Aberystwyth University

Department of Information Studies

MA Information and Library Studies

An examination of the challenges in retrieval of Ephemera in memory institutions, and potential solutions

Dedication

ContentsIntroduction...........................................................................................................................................7

Literature Review..................................................................................................................................8

Ephemera and research.....................................................................................................................9

Current Practices.............................................................................................................................10

Access & Retrieval.......................................................................................................................10

Arrangement of material.............................................................................................................12

Cataloguing standards.................................................................................................................13

Funding & Staff time....................................................................................................................15

Previous experiments......................................................................................................................15

Transferable practices.................................................................................................................17

Social tagging...................................................................................................................................18

Summary.........................................................................................................................................20

Methodology.......................................................................................................................................21

Case Studies.....................................................................................................................................21

Boundaries of the study...................................................................................................................21

Limitations of Case Studies and Interview...................................................................................21

Interviews....................................................................................................................................22

Summary.........................................................................................................................................22

Contributing factors in a cataloguing model........................................................................................23

User Groups.....................................................................................................................................23

Technological Capabilities...............................................................................................................23

What is affordable and available.....................................................................................................24

Practicalities; time, effort and funding............................................................................................24

Search Fields....................................................................................................................................24

Multilingualism................................................................................................................................25

Summary.........................................................................................................................................26

Introduction to the Cassidy-Quinn Collection......................................................................................27

The family background....................................................................................................................28

The date range: Historical events of importance..........................................................28

The postcards and the Irish language..........................................................................................29

The range of locations written from............................................................................................30

Original Organisation of the resource..............................................................................................30

Summary.........................................................................................................................................31

Case Study: the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Wales...................32

RCAHMW Structure.....................................................................................................................32

Organisation ideal........................................................................................................................32

Application to the Cassidy-Quinn Collection................................................................................33

Multilingualism............................................................................................................................34

Organisation and administration.................................................................................................35

Discussion: transferable elements...............................................................................................35

Summary.........................................................................................................................................36

Case Study: The John Johnson Ephemera Collection...........................................................................37

The John Johnson Ephemera collection...........................................................................................37

Organisation Ideal........................................................................................................................38

Standards.....................................................................................................................................38

Application to the Cassidy-Quinn collection................................................................................39

Multilingualism............................................................................................................................41

Organisation and administrative costing.....................................................................................41

Discussion: transferable elements...................................................................................................42

Summary of points..........................................................................................................................43

Outcomes: Preliminary model for cataloguing ephemera...................................................................44

Collection Level/Item Level cataloguing..........................................................................................44

Process work flow............................................................................................................................49

Digitisation and Social Tagging........................................................................................................50

Further areas of development.........................................................................................................51

Conclusion...........................................................................................................................................52

My solution......................................................................................................................................53

Disadvantages..............................................................................................................................53

Future research...........................................................................................................................54

Appendices..........................................................................................................................................55

Appendix A: Contributing factors in a Cataloguing Model...............................................................55

Appendix B: Interview transcripts....................................................................................................57

Interview with Julie-Anne Lambert, Librarian of the John Johnson Ephemera Collection,..........57

RCAHMW Interview with Susan Evans, Archives & Library Officer..............................................59

Appendix C: Introduction to the Cassidy-Quinn Collection..............................................................62

Appendix D: RCAHMW Case Study..................................................................................................67

Bibliography.........................................................................................................................................71

References.......................................................................................................................................71

Bibliography.....................................................................................................................................76

Table of Tables

Table 1: Common features of the John Johnson, and Evanion Collections..........................................16Table 2: Fonds structure for the message side of a postcard..............................................................33Table 3: Fonds structure for an image side of the postcard................................................................33Table 4: Collection Level catalogue format..........................................................................................45Table 5: Collection level description applied to Cassidy-Quinn Collection...........................................46Table 6: Item level description applied to the Cassidy-Quinn Collection.............................................47Table 7: Cataloguing workflow............................................................................................................49Table 8: Digitisation and Social tagging work flow...............................................................................50

Table of Figures

Figure 1: The Evanion Collection catalogue: Advanced search form...................................................55Figure 2: John Johnson Ephemera Collection: ProQuest catalogue search form.................................56Figure 3: Cassidy-Quinn family tree.....................................................................................................62Figure 4: PCIS006: Dr. Douglas Hyde, President of Ireland and the Gaelic League..............................63Figure 5: Census of Ireland 1901: Cassidy Family................................................................................64Figure 6: Dingle Bay Photograph.........................................................................................................65Figure 7: Dingle 1907...........................................................................................................................66Figure 8: Roodepoort Station..............................................................................................................66Figure 9: Collection level catalogue record..........................................................................................67Figure 10: Collection level catalogue record applied to the Cassidy-Quinn Collection........................68Figure 11: Item Level catalogue record applied to the Cassy-Quinn Collection...................................69Figure 12: Item Level Record with supplementary fields suggested....................................................70

List of Abbreviations

AACR: - Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules

AAT: - Art and Architecture Thesaurus

CEST: - Centre of Ephemera Studies Thesaurus

DDC: - Dewey Decimal System

EAD: - Encoded Archival Description

GAA: - Gaelic Athletic Association

ISAD (G) : - General International Archival Description

ISBD: - International Standard Bibliographic Description

JISC: -Joint Information Systems Committee

LCSH: - Library of Congress Subject Headings

LCTGM: -Library of Congress Thesaurus for Graphic Materials

LOC: - Library of Congress

MARC: -Machine Readable Cataloguing

NAF: - Name Authority Files

NLA: - National Library of Australia

NLM: - National Library of Medicine

NLW: - National Library of Wales

OCR: - Optical Character Recognition

RBMS: - Rare Books & Manuscripts Section

RCAHMW: Royal Commission on the Ancient Historical Monuments of Wales

RDA: - Resource Description and Access

Iconclass: - Classification system designed for art and iconography

Introduction

This study began as a digitisation project for a collection of family postcards from the 1900s. It

developed into an examination of the challenges faced in the retrieval of ephemera held by memory

institutions, and potential solutions.

The starting point to develop any solutions is to examine how well current cataloguing practices deal

with ephemera, leading to the first research question;

Examine current cataloguing of ephemera practices in archives and libraries

This study examines how institutions dealing with special collections catalogue material in the form

of case studies into the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Wales

(RCAHMW), and the John Johnson Ephemera Collection, part of the Bodleian Libraries. Due to the

time and budget limitations, this study focuses on two case studies, but could be expanded to

further institutions to gain wider perspectives on general practices.

In each case study, the practices used by institutions were applied to the collection of family

postcards as a test collection, to identify the challenges, and areas to be improved, addressing the

second research question;

The application of these practices on a collection of postcards, to illustrate problems and

impracticalities of current cataloguing methods

Postcards, like many forms of ephemera, feature image and text with equal importance, making

cataloguing rules for text or image-only resources difficult to apply without compromising quality

records. A significant barrier to creating cataloguing rules which comprehensively record the

information contained in the resources, is the wide variety of items covered by the term ephemera;

resulting in the use of a variety of thesauri, controlled vocabularies, subject headings, and standards.

This variety makes a standardized set of cataloguing rules for ephemera difficult to envisage. This

introduces the third research question this study aims to explore;

To create a preliminary model for cataloguing ephemera which can be applied to any collection by

any institution.

8

Literature ReviewDefining ephemera

In his extensive work with ephemera, Maurice Rickards proposed several definitions of ephemera,

the most enduring one being ‘the minor transient documents of everyday life’ (2001, p. i).

Although this definition has persisted, Rickards identified that some individual pieces cannot be

described as either transient or minor (Rickards and Twyman, 2001, p. i), resulting in the

construction of the Encyclopaedia of Ephemera, in order to define types of ephemera more

adequately.

Disciplines and memory institutions have different definitions when it comes to considering

ephemera, while traditional libraries may only collect and curate printed material, subject disciplines

such as Film and Cinema history may look at material ranging from vintage posters to current movie

merchandise (Wickham, P., 2010, p. 316), crossing into 3-dimensional material. This creates issues

concerning the cross-over of material which is collected by libraries and museums, and maintaining a

collection of related items rather than separating by format.

In the context of memory institutions, ephemera can include book jackets, commercial ephemera

(advertising), pamphlets, entertainment and theatre programmes, greeting cards, posters and

collections of material relating to particular events or subject matters such as transport timetables or

the Millennium (Bodleian.ox.ac.uk, 2017). The definition of printed ephemera is different for the

librarian, archivist, museum curator, researcher, hobbyist and dealer (Kolbert, 1991, p. 27) and will

only become broader with the development of digital ephemera.

Despite the lack of an agreed definition of physical ephemera, further research could be done to

define what is counted as digital ephemera; do we judge it as simply an online version of the printed

ephemera, or include additions only available online. While there are projects like the Web Archive,

saving snapshots of internet sites, this is not an in-depth method of defining or saving what is

valuable of digital ephemera.

9

Ephemera and researchThere is agreement among historians as to the value of ephemera as cultural documents (Andrews

434-450) and as a fragment of social history (Cocks and Rubery, 2012, p. 1). Ephemera, when it

survives, allows us to glimpse the material that we have chosen to forget. It exposes the cultural

practice of memory, marking the space between history as memorialised and the past as lived

(Mussell, J., 2012, p. 78). Academics have acknowledged that the transitory nature of ephemeral

publications can offer perspectives of social life and cultural developments of communities rarely

covered by mainstream collections including working class people, women, African Americans and

immigrants (Altermatt and Hilton, 2012, p. 174).

For instance, Mary Kelley’s Learning to Stand and Speak: Women, Education and Public Life in

America’s Republic uses a wealth of archival material and ephemera such as school catalogues,

gaining invaluable insight into the education of women in America (Barnhill, 2008, p. 128., Zboray

and Zboray, 2007).

Laura Lyons considers the lack of engagement with ephemera partly due to the difficulty in finding

the material, but determines in her study Ephemera and Irish Republicanism that due to the

timeliness and relation to history, ephemera can support or challenge official accounts of history

(Lyons, L., 2010, p. 407). The acknowledgement of the difficulty of finding ephemera for research

demonstrates a significant need for a better system of retrieval.

Shanna Benjamin gained access to unpublished postcards, photographs, letters and first manuscript

copies of an essay while researching for her book 'Half in Shadow: The Life and Legacy of Nellie Y.

McKay', which gave invaluable insight into the process of canonizing and compiling an anthology of a

previously neglected area of literature (2015, p. 19). Benjamin notes, that the Norton Anthology of

African American Literature represents a tradition of black writing, and McKay's unpublished history

symbolizes the potential of untapped ephemera (2015, p. 23). The use of ephemera here, is to

create a personal link to the subject using unique or rarely seen and accessed material, adding a new

dimension to the research topic.

The use of ephemera is not limited to academic research, but has been studied in marketing and

'brand management' in recent years. Market research is developing an interest in genealogies of

brands (Heller and Kelly, 2015, p. 397), which memory institutions such as the Museum of Brands,

Packaging & Advertising can support. Heller and Kelly argue that brand items and consumer objects,

largely regarded as trivial and ephemeral, can contribute to narratives of society and culture (2015,

p. 403) as well as giving insight into branding and marketing developments.

