival Institutions, ed. James Gregory Bradsher (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1988), 77: "Priorities for action to be taken to meet these goals within an archival repository should include: 1. Establishment and maintenance of a minimum level of intellectual control over the archival holdings of the repository. (Because it both reflects an appreciation of archival principles and represents the best investment of archival resources, the series level seems an appropriate minimum.)"
41. "Just as records can be processed at different levels, there are differences in the levels of description in inventories. Since the physical and intellectual work you do on the collection will vary, there can be no rigid definition of what constitutes an inventory. Some collections are never processed beyond the preliminary stages. In such cases, the final inventory can consist of a collection overview and perhaps a brief series list or box list. Collections that are of great importance or are very heavily used will get extensive processing, including detailed folder lists as well as indexes. Most inventories fall in between these extremes, and almost every inventory represents a compromise. You should try, though, to provide the researcher with the most meaningful, concise, and accurate information possible, considering limitations of time and resources." Northeastern University Libraries, Archives and Special Collections, Processing Manual (Boston, September 2002), 27.
42. Lucile Kane made a similar point several decades earlier in A Guide to the Care and Administration of Manuscripts, 51.
43. Steven L. Hensen, Archives, Personal Papers, and Manuscripts: A Cataloging Manual for Archival Repositories, Historical Societies, and Manuscript Libraries, 2nd. ed. (Chicago: Society of American Archivists, 1989), 5.
44. Hensen, Archives, Personal Papers, and Manuscripts, 9.
45. Ross Harvey, "Preservation," in Keeping Archives, 95-96.
46. See also, Gracy, Archives and Manuscripts: Arrangement and Description, 16-19:
47. "The proficient archivist will devote attention to the physical condition of the documents as the sorting progresses." He goes on to recommend removing all fasteners, etc. This expectation/directive is further reinforced by the widely distributed leaflet, National Park Service, Conserve O Gram: Removing Original Fasteners from Archival Documents, no. 19/5 (July 1993).
48. This assiduous item-centered approach is clearly reflected in some current processing manuals. For example, see the M. E. Grenander Department of Special Collections and Archives, Accessioning and Processing Manual (University at Albany, SUNY), developed by Jared Parker and Geoffrey Williams (Fall 1996), revised by Brian Keough (July 2001), Amy C. Schindler (July 2002), http://library.albany.edu/speccoll/ processing.htm (accessed 10 May 2004), which defines a normative processing level that involves full organization/ reorganization of collection materials, complete reboxing and refoldering, removing all metal, using acid-free barrier sheets, photocopying high-lignin items, item-level arrangement, and itemlevel weeding.
49. A full folder-level finding aid is also mandated. Similarly, Jane Boley, Marcelle Hull, Shirley Rodnitzky, and Gerald D. Saxon, Archives and Manuscripts Processing Manual, University of Texas at Arlington Libraries, Special Collections, 4th ed. (2001), http://libraries.uta.edu/SpecColl/ processman/title1.htm (accessed 10 May 2004), presents a very item-focused approach to physical processing, including removal of all metal (even the spirals in spiral notebooks!), liberal encapsulation of fragile and damaged items, placing all photos in envelopes, photocopying all high-lignin items, and use of barrier sheets around all items on colored paper. They also prescribe item-level arrangement and weeding. Here is a telling quote: By the time the finding aid is completed, the archivist will have worked with the material in each folder in the collection several times."
50. Mary Lynn Ritzenthaler, Preserving Archives and Manuscripts (Chicago: Society of American Archivists, 1993), 110.
51. Ritzenthaler, Preserving Archives and Manuscripts, 111.
52. Duckett, Modern Manuscripts, 90.
53. "The sheer bulk of modern records justifies a hard look at the amount of preservation work to be done for each collection. Preservation is very time-consuming. Your preservation recommendations-even the recommendation to refolder papers or remove staples-must be defended on the basis of the collection's research value and the degree of physical deterioration of the records." Lynch and Slotkin, Processing Manual for the Institute Archives, 47.
54. Northeastern University Libraries, Processing Manual, 24.
55. Mary Lynn Ritzenthaler, Preservation of Archival Records: Holdings Maintenance at the National Archives, Technical Information Paper No. 6 (Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, 1990). 2.
