Arrangement and description

"Arrangement and description" is dull-sounding jargon for the work that takes place in all archives, from the National Archives in Washington to a local history museum. At the Museum of History and Industry library, I spend many hours "describing" records but not much time "arranging" them. That's because most of the photographs and papers have already been organized into folders. Some of these collections even have handwritten or typed lists that were done years ago when the Museum received the donation. There are usually no big surprises.

Archival work sounds like Indiana Jones digging through musty boxes full of treasure. (That would be a museum, not a library.) Mostly, I painstakingly transcribe inventories into Excel spreadsheets and then write finding aids (the fun part) which the Museum publishes on the Internet-- archival work is both tedious and rewarding. The goal is to help researchers pinpoint exactly what they want to see without pawing through boxes of records. After all, what good is a collection if no one can find it or use it?

Speaking of pawing through, the picture above is a box of random brochures and booklets collected by someone at the 1962 Seattle World's Fair and later donated to the library. I had the chance to do some "arrangement" which was a nice change of pace. Fun and challenging. Yes, that really is an old Sun City brochure. Every state, country and business in the world had something to market at the fair. I just thought I'd show you what a more colorful box of archival records can look like. It will take me several hours to organize this interesting clutter into labeled folders.