10

Investigating personal family histories is becoming popular, thanks to programmes such as ‘Who Do

You Think You Are?’ and has seen the use of archives increase, and focus on specific lines of enquiry,

often linked to the historical context surrounding the users’ ancestors (Barratt, 2009, p. 11). This

interest has spawned a new type of historical research, termed ‘personal heritage’ which combines

the history of one’s ancestors with the story of where they lived, worked and died, interlaced with

the history of events in the local community (Barratt, 2009, p. 9-10). Ephemera, especially localised

material (e.g. local election leaflets, theatre production posters), can contribute to this research

area.

Smith and Rowley make a recommendation to researchers based on their examination of

digitisation of local studies collections that with increased access, more researchers in library and

information sciences, social sciences and history, can enrich their research and demonstrate the

value of local studies resources (2012, p. 279).

Current PracticesThe active collection of ephemera by libraries varies greatly from institution to institution; some

make encouraging provisions in their collection development policies, (LOC Collections Policy

Statements: Ephemera, 2008, p. 2), others collect items which fill gaps in existing collections and

noteworthy events and specific themes or genres (Bodleian.ox.ac.uk, 2015).

However, some institutions are reluctant to accept ephemera due to lack of space, or perceived

irrelevance to the institution's collection aims; for example, the National Library of Wales' collection

development policy states that only in 'exceptional cases' is it able to collect ephemeral material

(Collections Development Policy, NLW, 2016 p. 13).

Access & Retrieval There is disparity between institutions in practices concerning access, and retrieval of printed

ephemera. Copeland et al, (2006, p. 187) acknowledged in their project of cataloguing Pennsylvania

broadsides, that there are few standards or established practices for cataloguing ephemera,

resulting in a limited amount of literature on the subject.

It is clear that much of the variety in providing access to ephemera stems from the type of repository

and the requirements of their users (Hadley, 2001, p. 39).

This inconsistency persists from collections to item level; repositories which inventory at folder level,

can have clear titles, but make special annotations at item level for a particularly interesting or

valuable piece, despite not doing so for the rest of the material (Hadley, 2001, p. 47).

11

Copeland's project team at the Pennsylvania State University, chose to catalogue Pennsylvania

German broadsides and Fraktur as individual items, reasoning that this would illustrate the depth of

the collection and provide consistent access, but subsequently made two exceptions. These

exceptions were due to the material in question being intellectually more valuable when kept

together rather than as individual items (2006, p. 190). This indicates the difficulty of creating a set

of comprehensive guidelines which can be universally applied to ephemera. The fact that some

material is more 'intellectually valuable' when kept together establishes the necessity for

cataloguers to consider the context and meaningfulness of the material they work with at an item

level.

Collection level descriptions have multiple advantages; they are time efficient, keeps material

together, and have the potential to enable a relatively serendipitous discovery for the user.

However, it does not have the benefit of the detail which item level description can provide, which

could result in missing an important item. Item level descriptions have the advantage of providing in

depth information facilitating finding a specific item, but are time consuming. Additionally, they

could be less helpful than a collection level description if a user is searching around a subject rather

than for a specific item.

The most successful methods of cataloguing, and providing access to ephemera collections, is a

specialised approach to the material at a collection level, or putting it in subdivisions. Hadley sets out

four elements which effective strategies for the access and description of visual ephemera, need to

consider;

(1) Explicitly reflect the presence of materials held by the repository;

(2) Are reasonably consistent across the repository’s holdings;

(3) Provide the type and level of information appropriate to the nature of the materials; and

(4) Anticipate the likely use of the materials. (Hadley, 2001, p. 49)

This paper was published in 2001, and makes no reference to technological advancements, such as

digitisation, or the use of thumbnail images, which can help with access, and increase awareness of

material the institution in question holds.

12

Arrangement of materialDespite acknowledging the variety of formats ephemera can take, there are some common

characteristics which are overlooked; the material is printed in connection to a particular event, or

an item which is of ‘current interest’ not intended to survive the topicality of the message

(Anghelescu, 2001, p. 63). As the most common characteristic of printed ephemera, this could

inspire an approach to organise ephemera around or in conjunction with traditional resources

covering the same topic.

This approach has been taken in specialist institutes such as the Bibliotheque de Forney in Paris,

which views ephemera as material which complements more traditional resources, and therefore

should not be separated (Casiot, 2006, p. 22), and are arranged using the same classification schema.

Similarly, the Wellcome Library use the same schema (National Library of Medicine) and Library of

Congress (LOC) subject headings as their books and pamphlets (Lowther, 2006, p. 10-12), while

physically separating ephemera into conservation box files. The physical separation of ephemera

from traditional resources, makes practical sense and maintains a relative ease of access for users,

due to keeping the same schema for all material.

While both institutions have kept to their standard schemas, they are specialist libraries, which can

limit the number of subjects covered, and avoids the issues libraries providing a broad range of

interdisciplinary resources to a certain extent.

In contrast to institution specific solutions, common practices were implemented across local

libraries and the National Library of Australia (NLA), for dealing with ephemera collections. This

practice consisted of compiling boxes of material catalogued at collection level rather than

individually (Dewe and Drew, 1993, p. 128), which is consistent with other institutions. This has been

implemented across a network of libraries rather than a specialist institution, demonstrating that a

higher level of consistency in organisation and access can be achieved. However, this approach does

have the disadvantage of missing the in-depth information item level description provides.

Although there is consistency in the arrangement of ephemera in the form of boxes of related

material, this focuses heavily on ease of access to the physical material, and skips over making the

material discoverable via the catalogue.

13

Cataloguing standards Classification schemes and cataloguing rules are essential to information retrieval and are therefore

the main focus for this study. A catalogue is a formal record of a collection, which can be used for

retrieval and inventory purposes (Taylor and Miller, 2006, p7) and should be;

- Flexible and up to date

- Constructed so that all entries can be quickly and easily found by users

- and economically prepared and maintained (Taylor and Miller, 2006, p. 10-11)

This includes encoding the catalogue record into a machine-readable format, after descriptive,

subject and authority processes are completed (Taylor and Miller, 2006, p. 18).

Cataloguing codes were initially developed to standardize cataloguing practices, and have continued

to develop towards Resource Description and Access (RDA), which is looking to link records working

towards international authority file (Taylor and Miller, 2006, p. 33)

In Ranganathan’s Classified Catalogue Code, he places the user at the centre of the library, making

the measure of a catalogue’s worth in its value to those searching it in finding information (Welsh

and Batley, 2012, p. 2). Lubetzky’s principles insisted on a rationalised approach to cataloguing

standards based on objectives and principles, leading to cataloguing policy needing to adopt a

streamlined approach (Welsh and Batley, 2012, p. 4), which, when applied to the variety found in

ephemera, is even more vital.

Copeland et al. (2006 p. 191) applied a combination of cataloguing standards to the material -

monographic broadsides, graphic materials, and manuscripts;

Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules (AACR2), and the Library of Congress Rule

Interpretations, for the monographic items

Consulted Describing Archives: A Content Standard for manuscript items

A hybrid approach for genealogical records like birth certificates using a manuscript format

and adding monographic elements in note fields;

And Graphic Materials: Rules for Describing Original Items and Historical Collections, for

graphic pieces

14

Cataloguing guidelines set out by the Australian National Bibliographic Databases, for non-book

resources, adopted RDA as the preferred cataloguing standard, and have a minimum requirement of

AACR2 level one for descriptive standards. They also use Machine Readable Cataloguing 21

(MARC21) as standard, which causes issues regarding to description, storage and access of material

held by visual arts libraries, with their solution being to include item notes unsuitable for specific

tags into the general note (Libraries Australia, 2015).

Tamiment library, of New York University, uses MARC21 format at folder level, and Encoded Archival

Description finding aids rather than item level access (Altermatt and Hilton, 2012, p. 180).

There is relative consistency across institutions in implementing AACR and MARC21, however as

demonstrated by Libraries Australia, and Copeland et al., they are not sufficient for visual material,

which can result in inconsistency in actual use of fields, such as extensive information held in 'Notes'

fields (Welsh and Batley, 2012, p.46-7, 147-157).

The changes in cataloguing standards from AACR to RDA has resulted in changes to the MARC21

format (Kiorgaard 2006, Bl.uk, Welsh and Batley 2012 p. 157) in order to accommodate RDA

features. These changes will certainly influence cataloguing practices and therefore must be

acknowledged, but as the focus is on current practices in ephemera, the overarching changes from

AACR to RDA and the implications thereof will not be considered in depth in this study.

With the exception of Copeland's project team at Pennsylvania State University, institutions

consistently catalogue ephemera using existing cataloguing rules and formats, and the disparity

comes in decisions to catalogue at collection or item level. Consistently, despite the proven value of

ephemera in research, the material only gets catalogued as the result of a project or grant funding,

again showing a lack of resources available to ensure consistent and ongoing cataloguing of non-

traditional resources.

15

Funding & Staff timeA critical issue raised by Altermatt and Hilton's report on the Tamiment library's project to provide

access to its printed ephemera collections, is that of funding. The project was funded by a grant,

leading the team to question, if 370 boxes of material can be backlogged within a twenty-year

period, how can this be prevented from reoccurring after the grant ends (2012, p. 191).

Efforts to improve access to hidden resources such as local archive material and ephemera have

increasingly relied on project-funded grants, meaning institutions encounter the problem of

maintaining access and time to devote to these collections once grant funding has ended.

Digitisation projects have similar aims to ephemera-related projects; preserving fragile or rare

documents, and to make these more accessible to users, and therefore has similar problems. Smith

and Rowley (2012, p. 273) note that digitisation is often implemented as a short- term project, and

that a long-term strategy would require significant funding, which similarly can be applied to

projects devoted to ephemera.

Previous experimentsEphemera collections contain multimedia items, often with aesthetic qualities which make them

good candidates for digitisation projects. However, the complications of cataloguing ephemera

demonstrated by Copeland et al. (2006) and Altermatt and Hilton (2012), combined with the short-

term nature of funding, must lead institutions to consider and anticipate the likelihood of use

(Hadley, 2001, p. 49), to prioritise collections for digitisation.

Two notable cataloguing and digitisation projects concerning ephemera are the British Library run

project of the Evanion collection in 2000, (Bl.uk, 2017), and the collaboration between the Bodleian

Library, ProQuest and the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) to digitise and catalogue the

John Johnson Ephemera Collection begun in 2008 (Bodleian.ox.ac.uk, 2017).

Both projects found that they needed to create bespoke cataloguing schemes, and to catalogue to

item level in order to note the extensive bibliographic information needed for ephemera. The

curator responsible for cataloguing the Evanion collection, Helen Peden, formulated her own

scheme keeping rules for cataloguing single sheets, AACR2 and International Standard Bibliographic

Description (ISBD (A)) in mind (Peden, n.d.). The John Johnson cataloguing schema uses a custom

format with extensive fields.