56. Ritzenthaler, Technical Information Paper, 2.
57. Desnoyers, "When Is It Processed?" 14.
58. Much more recently, the Council for Museums, Archives, and Libraries, Benchmarks in Collection Care for Museums, Archives and Libraries: A Self-assessment Checklist (London: Resource Publications, 2002), 27-28, makes no mandate that collection material be rehoused, only that rehousing material be available if needed. Of boxes and folders it requires simply that "Containers used for physical protection are strong enough to withstand handling and the weight of the items they contain," and that "Boxes and folders fit the items they contain."
59. Uli Haller, "Variations in the Processing Rates on the Magnuson and Jackson Senatorial Papers," American Archivist 50 (Winter 1987): 107.
60. Haller, "Variations in the Processing Rates," 108-9.
61. The extent to which the U.S. Archives and Archivists Listserv is dominated by such discussions should concern anyone interested in the societal image of archivists or in the profession's culture. A quick search of the list's archives reveals extended threads on the paper clip vs. Plastiklip question in June 1993, April 1995, August 1995, December 1996, September 1999, March 2000, September 2000, July 2001, December 2003-January 2004. This doesn't include comparable threads on removing papers from binders and whether it is professionally acceptable to temporarily staple loose folder labels. What makes these threads particularly significant is the extent to which the posters focused on whether a particular kind of clip bent the paper to which it was attached-as if every sheet of every collection was a precious artifact.
62. Roe, Arranging & Describing Archives & Manuscripts, 68.
63. Charles Schultz, "Report on Case Studies in Manuscript Administration-Costs of Acquiring, Processing, and Housing Collections," unpublished report to the SAA's Committee on Personal Papers and Manuscripts, 28 September 1976.
64. William J. Maher, "The Importance of Financial Analysis of Archival Programs," Midwestern Archivist 3 (1978): 10.
65. William J. Maher, "Measurement and Analysis of Processing Costs in Academic Archives," College & Research Libraries 43 (January 1982): 62. The figures noted in the text divide total cubic footage as received by the total processing hours invested. If one calculates on the basis of the final size of the processed collection (subtracting weeded materials), the figures become 3.5 hours/foot and 9.8 hours/foot, respectively.
66. W. N. Davis, "Budgeting for Archival Processing," American Archivist 43 (Spring 1980): 210-11.
67. Karen Temple Lynch and Thomas E. Lynch, "Rates of Processing Manuscripts and Archives," Midwestern Archivist 7 (1982): 31. The cubic footage figures given here are extrapolated from the linear footage figures reported by Lynch and Lynch-15.9 hours/linear foot and 13.25 hours/linear foot, respectively. This extrapolation was made on the presumption that 1 cubic foot equals 1.25 linear feet.
68. Lynch and Lynch, "Rates of Processing Manuscripts and Archives," 28. Of course, it bears admitting that a project completed ahead of schedule would be required to return any unspent funds to the granting agency, so the system offers no incentive to finish early.
69. Terry Abraham, Stephen Balzarine, and Anne Frantilla, "What Is Backlog Is Prologue: A Measurement of Archival Processing," American Archivist 48 (Winter 1985): 39.
70. Abraham, et al., "What Is Backlog Is Prologue," 42, 44.
71. Paul Ericksen and Robert Shuster, "Beneficial Shocks: The Place of Processing-Cost Analysis in Archival Administration," American Archivist 58 (Winter 1995): 32-52.
72. Ericksen and Shuster, "Beneficial Shocks," 47.
73. Karen Lynch, untitled and undated conference paper, c. 1981, 3. In a typescript paper based upon the same processing grants study that produced the later 1982 Lynch and Lynch article "Rates of Processing Manuscripts and Archives," Lynch reports in her second footnote that "In a survey of grants funded by NHPRC, Robert W. Coran found that processing costs ranged from $61 to $321 per linear foot [our own survey of NHPRC processing grants reveals that the spread has widened enormously, from $10 to $1,900 per linear foot], and that labor costs accounted for about 90% of the total cost." This 90% figure seems quite consistent with the findings in our literature review and with our own survey data. The labor costs associated with processing archival materials are undeniably large, and it is dangerous for us, as professionals in this area, to have so little control over them and to be so untroubled by that fact.
74. Processing Rate 2 (14-20 hours per cubic ft.): Used for collections that have an average number of problems. Papers may have some order and sections of the collection may be properly sorted, although significant portions will have to be arranged and a good deal of interfiling work will have to be done. Most collections can be processed at this rate.
75. Processing Rate 3 (4-10 hours per cubic ft.): Used for collections that have no significant organizational problems. A minimum amount of interfiling and reorganization is needed. The major portion of staff time will be expended on the basic work required for all collections: reboxing, refoldering, listing, and describing the contents of the papers. In the more detailed processing instructions that follow, the manual advises: "Very few collections merit detailed item-level arrangement or description. For example, unless a collection (or a portion of a collection) has an extremely high research value, it is not necessary to arrange items chronologically or alphabetically within a folder. Avoid item-level arrangement simply by breaking folders into smaller chunks and providing more specific description; accurate date ranges are extremely important." They do, however, prescribe complete refoldering.
76. Dianne van der Reyden, Chief, Conservation Division, Library of Congress, e-mail to Mark Greene, 13 April 2004. "In answer to the questions 'Are there studies to which you could point us that quantify the improvement (presumably in terms of extended life during artificial aging experiments) resulting from refoldering? And/or studies that examine whether poor storage climate makes refoldering more or less effective?' I must answer that, to my knowledge, there are no studies addressing this query specifically. However, the Oddy Test has shown that volatile materials (which lignin containing folders are) in both ambient or poor environments (which high temperature and RH are) contaminate susceptible materials (which many documents are)."
77. Kane, A Guide to the Care and Administration of Manuscripts, 35. More recently, see Frank Boles, draft of paper delivered at 2004 SAA meeting, for session "Twenty Years Later and the Box Is Blacker than Ever." "Archivists like to present themselves as preservers. This is, for example, one of our profession's favorite postures in press releases and annual evaluations to our boss. We are forever talking about how we saved this thing from destruction or preserved that thing from the ravages of time. That's our pr image and our usual strategic niche in the tussle for organizational resources, but I think it is far more than that. I believe it reflects our deepest professional beliefs and psyche. What archivists really see themselves as are guardians of the past: the devoted followers of Hilary Jenkinson's 'keeper' mentality." We are grateful to Boles for permitting us to read and use this draft.
78. The most vocal and consistent advocate for a user-centered revision of archives administration has been Elsie Freeman Finch. See especially, Elsie Freeman, "Buying Quarter Inch Holes: Public Support through Results," Midwestern Archivist 10 (1985): 89-97;
79. Elsie Freeman, "In the Eye of the Beholder: Archives Administration from the User's Point of View," American Archivist 47 (Spring 1984): 111-23;
80. "Soap and Education: Archival Training, Public Service, and the Profession-An Essay," Midwestern Archivist 16 (1991): 87-94.
81. Terry Cook has criticized this view, most sharply in "Viewing the World Upside Down: Reflections on the Theoretical Underpinnings of Archival Public Programming," Archivaria 31 (Winter 1990-91): 123-34. Cook argues that the records, and not the user, should be the center of the archivist's universe. To be sure, a user-centered approach can cut the other way. When they gather in bars to complain about unrealistic demands from researchers, many archivists suggest that just as our users seem to want us to acquire and save everything, they likewise expect item-level access to everything (on the Web ideally, but certainly on-site). Certainly there is some truth to this, but Gordon, Using the Nation's Documentary Heritage and our own more limited survey of users suggest that if they understand the trade-off-some information about lots of collections versus lots of information about some collections-they would choose less detail. This only makes sense. Whether a researcher is a scholar or a genealogist, he or she doesn't have any chance at all of finding important material in a collection that is not open for research because it is unprocessed; they can at least find it in a less intensively processed collection, even if finding that information would take some digging.
82. See also, T. R. Schellenberg, Modern Archives: Principles and Techniques (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1956), 224: "The end of all archival effort is to preserve valuable records and make them available for use. Everything an archivist does is concentrated on this dual objective."