16

Table 1: Common features of the John Johnson, and Evanion Collections

Common elements John Johnson Ephemera Collection

Evanion Collection

Bespoke Catalogue schema Item Level Optical Character Recognition (OCR)

Subject Heading Schemes LCTGM, ICONCLASS, AAT, ESTC, RBGENR, and CEST

Rickards’ Encyclopaedia of Ephemera, LCSH

Full Text Searching Image manipulation (i.e. zoom, rotation)

Key search elements Title/first lineDate from- toPlacesPrinting ProcessPrinter/publisherEngraver/lithographerIllustration subjectsSubjectNameKeyword(s)ShelfmarkPhysical formSpecial features

TitleStart YearEnd YearPlaceImprintPressmarkIllustrationsHeadingSubjectName Genre

(See Appendix A Figs 1 & 2 for full images of search forms)

Due to the Evanion collection catalogue being developed around the year 2000, the technological

capabilities of OCR, full text searching, and image manipulation are not available when compared

with the John Johnson Ephemera Collection.

Neither catalogue fully takes into account issues of multilingualism, which is an enduring problem in

traditional cataloguing. This may be due to a lack of necessity for the specific collections, or limit of

staff time, and is an issue this project will be considering, especially when applied to the Cassidy-

Quinn collection, which features English, Irish and French.

While both catalogues provide extensive bibliographic information, enabling more focused

searching, the platforms for images are less user-friendly than institutions who use image-based

social media platforms to host images; lacking features such as a rolling image gallery or browser.

17

Memory institutions are increasingly using established social media platforms to improve use and

access of images at a low cost. This can be applied to the display of digital surrogates of ephemera.

Additionally, online retrieval techniques such as social tagging can contribute to the organisation of

material, as well as increasing engagement.

Despite being inexpensive, social media platforms hosting digitised material increases the workload

of picture cataloguers, as experienced by the NLA, who provide each physical image with an

individual record in order to provide a link to the digitised item from the catalogue (Gatenby, 2010,

p. 146). This is especially relevant to ephemera collections which may include mixed image and text

items; resulting in decisions concerning cataloguing items a separate image and text records, or

creating a combined record.

The LOC uses Flickr as a platform for its collections of photographs, illustrations, bookplates and

other images, and includes basic bibliographic information under each image.

However, there are inconsistencies in the extent to which the images presented have been

catalogued, and its collections do not display the extent of bibliographic detail the John Johnson

Ephemera Collection provides. However, the presence of images which are available to browse

online, and their corresponding call numbers, makes the resource accessible online, as well as

pointing the user to the physical location.

Transferable practicesAlthough many of the institutions considered have similar or overlapping practices, many emphasize

the need to consider the specific characteristics of the collection and material, when cataloguing,

and the likelihood of access (Copeland et al. 2006, p. 187).

Ephemera should first be considered at collection level, to enable cataloguers to decide on how

much contextual information is necessary for the collection and items contained to be meaningful.

This takes into account that much of ephemera is more valuable to researchers when kept together

(Copeland, 2006, p. 190), as it is more likely to provide a broader image of social history. While an

item level description is often presented as the ideal, an in-depth collection level description may be

of more use to a user when considering ephemera, as the social context pieces of ephemera

demonstrate is often what is valuable to the researcher, rather than one specific item.

18

Item level descriptions are costly in time and effort, and depending on the size of the collection, are

impractical unless part of a specific, funded project. However, for items of significant value or are

particularly heavily used, special exceptions may be made on an ad hoc basis. Additionally, if images

of the material are available via an online platform the use of tags can contribute as an additional

layer of search terms for specific qualities or features of images.

The John Johnson printed ephemera collection's specialist catalogue is the most extensive in

applying descriptors to ephemera, despite missing provision for language, and therefore could be

viewed as almost ideal. However, the depth of knowledge and information provided by cataloguers,

and cost in terms of time, is too high for most libraries to be able to include in consistent and on-

going working practices. The collection encompasses a vast range of material, whereas smaller

institutions may have slightly more targeted collections, which could benefit from a more focused

version of the John Johnson catalogue.

Social tagging A significant development which could promote and ease access to ephemeral collections is the use

of image hosting platforms and social tagging.

Hong and Shao identify the emerging data generated by social media users as an opportunity for

resolving longstanding issues surrounding the indexing of videos and other multimedia (2012 p. 1),

supported by academic departments experimenting with the platforms as hosts for teaching and

research materials and resources (McWilliams, 2008).

Research into social tagging can be divided into three principal areas;

- Investigating users’ tagging behaviour;

- Analysing and refining tags;

- Regarding tagged multimedia as a knowledge base and exploring it in multimedia

understanding (Wang and Yang, 2012, p. 3)

A significant amount of papers in all three areas of study focus heavily on Flickr image retrieval and

tagging, rather than social networking sites (Van Laere et al. 2013, Qian et al. 2013, Strohmaier &

Kern 2012). Mussell notes that the success of Flickr in making visual material available is largely due

to the crowd-sourced tagging which has provided an environment where ephemera and multimedia

material is much easier to access (2012, p. 87).

19

Lui et al. proposed a batch tagging approach to reduce effort in tagging photo albums (Wang and

Yang 2012, p. 5); this could be used as a tagging equivalent of collection level description with any

additional tags to specific pictures as parallel to item level descriptive records. This could arguably go

some way to providing a semblance of hierarchy to tagging collections and photo albums, where the

batch tagging equals general fields or subject headings, and the item level tags create a further level

of detail replicating sub-headings.

Studies such as Ames and Naamen (2007), and Stivlia and Jörgensen (2009) provide insight into user

motivation for tagging content which can inform researchers of user needs and enhance existing

controlled vocabularies (Stvilia and Jörgensen, 2010, p. 2478, Peters, 2011, p. 89), and even provide

subject access to which LOC terms have not been assigned (Spiteri, 2016, p. 176).

In a comparison of Flickr tags and index terms, Abebe Rorissa identified that due to users becoming

accustomed to engaging in creating and indexing the resources, incorporating user-generated tags

into the process of indexing and retrieval is a significant area worth investigating (2010).

Additionally, sites such as Amazon, Goodreads and LibraryThing allow users to tag and classify items

in language which reflects their needs (Spiteri, 2016, p. 169) which demonstrates a user-centred

design which libraries could learn from and include in their retrieval designs.

However, there is a gap in research of evaluating official memory institution accounts. It would, for

example, be beneficial to examine accounts run by the National Libraries of Ireland and Wales

respectively, and the LOC, and identify similar and best practices.

Memory institutions’ use of tags for image retrieval could benefit from further research; while

studies identify consistency and accuracy of tags (McWilliams, 2008) as an issue in effective retrieval,

examining accounts run by libraries, museums and archives may yield interesting results, especially

where institutions allow users to contribute their own tags to ones assigned by the account holder,

limiting their degree of control.

A significant proportion of ephemera collections are valued due to their aesthetic quality and

therefore can benefit from digitization and online image platforms. The use of tagging and

folksonomies to inform the creation of subject specific controlled vocabularies could contribute to

cataloguing ephemera more effectively.

20

SummaryThe value of ephemera to researchers in multiple disciplines has been definitively proven, but the

resource suffers from a lack of sustained effort in cataloguing and being made accessible. The

majority of ephemera cataloguing and digitisation projects have been short –term projects related to

a specific topic or event, and suffer from the industry problems of a lack of funding or staff time and

is therefore often a low priority.

While projects like the John Johnson Ephemera Collection at the Bodleian library, and the Evanion

catalogue at the British Library have been successful examples of cataloguing and making ephemera

available, the methods of cataloguing have been specific and custom made for those collections. The

majority of studies are institute specific solutions, making this study into the creation of a generic

cataloguing model a useful contribution to cataloguing practices.

The additional consideration of online image retrieval and social tagging to improve and promote

access and engagement is an important facet for library resources in general, but could be especially

useful in accessing rare, and fragile items, and objects of aesthetic value including ephemera.

21

MethodologyCase StudiesEphemera is a relatively unexplored area of research, therefore case studies into the practices of a

specialist library institution focused on ephemera, and a specialist archive is necessary to provide a

real-world perspective to institutions’ approaches to cataloguing (Yin, 2014, p. 4).

The research questions aim to explore how and why current cataloguing practices in ephemera have

developed in these expert institutions (Yin, 2014, p. 29), and to create or refine a model for

cataloguing.

The methodology for this research consists of instrumental case studies providing insight into the

cataloguing practices of; the Royal Commission for the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Wales

(RCAHMW), and the John Johnson Ephemera Collection at the Bodleian Library.

Boundaries of the studyThe study consists of two interviews concerning cataloguing ephemera, with the RCAHMW, and the

John Johnson Ephemera Collection, to establish current practices in a library environment, and an

archive, having first established the context of memory institution practices regarding ephemera.

The case study aims to identify current practices in cataloguing ephemera, and areas which

cataloguing schemes can be improved, for enhanced access for users. In order to identify areas for

improvement, I will be applying the outcomes to a collection of postcards.

The study will examine current practices and consider solutions to challenges identified, but will not

go into depth concerning technical solutions or software options available. However, exploration of

the implications and potential of some technological developments such as social tagging, will be

considered.

Limitations of Case Studies and InterviewThe case study is limited to an archive, and a library example, and could be extended to a wider

sample of memory institutions, in order to gain further perspective on current sector practices.

Due to the specialist institutions examined, the interview questions formed were specific, whereas in

a more extensive study with an increased sample of institutions, interview questions could be

changed towards a less informal, and more structured format.

22

Interviews Interviews with librarians and archivists responsible for the collections used in the case studies

provide valuable insight into the steps taken by institutions and the logic behind cataloguing

decisions. Interviews provide a practical look at the non-public side of the catalogue in real time, and

opportunities to discuss future goals for institutions.

To collect consistent information, interview questions for both Sue Evans, Archive & Library Officer

(RCAHMW) and Julie-Anne Lambert, Librarian of the John Johnson Ephemera Collection (Bodleian

Libraries) were prepared in advance to ensure focus on the research questions, and provided

opportunities to record personal views and perceptions (Yin, 2014, p. 106).

Using interviews to collect information can suffer from multiple issues including; Bias due to poorly

formulated questions, response bias, inaccuracies due to poor recall, and reflexivity (Yin, 2014, p.

106). To combat these disadvantages, I used a voice recorder to improve accuracy, and designed

questions to establish the facts of current practice, and open questions to encourage elaboration

concerning future practices (See Appendix B for transcripts of interviews).

A criticism of case study methods concerns its generalisability; a study based on a singular case

cannot be generalised (Punch, 2014, p. 122). Despite the specialist nature of Ephemera, library

cataloguing schemes and standards are developed with transferability within the sector in mind,

therefore concerns about generalisation in case studies can be neutralised to some extent.

SummaryThis study initially looked at two institutions for an in-depth view of cataloguing practices in use,

rather than a general view.

In identifying the disadvantages of case study methods, I have acknowledged that this study is one

that can be further expanded using questionnaires and wider sample institutions and collections, for

a more general view of cataloguing practices concerning ephemera.

23

Contributing factors in a cataloguing modelUser GroupsThere is significant support and interest in using ephemera in research due to its ability to provide a

window into transitory society, in comparison to traditional resources, therefore a significant

percentage of the user group can be designated as researchers in the humanities and social sciences

in particular.

Another user group to consider is local studies researchers; local public libraries and archives able to

save material relevant to local elections, events, celebrations or history, need to make this material

available to researchers, especially in a period where libraries are under pressure to demonstrate

their value. Furthermore, the aesthetic quality of many ephemera collections can also be a point of

interest for artists and designers as elements of inspiration or reference.

Consequently, the user groups concerned with accessing ephemera are familiar with library or

archival catalogues to retrieve information resources. Although a basic level of information literacy

can be assumed from the majority user group, it is important to ensure the resources are searchable

to user groups which are unfamiliar with traditional retrieval techniques to improve engagement

with the material.

Technological CapabilitiesCataloguing schemas used by both libraries and archives can enable us to create and provide

comprehensive information and access points to resources. While developments in information

retrieval and technology have enabled memory institutions to seriously consider the benefits of

social tagging as a method of improving access further.

Social media and image hosting platforms allow us to create digital surrogates to help preserve the

original material, and engage with users online, as well as being able to be linked to institutions

home websites and catalogues at a relatively low cost. Online catalogues also go some way to

resolving issues of arrangement and meaningfulness, due to increased functionality of searching; i.e.

a collection arranged chronologically to express a narrative can also be searched by subject terms.

24

What is affordable and availableThe costs of digitising material without causing damage to fragile material, depends on whether the

institution has access to an in-house digitisation unit, which could reduce costs.

Social media platforms are relatively inexpensive, and easy to use minimising costs of staff training,

and provide an open platform for staff to promote the collection using images, and provide the

opportunity for users outside the core group of researchers to access and engage with content.

Practicalities; time, effort and fundingTo maximise efficiency, one of the main obstacles to overcome is the variety of subject headings,

and thesauri used to create access points to the material. The compilation of a Thesaurus for

Ephemera terms (Morris, 2013) presents an opportunity to streamline assigning accurate terms to

the material. Additionally, although applying multiple classification schemes to the material

increases accessibility, it is not efficient in terms of staff time. When cataloguing different collections

of ephemera, it may be more practical to survey the nature of specific collections and apply the most

appropriate scheme, for example; if a collection is predominantly image based, the cataloguer

responsible would assign either Library of Congress Thesaurus for Graphic Material (LCTGM) or

Iconclass as the principle thesaurus for the collection.

Search FieldsThe Evanion collection records feature twelve elements in their advanced search form using

keywords, date ranges, browsing, and advanced searches using indexed headings, names, genres,

and subject terms. It also provides linked indexes of Headings, Subject, Name and genre, enabling

users who are browsing or unsure of what they are looking for, to have an insight into the scope of

the content (See Appendix A, Fig. 1).

The John Johnson Ephemera Collection ProQuest project catalogue search provides users with a

form containing fourteen fields, and includes drop down lists to choose from and uses combinations

of classification schemes to define genres and subjects (LCTGM, RBMS, AAT, LCSH and Iconclass) (See

Appendix A, Fig. 2).

The provision of drop down lists for users to choose from can encourage catalogue searching by

unfamiliar users, and engage with users browsing rather than conducting a focused search for

specific material. The ProQuest project catalogue was identified by Julie-Anne Lambert (2017) as the

ideal in terms of search functionality, in comparison to previous digital projects aimed at making

material in the collection accessible.

25

Both collections created their own cataloguing rules for ephemera, informed predominantly by

AACR2 and LCSH, with a similar amount of search fields, and have been relatively successful in

enabling users to access material otherwise hidden. While the respective institutions have created

successful schemes in relation to their own material, it is important to examine how many of these

rules are transferrable or applicable to general library cataloguing rather than being tailored to a

specific collection. One element that is overlooked by both collections, is the notation of different

languages present in the material.

MultilingualismThe John Johnson Ephemera Collection uses Iconclass to inform its cataloguing, which is a

classification scheme designed for art and iconography, and is multilingual using English, French,

German and Italian, while working towards Norwegian, Finnish, Dutch and Chinese. This is done by

creating the same hierarchical structures in each language. However, this can be problematic due to

differing linguistic structures which change over time, meaning direct translations of hierarchical

subject terms often do not create accurate or intuitive retrieval routes.

While classic cataloguing rules have struggled with incorporating multilingual capabilities in their

search terms, social tagging is less rigid and can therefore be used to tag items using multiple

languages as appropriate.

Technological developments in multilingual information retrieval are increasing due to the gap

between English and other languages such as Chinese and Spanish narrowing among internet users

(Chu, 2010, p. 161), with standards like Unicode being developed to code characters, letters and

symbol in any language aiding interoperability. As they develop, these standards will have a greater

impact in global resource sharing.

Currently, the Library of Congress Name Authority Files (NAF) uses ‘see also tracings’ for writers who

choose to write under multiple different names. Using the example of Agatha Christie, Welsh and

Batley (2012, p. 66) demonstrates the linked bibliographic identities;

Christie, Agatha, 1890-1976

Mallowan, Agatha Christie, 1890-1976

Westmacott, Mary, 1890-1976.

In some library management systems, it is possible for a search for ‘Kristi, Agata’ to link to the

authorized heading of Agatha Christie (Welsh and Batley, 2012, p. 68). Although, this is dependent

26

on the library management system in use, there is some scope to improve the recall of resources by

linking alternate spellings of bibliographic identities.

When considering tagging or describing the Cassidy-Quinn collection, at Item level items containing

Irish language could be tagged using the language terms (I.e. Eire instead of Ireland/Irish) to indicate

this. A collection level description may include tags or descriptors in both languages to reflect

elements in the collection as a whole.

Institutions working in a bilingual environment, such as the National Library of Wales (NLW) and the

RCAHMW, have explicit fields for Welsh/English translations of subject terms, which are helpful in

considering the specific collection of postcards, but not for a general set of cataloguing rules for

ephemera.

SummaryA cataloguing scheme for ephemera must balance the high level of detail needed to create

meaningful records, and the pressures on staff time and funding which libraries are experiencing.

Furthermore, it is vital for a catalogue to be consistent, and easy for users to navigate.

Therefore, a cataloguing scheme must be;

Efficient and streamlined; less combinations of thesauri and classification schemes

Keyword searching, advanced searching with a minimum of twelve fields, image browsing as

appropriate

Easily searchable for all users

Elements such as multilingualism and interoperability, and the use of social tagging, will improve

with further technological developments and implementation in memory institution’s day-to-day

working practices.

27

Introduction to the Cassidy-Quinn CollectionFor this project, I have scanned a collection of postcards from the 1900s into a digital format,

including both the image and written sides in order to mimic a 'digital surrogate' collection, and plan

to apply the aims set out to this material to demonstrate the practical problems of classifying and

providing accessing collections of ephemera. Further references to this collection will be entitled the

‘Cassidy-Quinn’ collection, referring to the two main correspondents.

As postcards, the resource combines text and image in a ratio that varies from each item, meaning

that decisions must be made concerning whether the collection as a whole is catalogued as one

type, or the type is assigned at item level. Additionally, the postcards contain postage stamps and

dates, which I have excluded from considering in detail due to Philately having a dedicated

catalogue, however Clinton (1981, p. 31-32) notes that if postage stamps are excluded in postal

ephemera, then what of postmarks and handstamps.

Copeland's team at Pennsylvania State University catalogued items which combined text and image

as text because the images, although relatively large in proportion to the text, do not stand on their

own and the textual portions are crucial to the documents in conveying the meaning (Copeland et

al., 2006, p. 190).

For a collection of ephemera to be meaningful, certain contextual information must be set out.

Research which has used ephemera focus on illustrating particular events or significant social

changes, therefore cataloguers need to provide a set minimum of information, such as the relevant

time period and social context.

As detailed below, there is a large amount of context about the social and political changes during

the time that this correspondence took place which has an impact on its significance and meaning,

turning an unorganised bundle of postcards, into an interesting resource demonstrating social

relations, language use, and travel in the 20th Century. To send postcards in Britain which were

entirely covered by the picture on one side, was only possible from 1902 onwards (Clinton, 1981, p.

37) making this collection, and the locations they range from, relatively early examples of long

distance postcards.

As this is a personal collection, I have enough knowledge to set out its background without much

further research. However, providing this depth of context for an institutional collection, relies on a

certain amount of knowledge from cataloguers or previous records, or time for staff to conduct

research into the collection.

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The family backgroundThe correspondence is from my mother’s side of the family, both branches of which came to the

English midlands from Ireland in the 1800s. The information about the family comes from sources

including official census records and family knowledge.

There is an increase in public interest in family history, and online availability of census and ancestry

records, admittedly mainly behind a paywall1. This increase in resources available could improve

linking data to enrich material like these postcards, turning them into a valuable resource for

research in family history, or as illustration of wider social history.

The postcards are addressed mainly to Mary Adelaide Quinn, my great-grandmother, with a few

addressed to other members of the family (See Appendix C, Fig.3).

The date range: Historical events of importanceThe majority of the postcards are written and sent to Mary Quinn between 1905 and 1912, with

others from 1938 to 1942. This sets the correspondence within the date range when Ireland was

part of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland (1801-1922), and includes the turbulent

political events of the effect of The Great Famine (in the 1840s, leading to mass emigration), the

Home Rule campaign, and World War One.

Groups such as the Gaelic League, and the nationalist movement aimed to maintain and revive

traditional Irish cultural forms and of the Irish language (Barbour and Carmichael, 2003, p. 37). The

family were aware that John Thomas Cassidy was a member of the Gaelic Athletic Association

operating in mainland Britain, and made the effort to learn Irish, which supports the idea of that he

at least sympathised with the Irish nationalist cause. This could be further supported by an image of

Douglas Hyde, first president of Ireland, a leading figure in the Gaelic revival and president of the

Gaelic League, appearing on one of the postcards (See Appendix C, Fig. 4)

The Great Famine was responsible for a huge increase in emigration from Ireland especially from the

west, to the United Kingdom. Such was the increase, that by 1851, 25 % of Liverpool’s population

was Irish-born (MacRaild, 2011, p. 49), causing social tensions including discrimination and prejudice

against Irish workers (Bielenberg, 2015, p. 24) complicated further by prejudice against Catholicism.

1 i.e. Findyourpast.com, Ancestry.co.uk

29

The correspondence is written in multiple languages, with the most common after English being

Irish. The poorest and rural areas of Ireland were hit hardest by the Great Famine. These were also

the areas where the Irish language was traditionally the majority language, causing an increased

decline in the language (O'Huallachain, 1995, p. 31). The death of an estimated one and a half million

people, while a further million emigrated in the following five years, a great proportion of which

were Irish Speakers (Price, 1985, p.40) further impacted the regular use of Irish.

The postcards and the Irish languageThe presence of Irish in the postcards is a point of interest in socio-linguistic studies, demonstrating

the value of this resource in academic research. The writer of the majority of the Irish cards is from

the generation who did not speak Irish as their first language. The correspondence and translations

imply that Mary wrote back in Irish, which is unusual considering the Quinn family were an earlier

wave of Irish emigration and therefore would not have been brought up around native Irish.