83. Society of American Archivists, Planning for the Archival Profession (Chicago: Society of American Archivists, 1986), 22.
84. James M. O'Toole, Understanding Archives and Manuscripts (Chicago: Society of American Archivists, 1990), 58.
85. Thibodeau, "Archival Arrangement and Description," 67.
86. Slotkin and Lynch, "An Analysis of Processing Procedures," 157.
87. Brunton and Robinson, "Arrangement and Description," 224.
88. Boles, draft of paper delivered at the 2004 SAA annual meeting.
89. "Each collection and record group is unique, each exhibits its own personality. . . ." 90 Little has come from that effort to date, and it was disappointing to read in the "white paper" that served as the background for the meeting, and in the few presentations during the meeting that have been posted on the Web, that what was largely being suggested was to dedicate more resources to the same approaches-adding yet another layer of work, to boot, by stressing flexible Web linking to finding aids and collection materials. See, particularly, Barbara M. Jones, comp., "Hidden Collections, Scholarly Barriers: Creating Access to Unprocessed Special Collections Materials in North America's Research Libraries-A White Paper for the Association of Research Libraries Task Force on Special Collections" (June 2003), http://www.arl.org/collect/spcoll/ehc/HiddenCollsWhitePaperJun6.pdf (accessed 19 May 2004).
90. One of the few recent sessions was "Undaunted by the Deluge: Case Studies in Managing an Archives Backlog," at the 2000 SAA conference in Denver. In addition to the work being done in the institutions represented by the two investigators for this project, we know of useful work occurring at Arizona State University, Georgia State University, Yale University (Archives and Manuscripts Division), the Pennsylvania Historical Society, and the Wisconsin Historical Society, only one of which has published anything about its efforts. (See Pam Hackbart-Dean and Christine de Catanzaro, "The Strongest Link: The Management and Processing of Archival Collections," Archival Issues 27, no. 2 [2002]: 125-36). However, speakers from Yale and the Pennsylvania Historical Society presented findings at the 2004 Society of American Archivists meeting. Archivists and manuscript curators at Yale, University of Montana, and Texas Christian University also agreed to pilot implementation of the recommendations in this article and will report on that work at the 2005 SAA meeting.
91. Anne R. Kenney, "Collections, Preservation, and the Changing Resource Base," Access in the Future Tense (Washington, D.C.: Council on Libraries and Information Resources, April 2004), 26. http://www.clir.org/pubs/ reports/pub126/kenney.html (accessed 4 June 2004).
92. Schellenberg, The Management of Archives, 108.
93. For full quote and citation, see note 23.
94. which identified for archivists the "end of establishing bibliographical control over the holdings of a particular repository. . .in the form of catalogs and guides." See also Susan Beth Wray, Vesta Lee Gordon, and Edmund Berkeley, Jr., Manuscripts Collections Processing Manual (Charlottesville: University of Virginia Library, 1976), 2, which also notes grudgingly but more realistically: Ideally, all collections should be processed as completely as our competence will allow. Because collections differ from one another both in their relative importance and their state of preservation, and because of work loads, the budget, and other factors which must be considered, it is the policy of the Manuscripts Department to view the processing requirements of each collection individually rather than to attempt to apply every step in our procedures to each collection. The processor may, therefore, be required to apply a variety of relatively complicated processes to one collection, and only to rebox and label another.
95. The technique of reordering folders for the finding aid without concomitant physical reorganization is described in Hackbart-Dean and de Catanzaro, "The Strongest Link," 133; Georgia State uses the approach to deal expeditiously with additions to existing collections, but other places use it from the start for partially processed collections.
96. One noted attempt to challenge the theory and utility of original order is Frank Boles, "Disrespecting Original Order," American Archivist 45 (Winter 1982): 26-32.
97. Private e-mail to the authors.
98. Schellenberg, "Archival Principles of Arrangement," 158.There is really no brief in archival theory for a conscious and willful reordering of collection materials on any hierarchical level. We are not enjoined by our tradition or literature to shift around the files within a series, let alone to be shuffling and redealing items within folders.