The rule of Ireland under British government included the setting up of National Schools, which was

a factor in the decline of the Irish language (Tissier-Moston, 2010, p. 91-92). The schools taught

solely in English, and prohibited speaking Irish at all, creating a generation who were at least/only

educated in English (O Dochartaigh, 2000, p. 9).

Class has an impact on the decline of the Irish language; if you could only speak Irish, you were less

likely to be educated and have the chance to improve your social standing. In census records of the

Cassidy family in 1901 (See Appendix C, Fig.5), Michael Cassidy Sr was a teacher in the National

schools, and speaks both Irish and English, implying that the family were bilingual, however family

knowledge asserts that he did not teach or encourage his children to speak Irish.

The Irish writer most often is John Thomas Cassidy, who did not speak Irish fluently as a first

language, despite his father being bilingual. From family knowledge, we know that Michael Cassidy

Sr discouraged speaking Irish due to class prejudices, and economic opportunities, making John

Thomas’ learning the language surprising. Preliminary translation work on the postcards’ contents,

discovered that John Thomas is learning Irish as an adult, due to grammatical mistakes, and the use

of less sophisticated handwriting in the Irish script.

Learning Irish would not have had value in terms of further employment or economic opportunities

for any of the family living in England, therefore the cards could support the idea of learning the

language out of a sense of national identity. This is further supported by the photographs of family

holidays to Dingle, County Kerry (See Appendix C, Fig. 6 & 7), in the most western point of Ireland;

during a time period where the county would have been majority Irish speakers, with a sizable

30

portion of the population being monoglot Irish speakers. It has some history as a location for people

to travel to in order to learn and improve their Irish, due to being part of the Gaeltacht.

The range of locations written fromThe postcards are sent from a wide range of locations. The regular correspondence is between

Birmingham and Ireland, with cards coming from Brazil, South Africa, Switzerland, France, and Italy.

The locations are a topic of interest in the narrative of these cards, and could act as a starting point

for researching these travellers, and why they may be in those locations. The wide range of locations

can provide an insight into the Irish diaspora, or as source material for events happening in the

country at the time for example; there are postcards sent from South Africa in 1906 which mention

being ‘stationed’ implying the writer is part of a military presence (See Appendix C Fig. 8).

Original Organisation of the resourceThere are 185 postcards, and 26 photographs; my initial step in organising the cards was to put them

into a photographic album with non-acidic paper.

The lack of uniformity in postcards is the main issue with organising them consistently. This includes;

- Different addressees and addresses

- Some are dated, and some are not

- Different senders

- Special greetings cards especially Valentines, and St Patrick’s Day cards

I chose to organise the cards which had writing present using the address, and dates where possible,

and then do the same with the postcards that only had an address with no further written content.

This has separated them into various collections; the later postcards of 4 from the 1930s, the

‘Hospital cards’ while the recipient was in a sanatorium, and later a recuperation home in

Llandudno, and the bulk of the cards which are sent to two separate addresses in Birmingham.

Although many of the postcards depict prints or photographs of landscapes, a significant amount

have portraits, illustrations and greeting cards, which could be arranged together on an online

platform, to be more user-friendly than chronological arrangement. The cards could be also

organised by sender which could improve the narrative content of the correspondence.

After scanning the postcards, I created and assigned record numbers aiming to keep the correct

image and written side together. This led me to give the written and image sides corresponding

identifiers; i.e. the first postcard in the series would have two identifiers; the written side as

PCWS001, and the image side as PCIS001. To present the two sides of the postcards and a clear

31

transcription or translation of the content in one record, I found the best presentation to be

combining these into a PDF file.

Summary

The introduction to the Cassidy-Quinn collection demonstrates the wealth of contextual information

which can be provided, and how it can add to the value of the material for researchers. This

collection for example includes references to military presence in South Africa which could be useful

to history academics, and examples of an Irish learner’s writing in the 1900s which could interest

linguistic scholars.

Postcards are an excellent example of the diversity of ephemera causing problems for cataloguing,

as set out above, there is huge variety within the resources’ textual information, and the mixture of

text and graphic material in contained in one item can complicate cataloguing processes.

This chapter has also provided a frame of reference to the collection to which I will be applying

current practices and formats to.

32

Case Study: The Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of WalesIn this section, I will first consider the application of archival cataloguing methods to the Cassidy-

Quinn collection, using examples from the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical

Monuments of Wales (RCAHMW). Subsequently, I will consider the implications and feasibility of

these standards in a general model for cataloguing ephemera.

RCAHMW StructureThe RCAHMW's remit is to document the changes to the landscape of Wales, and therefore has a

specialised system for cataloguing whereby the catalogue entries are attached to and rely on the site

data record (Evans, 2017).

The catalogue follows archival structures of fonds; Collection level> Group Level> Sub-Group Level>

Batch Level> Item Level. This enables an elevated level of granularity for collection items which is

useful when considering the diversity associated with ephemera. The multiple levels allow for the

inclusion of detailed description and high levels of contextual information which can improve the

'meaningfulness' and use of ephemera. However, it does have the disadvantage of being highly time-

consuming, and requiring a prominent level of knowledge of the material.

Organisation idealEvans (2017) states that the ideal for ephemeral material similar to this collection, would be to

digitise it and make it available online, which is something the RCAHMW has previously done with

Coflein, an online database for the National Monuments Record of Wales containing details of sites

and an index to drawings, manuscripts and photographs.

When asked to elaborate further concerning digital surrogates, especially concerning social tagging,

Evans was enthusiastic stating that while some moderation is necessary, problems of inaccuracies or

'malicious' tagging are in fact minimal. Citing the 'People's Collection Wales'2 as an example, users

are engaged and want to create accurate tags to improve or supplement retrieval tools.

2 https://www.peoplescollection.wales/

33

Application to the Cassidy-Quinn CollectionApplying these standards to my material enabled or entailed making decisions on the organisation of

the cards. Firstly, the overarching collection level is titled: the Cassidy-Quinn collection. It was

necessary to divide the cards into sub-categories of address sent to (i.e. a group of cards sent to an

address in a hospital is a Group level description). Subsequently, cards sent to the same address but

from differing locations – the key ones being from Ireland, South Africa, and Brazil- make up sub-

group level descriptions.

I designated Batch Level as determining the individual card in the collection, and the Item Level

record as pertaining to the specific image or written side.

Therefore, the written side of a postcard sent to the hospital address would be organised thus;

Table 2: Fonds structure for the message side of a postcard

Collection level: Cassidy-Quinn CollectionGroup level: Hospital CardsSub-Group level: Not Applicable

Batch level: PC003Item level: PCWS003

The Image side of a card sent from Brazil would be:

Table 3: Fonds structure for an image side of the postcard

Collection level: Cassidy-Quinn CollectionGroup level: 120 St Saviours Road CardsSub-Group level: BrazilBatch level: PC088Item level: PCIS088

While the RCAHMW does hold postcard collections, scanned and catalogued at item level, the

organisations' interest is in the image on the postcard rather than the text (Evans, 2017), making

cataloguing a simple case of attaching the item level record to a site data record. However, Evans

does suggest that creating a code for the type of message on postcards, I.e. personal message,

greetings, official correspondence, or updating family members of a location, could be a useful

category for searching postcards by content.

34

The tables used by the RCAHMW to hold their information are free text, and have a high character

limit, meaning a transcription of the message can be provided at item level, and enable us to pick

out keywords for quick access searches. Evans (2017) suggested that separate tables should be used

for data; people, dates and addresses, and content; the subject matter of the message and

transcriptions (See Appendix D, Figs. 9-12).

While the provision of transcriptions can add further value to a resource, it is also time and labour

intensive, and therefore not practical to include in everyday processes. However, there is some value

in free-text fields when cataloguing ephemera. As previously discussed, much of the value in

collections of ephemera is directly linked with the social and historical context it was produced in

(Cocks and Rubery, 2012, p. 1), therefore providing this context in the form of the ‘Scope’ field may

be more valuable to the user, and less time consuming for the cataloguer.

MultilingualismThe RCAHMW has corresponding Welsh and English language fields, which helps represent the

bilingual nature of the country, but mainly refers to material which is either one language or the

other. However, in the Cassidy-Quinn collection, the content of each record is bilingual in a true

sense of featuring both languages in one dialogue moving between the two. Evans (2017) originally

suggested dividing the material by language, but considering the mixture of languages found on each

written side, advised a drop-down menu with options of the languages featured, or 'mixed'.

Other Welsh institutions have similar approaches to dealing with bilingualism, such as the Welsh

Political ephemera collection, in the NLW, which has fields denoting 'Language of material' and

'Language and script notes'. The inclusion of these fields may have been influenced by the material

itself, where most Welsh political parties create bilingual content as a rule.

Although the Welsh Political Ephemera Collection has not been digitised, the NLWs' photographic

collections are viewable in their library catalogue, or on the institution's Flickr account. The Flickr

account includes a variety of tags in both Welsh and English, with relevant consistency

demonstrating how tagging can contribute to multilingual browsing.

Organisation and administrationWhen organising postcards, and general correspondence, the presence and acknowledgement of a

narrative is important. While collections are not consistently complete, or present both sides of a

35

conversation, the chronological order offers value, and needs to be considered when separating

items into batches or related subject matter. If the material is restricted into batches too tightly,

then the interaction across the correspondence can be lost.

However, creating meaningful content and maintaining continuity is problematic when creating

groups and sub-groups by address; the hospital cards are a small subgroup, but if taken together

with the subgroup of cards sent to a convalescence hospital in Llandudno twenty years earlier, they

can point the researcher on to a lifelong ‘affliction’ which from family knowledge was suspected to

be depression. Similarly, the multiple cards sent from South Africa, featuring notes such as 'I'm

stationed here' etc, point to a connection with the army during the Boer War. The content may not

be grouped together chronologically, but has more meaning and value when grouped by theme. This

is where creating a code for the type of message, to be used as a search field could improve specific

or thematic searching.

While chronological order is important for the physical material, if the collection is available online,

the user would be able to search by theme or date range according to their needs, reducing the

problem of preserving continuity.

Discussion: transferable elementsMuch of the interview with Susan Evans, Archive and Library Officer (RCAHMW), focuses on the

structure of their cataloguing system, and my specific collection of postcards. While the discussion

has helped to develop possibilities for cataloguing the collection, how transferable these practices

are to a generic cataloguing model for ephemera is debatable.

The amount of hierarchical levels used in archival standards indicate the need for high levels of staff

time and knowledge of the material. Therefore, examining archival standards has been beneficial by

considering supplementary search fields, which could be included in a cataloguing model. However,

the level of detail provided by the catalogue record format used by the RCAHMW reflects the

specificity of their remit to document the archaeological, architectural and maritime heritage of

Wales, and therefore is too distinct to transfer into a general cataloguing model. Contextual

information provided in sub-category records can be provided in general descriptions of collections

hosted online, allowing the item records to contain information directly referring to a singular item.

36

SummaryThe cataloguing format and process of the RCAHMW is useful in informing the organisation of a

collection into sub-categories which provide more accurate or detailed search terms when related to

the type of material. It has confirmed the need for both collection level descriptions, and item level

descriptions in order to provide and maintain the meaningfulness of the material. Although the

amount of hierarchical levels in the RCAHMW, would not be necessary in cataloguing the Cassidy-

Quinn postcard collection, they do raise an important point.

If a generic cataloguing model for ephemera needs to provide rules for both a collection level

description and an item level description, the context provided by a collection description must

necessarily increase in each subdivision, which could potentially result in a more time-consuming

process than item level cataloguing, in terms of staff time and knowledge required.

Despite the value discussed in cataloguing the image side, and written sides of postcards as separate

items, for a more in-depth record of each side’s content, it is impractical to attempt cataloguing the

two sides separately, and keeping track of corresponding sides. Therefore, a cataloguing format

which provides fields to catalogue information contained in text, and note the qualities of the image,

would be especially useful for cataloguing ephemera, where items are often preserved due to their

aesthetic qualities.

Points to take forward:

1. Collection level description and item level description needs to be considered

2. Approaches to mixed text and image material

3. Advantages of using free-text for some elements

37

Case Study: The John Johnson Ephemera Collection

In this section, I will explore the various experiments and projects applied to the John Johnson

Ephemera collection held by the Bodleian libraries, then consider the feasibility of using the results

of these experiments to inform a general model for cataloguing ephemera.

The John Johnson Ephemera CollectionJohnson began collecting printed ephemera from the 1930s until his death in 1956, assembling over

1.5 million items divided into 680 subject headings (Bodleian.ox.ac.uk, 2017), with a strong focus on

material produced in the 18th to early 20th century. It includes advertisements, handbills, playbills

and programmes, menus, greeting cards, posters and postcards, and has been the subject of

multiple projects to make the material more accessible as technology has evolved. These projects

have included;

- Broadside Ballads Online; a digital collection of English printed ballad-sheets from between

the 16th and 20th centuries

- The Toyota Transport Project - containing all motoring material in the collection and 1000

sample images from other transport sections, and was the Bodleian’s first digital project

- VADS: Political Cartoons and Trades and Professions Prints; an image based site which is also

available through the Visual Arts and Humanities Data Services

- An Archive of Printed Ephemera – in collaboration with ProQuest, which catalogued and

digitised 67,754 documents from the collection, focusing on; Nineteenth-Century

Entertainment, the Booktrade, Popular Prints, Crime, Murder and Executions, and

Advertising.

The project in collaboration with ProQuest is the most recent project and includes full text searching

using Optimal Character Recognition (OCR), and is the project chosen by the John Johnson Librarian

as the most successful experiment thus far. Therefore, I will be focusing primarily on this project for

this case study.

38

Organisation IdealThe ideal of the collection is to catalogue everything to item level which corresponds to archival

preference, and use OCR as much as possible to increase searching capabilities. Additionally, they

aim to increase availability of material online, and social media engagement (Lambert, 2017).

However, conforming to trends in the library sector, projects tend to be heavily image focused, and

neglecting the text dominant material, including historical or political documents which may be of

more value to researchers, prompting the desire to increase the use of OCR in documents (Lambert,

2017).

Going forward, Julie-Anne Lambert – Librarian of the John Johnson Ephemera Collection discussed

the possibility of generating metadata via the application of OCR to material then using this as the

basis for keyword searches.

The generation of metadata and key words using full-text searching can increase with technological

advancements, but could be replicated using social tagging which has the advantage of engaging

users and reflecting search terms, and is applicable to both text documents, and image files.

In order for ephemera to be used in research, the material needs to be accessible via up to date

pathways, therefore the aims of the organisation to increase online availability, and improve

keyword search terms are relevant and necessary.

StandardsThe John Johnson Ephemera Collection created and uses its own custom cataloguing format for

ephemera using allegro c, due to finding MARC lacking the extensive fields needed to catalogue

ephemera (Lambert, 2017).

Thesauri used is currently the area in need of streamlining. Due to the nature of ephemera, a variety

of thesauri have been used for items according to the primary features, i.e. Iconclass and LCTGM for

images. However, a thesaurus of Ephemera terms was published (Morris, 2013) with the intention of

annual revisions. Although there are no current plans to provide a searchable version as yet, a

cohesive thesaurus specifically designed for ephemera is informative and vital to developing

cataloguing rules.

39

In the current cataloguing rules compiled by the John Johnson Ephemera Collection, the ‘Type of

Material’ category draws from;

- Art & Architecture thesaurus (Getty) (AAT)

- LCTGM

- LCSH

- The Centre for Ephemera studies thesaurus (University of Reading)

- ARCL Rare books and Manuscripts section controlled vocabulary

- English Short Title Catalogue genre term;

The catalogue rules also provide further codes for sub-categories, special features, genres and

authorities. The use of this variety of thesauri and controlled vocabularies allows for specific and in-

depth notation of types of material. However, this is time-consuming, and the variety can also result

in inconsistency, which is counterproductive for users. A streamlined approach to controlled

vocabulary and thesauri can resolve these issues and be an area for further development to

consolidate a unified thesaurus of ephemera terms.

Application to the Cassidy-Quinn collectionA complication specific to postcards, which I had not previously considered, is the difficulties of

copyright. To comply with copyright law, organisations wishing to digitise postcards must seek

permission from the sender, and receiver of the postcard. This is not an issue for the collection I am

working with as it is a family collection, but can be a massive hurdle for collections held by

institutions.

Furthermore, the optimum arrangement of correspondence is debatable depending on what the

user is looking for. At first, chronological arrangement seems the most logical solution, as it

maintains a narrative structure, however if the user is looking for common themes, such as illness or

travel, it is more useful to arrange the collection by common themes.

While this consideration is important in the physical arrangement of material, it is less important to

users searching online, given the variety of search terms a user can apply.

40

Applying the headings set out in the Thesaurus of Ephemera (Morris, 2013) results in several broad,

narrow and related terms;

Broad Term: Narrow Term: Correspondence PostcardsPhotographs PostcardsCards Postcards; Congratulations Cards; Acquaintance

Cards; Greetings CardsThese headings allude to the type of message conveyed by the text, and eliminate the need to

create a code for messages, suggested by the RCAHMW, and are consistent with Rickards'

Encyclopaedia of Ephemera which provides separate entries for various forms of correspondence

and cards based on the type of message it conveys.

The cataloguing format notes whether an item includes both sides of the postcard, or single sides,

but doesn’t distinguish whether subject terms applied to the item are applied to both sides.

Postcards present a particular difficulty due to the difference between sides; one being solely text,

and the other generally solely image based, but are unable to be physically separated. Therefore, at

least two standards have to be applied, one to deal with the textual information, and one with the

graphic.

The issue of the dual nature of postcards continues in considering which subject terms can be

applied, whether they are based on the written text and its context, or the features of the image,

and whether this information is presented in one record, or separated.

It is arguable that the archival structure of providing increasingly in-depth descriptions and context

in subsequent fonds, enables a more detailed picture of the item in relation to the collection and a

clearer separation between the image and message sides of the cards, while clearly noting the two

sides of the same card.

Despite being extensive, the John Johnson catalogue format doesn’t include specific image-related

codes, rather it relies on the use of subject headings and image-focused thesauri, specifically

Iconclass, LCTGM and the AAT.

The lack of codes or fields for noting features of images is unexpected considering the strong

aesthetic qualities which items of ephemera frequently contain, and is often the reason they are

preserved. This is where social tagging could contribute to image description, and key words for

basic searches.

41

MultilingualismThe capacity to note language or the presence of multiple languages is one of the only elements I

found lacking in the John Johnson cataloguing rules. There is a ‘country code’ field to denote where

an item was published, but no field for noting or distinguishing the language or languages featured in

the material. However, this could be easily remedied by adding a field to denote language of text.

The disparity between the availability of resources and catalogues in multiple languages is

decreasing, but is an issue in cataloguing in general. This can be applied to the appropriateness of

using free-text compared to coded information in catalogue formats; coded information may be

easier to map and convert into other formats via crosswalks, making the information more likely to

be converted or linked to multiple language formats. In contrast, free text would require significant

translation efforts, which cannot be automated, resulting in a large amount of skilled staff time

required.

Interoperability is an essential requirement between cataloguing formats, and between languages

due to the rising connectedness across the globe, making coded information which can be linked to

corresponding records in other languages increasingly important. In developing a cataloguing

format, this must be considered in relation to the provision of context in a free-text format.

Organisation and administrative costingThe collaboration with ProQuest undoubtedly produced the best functioning catalogue of material

selected for the project. The project cost upwards of £1 million, including the cost of outsourced

digitisation, two conservators, a project manager, administrators and cataloguers. The work was

labour intensive and included creating indexes, remounting each item, and tracking and shelving the

material while the digitisation process took place.

While the effort to catalogue existing collection items, and obtain modern ephemera is ongoing, the

work relies on twelve volunteers as well as paid staff, and does not include digitisation due to the

costs. This is where practicality and efficiency is important, especially considering the time-

consuming nature of consulting various thesauri and cataloguing every resource to item level. Most

institutions would struggle to justify or acquire the necessary staff time, and money spent on a

specialist area, rather than standard services in which are in high demand.

42

Discussion: transferable elementsAfter creating their cataloguing scheme, the John Johnson library had hoped it may be adopted by

other libraries (Lambert, 2017), however the problems of higher priorities, lack of funding and time,

mean that there is a lack of focused effort to make ephemera available to users, over more heavily

used and less specialist material, including the implementation of a specialist cataloguing scheme,

Due to the variety and extent of the John Johnson Ephemera Collection, the cataloguing scheme

created is extensive, however the amount of time devoted to cataloguing activities is too high for

non-specialist libraries; therefore, a condensed version of the scheme with optional tables may be a

more feasible approach to encourage its use in other institutions.

Additionally, as noted previously in the consideration of factors in cataloguing rules, the application

of one subject headings scheme for specific collections, rather than using a combination of multiple

thesauri and indexes can contribute to streamlining cataloguing.

Additionally, the cataloguing rules need to be interoperable with different platforms and library

management systems. Given its resemblance to MARC21, and the development of ‘crosswalks’ such

as between Dublin Core to MARC 21 or EAD (Encoded Archival Description), and EAD to ISAD (G)

(General International Standard Archival Description) (Day, M. n.d.), the possibilities of making this

format interoperable is not unlikely.

43

Summary of points

It was hoped, when the cataloguing rules were formed, that other institutions would apply it to their

collections (Lambert, 2017), however, due to external pressures of lack of funding, staff or time,

cataloguing ephemera is not a priority in most institutions, therefore there are no examples of the

scheme being implemented in other memory institution to judge its effectiveness or practicality in

being applied to generic collections.

Although I have identified language of the resource as an area which could be further developed, the

scheme is an extensive one which accommodates the variety which is characteristic of ephemera

collections. However, the practicalities of library operations in terms of funding, priorities and staff

time, have resulted in a lack of sustained or ongoing efforts to catalogue specialist material, relying

heavily on projects.

For the John Johnson ephemera cataloguing format to be implemented by other institutions, there is

a balance needs to be achieved between the level of detail required and supplied to ensure that the

material is able to be found, and a level which is time-efficient and manageable for cataloguing

librarians.