99. No doubt this cost-benefit analysis would be altered for a repository with many of its holdings stored off-site, particularly the few that are only able to do next-day retrieval by truck. In such cases more weight might need to be given to detailed description, to facilitate long-distance retrieval. Even then, however, it must be asked whether it is better to have minimal description of all the off-site material rather than detailed description of just some. And it would be well to note that some university libraries hold hundreds of thousands of volumes in off-site storage, retrieved at best once a day, and relying solely on standard bibliographic records to assist patrons in selection (for example, Johns Hopkins University, which by 1996 stored half a million volumes off site with an average 52-hour retrieval time, Council on Library and Information Resources, Comprehensive Access to Off-Site Print Materials at Johns Hopkins University: Research Brief 3 (November 1997), http://www.clir.org/pubs/ research/rb3.html).
100. David B. Gracy, An Introduction to Archives and Manuscripts (New York: Special Libraries Association, 1981), 22.
101. Private e-mail to the authors.
102. Michael J. Fox and Peter L. Wilkerson, Introduction to Archival Organization and Description: Access to Cultural Heritage (Los Angeles: Getty Information Institute, 2002), 2.
103. S. Muller Fz., J. A. Feith, and R. Fruin Th.Az., Manual for the Arrangement and Description of Archives, trans. Arthur H. Leavitt, 2nd. ed. (Chicago: Society of American Archivists, 2003), 100.
104. These two principles are discussed in much greater detail in the International Council on Archives Committee on Descriptive Standards, ISAD(G): General International Standard Archival Description, 2d ed. (Ottawa: ICA, 2000),12
105. and in Describing Archives: A Content Standard (Chicago: Society of American Archivists, 2004), xii-xiv.
106. Kathleen Roe, Guidelines for Arrangement and Description of Archives and Manuscripts: A Manual for Historical Records Programs in New York State (Albany: New York State Archives and Records Administration, 1991), 4-5.
107. Roe, Guidelines for Arrangement and Description of Archives and Manuscripts, 25-26.
108. Dan Hazen, Jeffrey Horrell, and Jan Merrill-Oldham, Selecting Research Collections for Digitization (Washington, D.C.: Council on Library and Information Resources, August 1998).
109. Library of Congress, Environmental Protection of Books and Related Materials, Preservation Leaflets Number 2 (Washington, D.C.: Library of Congress, February 1975), 1;
110. Library of Congress, Preserving Newspapers and Newspaper-Type Materials, Preservation Leaflets Number 5 (Washington, D.C.: Library of Congress, October 1977), 1.
111. As one example, a survey respondent answered that his repository permitted access to unprocessed collections "if the collection has been reviewed to check for sensitive items and is minimally organized." Another respondent stated that "as a general rule, No. But if we know the person and review the material we may allow some limited access." Leaving aside the questionable ethic of making material accessible "if we know the person," the idea of having to review collections (or even parts of collections) item by item to identify "sensitive" material is impractical, both because of the time it takes and because there is no agreement about whose sensitivity we measure against. One processing manual identifies "sensitive subjects as adultery, alcoholism, drug abuse, homosexuality, lesbianism, mental illness, or suicide" (Bruce P. Stark, A Guide for Processing Manuscript Collections [n.p., 2001], 24), but several of those items are not sensitive to every donor or donor's family. Both archivists who believe we should not be in the business of protecting sensitivity and those who believe we should be much more active are beginning to agree that in either event decisions should not be made at an item level.
112. See, respectively, Mark A. Greene, "Moderation in Everything, Access in Nothing?: Opinions about Access Restrictions on Private Papers," Archival Issues 18, no. 1 (1993): 31-41
113. and Marybeth Gaudet, "Playing Fair with the Right to Privacy," Archival Issues 28, no. 1 (2003), 21-34.
114. Further, though suggesting such screening should take place during processing, Mary Jo Pugh's new manual, Providing Reference Services for Archives & Manuscripts (Chicago: Society of American Archivists, 2005), 161-66, allows that identifying "sensitive" material can and often does happen at the point of reference.
115. Maher, "Measurement and Analysis of Processing Costs," 63.
116. Kenney, "Collections, Preservation, and the Changing Resource Base," 26.
117. Ham, "Archival Choices," 12.