A vital area of change to make cataloguing ephemera more efficient using the John Johnson

catalogue format, is the use of multiple thesauri and controlled vocabularies to create access points

and assign subject headings. Streamlining this process could not only reduce staff time spent, but

increase consistency in item description.

The potential developments in OCR, social tagging and full text search, to compile and generate user

friendly, keywords for basic searches is an area which ephemera could benefit from, especially

concerning the retrieval of images, and mixed media resources.

Points to take forward:

1. Collection level and item level descriptions

2. Streamlining of thesauri and controlled vocabularies

3. Interoperability; free text and coded information

4. Potential technological developments provide

44

Outcomes: Preliminary model for cataloguing ephemera

The initial aim of this project was to examine current practices for cataloguing ephemera in order to

inform the creation of a preliminary cataloguing model for institutions to use.

In scrutinizing the John Johnson Ephemera Collection, and its custom cataloguing rules, I found an

extensive scheme which includes the high number of fields needed to note details of ephemeral

material. The Evanion Collection at the British Library similarly found no existing cataloguing scheme

which adequately represented ephemera and therefore created its own informed by a mixture of

other schemes.

While the John Johnson cataloguing scheme provides for significant levels of detail, this is not

practical for institutions with more limited amounts of time and funding. Therefore, the creation of

scheme which may be based on the John Johnson model, but be condensed or have optional

modules or tables for material formats may be more efficient and practical. This has been done in

part by the inclusion of tables for material related codes, category-specific codes, production-related

codes and country codes. Many collections of ephemera are grouped by physical format as the most

efficient means of storage, which can then inform cataloguing efforts.

There is no limit to how complicated and extensive cataloguing schemes can be for a resource as

diverse as ephemera; there is potential to create specific search terms for each entry in Rickards’

Encyclopaedia of Ephemera (2001). However, this is impossible to carry out due to time, funding and

staff available to institutions. In this chapter, I will draw on cataloguing schemes previously discussed

to form a general cataloguing scheme for ephemera, and apply it to my collection of postcards.

Collection Level/Item Level cataloguingOne of the most common uses of ephemera in research, is to illustrate a broad picture of social

history, making contextual information essential to maintaining the meaningfulness of an item or

resource (Copeland, 2006, p.190).

Although both the RCAHMW, and the John Johnson Ephemera Collection state that item level

description is the organisation’s ideal, they are both specialist institutions; whereas for organisations

with broad remits, quality collection level descriptions can be more important and useful in guiding

users to the resources. While the John Johnson cataloguing rules are applied to each individual

item, the catalogue records provided by the RCAHMW demonstrate multiple collection subdivisions

down towards the individual item record.

45

The difference in approaches have the potential to be combined into a time-efficient approach,

which is a satisfactory balance between the detail provided by item level descriptions, and the

important contextual information provided by collection level descriptions.

I propose a minimum set of fields which explicitly note the contents and context of a collection,

based on the John Johnson cataloguing format with a minor change of the ‘Notes’ field to ‘Scope and

Context’ with the addition of LOC subject headings as another layer of access points, and explicit

notation of medium types using the Centre for Ephemera Studies Thesaurus (University of Reading);

Table 4: Collection Level catalogue format

Record-related fields#000 Record Number#0rr Latest record revision #0rx Record link#0cl Cataloguing level

d Done

p Partially edited#0rt Record tag

c Cassidy –Quinn Postcard CollectionType of Material100* Category (i.e. genre)101 Sub-category102* Special FeaturesText Related fields200 Collection title: 270 Series

$n Number:$f Frequency

Subject700 Subject

$x* General subdivision$y* Chronological subdivision$z* Geographical subdivision

724 LCSH$x* General subdivision$y* Chronological subdivision$z* Geographical subdivision

Miscellaneous800* Notes

ExtentLocation950* Shelfmark

$g Image file name *= Repeatable

46

The difficulty in this approach comes when we consider collections which are divided into sub-

collections, and whether the context provided must increase in specificity in each subdivision. It

would also be beneficial to include fields featured on the RCAHMW catalogue, such as ‘Extent’, i.e.

number of items contained in the collection, and field for noting languages featured in the material.

An increased level of specificity in collection level description can improve the accuracy and speed in

which users find various items relating to their subject area, especially with the addition of access

points based on contextual information. This approach also significantly reduces time spent

cataloguing in comparison to item level descriptions.

However, as previously acknowledged, the level of detail contained in item level can be

advantageous, and therefore I suggest the John Johnson cataloguing rules3 be applied to individual

high used items, or those of special interest.

Subsequently, a completed collection level description would resemble the following;

Table 5: Collection level description applied to Cassidy-Quinn Collection

Record-related fields#000 Record Number#0rr Latest record revision #0rx Record link#0cl Cataloguing level

d Done

p Partially edited#0rt Record tag

c Cassidy –Quinn Postcard CollectionType of Material

100* Cards – PostcardsCorrespondence - Postcards

101 Postcards102* Special FeaturesText Related fields200 Collection title: Cassidy-Quinn Collection270 Series: Hospital Cards

$f 2Subject700 Subject

$x* General subdivision$y* Chronological subdivision$z* Geographical subdivision

724 LCSH

3 http://www.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/johnson/docs/search/JJ-catalogue-format.pdf

47

$x* History of EuropeSocial Life and CustomsIrish Question

$y* 19th-20th Centuries$z* Ireland

EnglandMiscellaneous800* Scope

and Context

This collection features correspondence between the Cassidy and Quinn families, during a period of mass immigration in from Ireland. This group of items pertain to a period spend in a Sanatorium in Birmingham

Location950* Shelfmark

$g Image file name

An item level description would subsequently resemble this format;

Table 6: Item level description applied to the Cassidy-Quinn Collection

Record-related fields#000 Record Number#0rr Latest record revision: #0rx Record link#0cl Cataloguing level

D Done

p Partially edited#0rt Record tag

C Cassidy –Quinn Postcard CollectionCoded information (relating to the material)#080 CCL (Creative Commons License)#091 $o: b:m:q

#098 $uk:enType of material#100* Postcards$tgmgpc (Category (i.e. genre) Thesaurus)#101 Illustration#102* ColourGenre Authority1CA Authority term

$t Thesaurus1CR* Cross-reference1CN NotesText-related fields#200 Title: Chosen leaf of Bard and Chief: Old Erin’s native Shamrock#210 Short title: Chosen leaf of Bard and Chief#240 First line: Dear Maire#242 Full text:

48

Dear Maire, Do you remember how long we’ve had this p.card? Thank you for letter re’cd today and list. Glad to know you’re happy and improving will write you a letter tomorrow evg, D. V. Love from all at home, yours always Sean jay(?)

Address: Mrs M. A. Cassidy Ward 4 T. C.

Romsley Hill Sanatorium Hallsowen Birmingham

#270 Series:$n Number: 003$f Frequency: 2

Names: associated persons#420* Addresser: John Cassidy#421* Addressee: Mary Adelaide Quinn#434* Town $i birmingham

$a Romsley Hill Sanatorium, Hallsowen, BirminghamNames: production-related#570* Publisher: Lawrence, DublinPhysical form and production#600 $p2 (Pages image side and writing)

$d10.5cm*14.8cm (Dimensions)#680 Printing process of text: handwritten & print#691 Period of work: 20th century#692 Date type Subject#700* Subject

$x General subdivision$y Chronological subdivision$z Geographical subdivision

#708* Subject of illustration (supplementary to LCTGM terms)#720* LCTGM (Library of Congress Thesaurus for Graphic Materials

$v* Postcard (form subdivision)$x* General subdivision$z* Ireland-lakes

#724 LCSH$x* History of Europe

Ireland$y* 19th-20th Centuries$z* Irish Question

Location#950* $g Image filename (PCWS003: PCIS003)

49

Process work flowThe table below demonstrates a preliminary work flow of the process of planning, selection of

material and cataloguing, including digitisation, and material selected for item level descriptions.

This work flow is practical in terms of corresponding with other processes and cataloguing of

traditional material.

Table 7: Cataloguing workflow

Although funding for digitisation is not guaranteed, I would suggest including consideration for

digitising key or illustrative images of collections in the planning stages. Another area which may

need further development are qualifiers for item level descriptions such as the presence of

significant persons in the material, rare or significant stamps and markings, or the relevance to a

particular topic; such as items relevant to specific exhibition.

50

Identify material with special features, or frequently usedIdentify collections which will need specialist knowledge to provide context

Planning

Collections to be catalogued according to format devised'Scope and Content' to be writtenSelect items for digitisation

Prioritization Items previously identified as frequently used or of special interest to be catalogued to John Johnson catalogue formatDigitise

Specialisation

Digitisation and Social TaggingIn concurrence with Susan Evans (RCAHMW), and Julie-Anne Lambert (John Johnson Ephemera

Collection), I believe ephemera collections would benefit from the ongoing commitment of libraries

and archives to provide more increased online content. Therefore, digitisation of ephemera

collections is an element considered ideal in improving access and use of material in research.

However, the limitations of this ideal due to copyright restrictions must be acknowledged.

The use and exploration of social tagging is an area which has potential to significantly improve

retrieval of ephemera, assuming digitisation of material has taken place. While thesauri and

controlled vocabularies create logical access points, harvesting social tags to use as key word

searches has the benefit of being user-generated and therefore reflects language used by users

which can be more accessible.

The concerns of librarians over inaccuracies, duplications or malicious intent of tagging, can be

neutralised by enabling moderation.

Specifically; cataloguers responsible for creating the collection level descriptions detailed above

should assign keywords as a guide or example for users who wish to tag individual items within that

collection.

Table 8: Digitisation and Social tagging work flow

51

Items selected for digitisation catalogued to item level (assuming copyright clearance)Scanned as high resolution images and named appropriately

Digitisation

Uploaded to social media/image platform, which allows user tagging, in 'albums' replicating 'collections' structureUse catalogue record to supply information of collection

Social Tagging Review tags accumulated over one monthHarvest accepted tags to inform keyword searchingUse view statistics to inform items eligable for item level cataloguing

Tag moderation

Further areas of developmentAn aspect not previously explored is the provision of transcriptions, - and in cases of multilingual

resources – translation of content. Although this additional layer of content would be advantageous

to users, it is an excessive step, which would be costly in terms of labour and time, and impractical to

include in general working practices. For search and retrieval purposes the use of OCR, or assigning

keywords from the text of an item, is a much more practical method, compared with full

transcription.

Digitisation has already had a major impact in making collections available and accessible to users,

while preserving the original material. However, further developments in the image hosting

platforms, could see more engaging features such as improved zooming capabilities, split screen

images for comparative purposes, and rolling galleries, which could facilitate further participation

and discovery of resources.

Further developments in OCR full text searching, and moderated social tagging have the potential to

create or contribute to increasingly accessible controlled vocabularies, using real language search

terms circulating by users. This could contribute to keeping up to date with new or developing

subject specific vocabularies, and has the potential to improve retrieval systems in general, but could

be especially impactful in specialist, or niche collections.

52

ConclusionInitially when examining the cataloguing format composed for the John Johnson Ephemera

Collection, I established that it was extensive enough to cover the variety of resources and material

included under the term ephemera. However, after considering the practicalities of cataloguing

items in such detail as part of regular working practices, I concluded that the comprehensiveness of

the item records were not conducive to inclusion in everyday activities carried out by librarians in

most institutions.

Furthermore, when exploring the use of ephemera in research, I determined that the majority of

ephemera used in research is valued in relation to specific social, political or cultural events.

Therefore, for ephemera to be valuable, libraries need to provide a base amount of context

surrounding the material. This led me to consider whether item level descriptions were the most

useful method of retrieval for users, or whether collection level descriptions were more appropriate.

The literature review identified the use of ephemera in academic research, and the current practices

of cataloguing material, to provide a frame of reference for the need to consolidate and improve

retrieval methods, and a brief insight into the potential of technological developments such as social

tagging.

The methodology set out the reasoning behind using case studies and interviews to scrutinize

practices in-depth, and acknowledged the potential of expanding the study to a wider cohort of

institutions.

Factors which contribute to cataloguing formats were then considered including; user groups,

technological capabilities, practicalities such as staff time and funding and the minimum number of

search fields required. Multilingualism was considered separately, as an element which is

increasingly important in online resource retrieval in general, and has an application in the test

collection used in this study.

The Cassidy-Quinn Collection was then contextualised, giving a frame of reference to a collection of

postcards to which elements of cataloguing and retrieval were applied to.

Case studies of the Royal Commission for Ancient and Historical Monuments of Wales (RCAHMW),

and the John Johnson Ephemera Collection at the Bodleian were then set out, presenting the

context of the collections, the organisation ideal, and their current practices, in order to compound

successful practices and consider areas for improvement.

53

Outcomes of the examination of the case studies were then presented, with a suggested work flow

and cataloguing format based on the conclusions drawn in the case studies. A work flow for using

social tagging to contribute to retrieval was included as an introduction into how technological

developments could be implemented.

My solutionMy solution is to focus on providing information which enhances the usefulness of items of

ephemera, i.e. the social, historical and political context of the collection, via a collection level

cataloguing format, then providing a corresponding, and more comprehensive format for items of

special significance within a collection.

This provides a middle ground where users have enough information to make judgements on

whether the material is relevant to their research, and cataloguers’ workload is not as extensive as

full item level descriptions would be.

I have also reduced the number of thesauri used, applying LOC subject headings to the example

items’ content, and the Thesaurus of Ephemera terms (University of Reading) to the material type.

These standards would be subject to the type of ephemeral material contained within a collection; if

a collection is solely art exhibition flyers, held by a specialist art library, other standards may be

more appropriate, but would be applied to the whole collection, to avoid inconsistency among

items.

DisadvantagesAlthough collection level descriptions may be advantageous for users, and for cataloguers in terms

of staff time, constraining item level descriptions solely to heavily used items, or items of special

value, does rely on the judgement of cataloguers concerning what features make an item qualify for

item level cataloguing.

This format is needs to be interoperable, and therefore a cross walk between standards may need to

be developed. The capacity to work across multiple languages also relies on interoperable standards.

Additionally, this format is being developed prior to any widespread implementation of RDA in the

library sector, the effects of which cannot be predicted.

54

Future researchThere are various research projects which could further this study. As previously identified in the

assessment of case studies and their disadvantages, a wider and more formal survey could be

circulated among institutions to gain a more extensive insight into practices.

It would also be beneficial to test the preliminary model developed within this project in established

institutions with uncatalogued ephemera to see how successful the model is in retrieval, but also

how practical it is in terms of staff time and effort.

55

Appendices

Appendix A: Contributing factors in a Cataloguing Model

Figure 1: The Evanion Collection catalogue: Advanced search form

56

Figure 2: John Johnson Ephemera Collection: ProQuest catalogue search form

57

Appendix B: Interview transcriptsInterview with Julie-Anne Lambert, Librarian of the John Johnson Ephemera Collection, Bodleian Libraries, 14.30, 31st July, 2017

Current practices

How are they stored, according to what classification scheme and why?

Boxed according to material type (I.e. bookplates, playbills, etc.)

What methods have been successful and what are the key factors behind the project's success?OCR played a big part in the ProQuest funded projectTechnology changes play a big roleCustom catalogue format solves problem of MARC lacking the extensive needs of Ephemera cataloguing.

What are the drawbacks in their current methods?Due to being project-based most material looked at for digitisation are image based, neglecting text dominant material like historical/social/political documents which may be of more value to researchers, but less aesthetically appealing to the public

What plans do they have to address problems/drawbacks/gaps? Would like to experiment with generating metadata via applying OCR to material then using

this as the basis for keyword searches Interested in expanding social media preserve and engagement, but find crowd-sourcing and

social tagging difficult; tag-moderation is one difficulty, and engagement from public outside of time-pressed academics is difficult

Is it possible to have a screenshot or image of a catalogue record in use, to apply to my collection?

Sending me the URL

Difference between ProQuest functionality and main catalogue

What did you consider in terms of access, the digitisation quality is fantastic, did you or would you consider providing transcriptions to resources if there was time

The issue with transcription of any text is the copyright, the tracking down of authors or publishers of ephemera is so difficult that unless the collection already comes with copyright permissions, transcribing any manuscript material is unfeasible.

58

The material I’m considering has a strong bilingual element, do you have an approach to noting multiple language present in the resources?

The current approach to language is to include it in the country code table. This still leaves no room for noting bilingualism or multiple languages in an item. #098 field for country code, the material originated from, but do not distinguish between this and the language which appears in the item record

If you had unlimited resources/time/staffing, what would be your ideal for this kind of material to be accessed

ProQuest project cost upwards of £1 million, including the cost of digitisation, 2 conservators, project manager, administrators and cataloguers.

The ideal is for every piece catalogued to item level

Increased availability of material online and social media engagement

Additionally, any information about the cost of the project in money, and staff time would be very useful

Very labour intensive; included creating indexes, remounting, tracking and shelving of material while the digitisation process took place.

Now, funding is difficult to obtain, and still relies on projects rather than ongoing efforts for the majority, although modern ephemera is being collected.

Recommendation: consult/compile as comprehensive thesauri for terms (I.e. the Reading one) as possible

Do you think the cataloguing rules created by your institution are transferrable to other institutions, how practical is it for less well-funded institutions?

They had hoped that the rules would be tried by other institutions but the perennial funding problem makes Ephemera-focused librarians scarce.

Depending on the scope of the collection, it is also specialist and labour intensive. The department has 12 volunteers, each of which have a type i.e. the volunteer responsible for bookplates has to include and research heraldry for the depth of detail required.

59

RCAHMW Interview with Susan Evans, Archives & Library Officer14.00, 14th July 2017

Current practices

How are they stored, according to what classification scheme and why?

Specialist classification scheme based on location

Catalogue records – Collection title,

- arbitrary catalogue number usually relating to the site location- date of record- if they were copied, and date- location details- note concerning what medium, with a drop-down list of text, photo, cartographic, and

Miscellaneous- Scope and content field

includes ISAD (G) standards but they do not call them fonds

Interesting unusual fields for RCAHMW is the addition of ‘linked sites’ everything hangs off the site data record, and we link the catalogue entry to the site data records, in this case ‘Abermagwr roman villa’

Within collections they catalogue to group, sub-group, batch, item; a.k.a hierarchical system

For your collection of postcards, what I would probably do would is create a collection level entry for the postcard collection,

then probably divided it by the languages as groups, and then catalogue them to item level

What methods have been successful and what are the key factors behind the project's success?

Custom catalogue format solves problem of lacking the extensive needs of the cataloguing

What are the drawbacks in their current methods?Due to being project-based most material looked at for digitisation are image based, neglecting text dominant material like historical/social/political documents which may be of more value to researchers, but less aesthetically appealing to the public

What plans do they have to address problems/drawbacks/gaps?

Crowd sourcing, I would think that’s a really good idea, I think that would be very good, sometimes there has to be a bit of moderation, but I don’t think it is a massive problem. I don’t think with the People’s Collection, you have that sort of problem, due to the type of users who are accessing it. So yes, I would consider using that

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Is it possible to have a screenshot or image of a catalogue record in use, to apply to my collection?

Sending me the Screenshots

What did you consider in terms of access; did you or would you consider providing transcriptions to resources if there was time

If we were to have that collection, our emphasis would be on the image rather than the message, but you presumably would want to catalogue it according to the type of image or where it’s been sent from even, or the date.

you don’t want to separate the image from the message, so that’s where your unique reference number needs to be, you’ve got to have a unique reference number for the image and the written side. But that could be a unique number and then add a suffix for the image or written side, with a being an image, and b being the message.

You could have a separate table for the sender and the manufacturer of the postcard, you wouldn’t need much information you would just need the full names.

I would recommend a separate table for any people involved in the postcard, rather than putting all the information in one table, and then you have the subject matter of the message.

I guess you’d have to work out a code for the type of message, whether it’s a personal message or an official message, a greeting message, location message.

You’ve got to think of the output.

Tables they use are free text, there would be nothing stopping you transcribing the whole message, and then using key words.

The material I’m considering has a strong bilingual element, do you have an approach to noting multiple language present in the resources?

For your collection of postcards, what I would probably do would is create a collection level entry for the postcard collection,

then probably divided it by the languages as groups, and then catalogue them to item level

Ellie notes, that they are bilingual in-text rather than between items, making this approach unfeasible

In which case, you could have a drop-down menu to denote language with a drop-down menu including a bilingual, or mix of both notation

If you had unlimited resources/time/staffing, what would be your ideal for this kind of material to be accessed

Digitise it, definitely if money was no object, that’s what we’d do.

We would digitise them and make them available online, which is what we do to most of our records on Coflein. The thing with digitisation, you’d have your catalogue entry, and the digital instance. We have a separate table for a digital instance which contains the technical metadata, file size, how the image is recorded, and then the descriptive elements with details about the collection, in a series of tables all linked together. Currently using Oracle, but moving on to a new system soon.

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Additionally, any information about the cost of the project in money, and staff time would be very useful

I think the system we use is far more complicated than anything you would need to use for your collection, but definitely there is enough data to put into a couple of tables at least.

We do have postcard collections that have been catalogued and scanned at by other people, and catalogued at item level, but our interest is always the image on the postcard, it is less so the message, we would include the post mark, but rarely about the sender or the message. We’re looking at these from a very specific aspect.

If you can organise them into discreet groups, then you could include context, but it sounds like you have such a mixture you’re better off at item level, then picking things out. if you try to restrict too tightly into batches, then you might lose the interaction between different postcard within each batch. Certainly, a key for the languages, whether there’s a mix of languages, if you transcribe the text into the database, you will transcribe it in the language that it’s written, we’ve got fields in scope and content in both English and Welsh, as far as I know it’s going to be a direct translation in each field, so you could have your languages in separate fields, but I don’t know whether you’d want to.

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Appendix C: Introduction to the Cassidy-Quinn Collection

Figure 3: Cassidy-Quinn family tree

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Figure 4: PCIS006: Dr. Douglas Hyde, President of Ireland and the Gaelic League

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Figure 5: Census of Ireland 1901: Cassidy Family

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Figure 6: Dingle Bay Photograph

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Figure 7: Dingle 1907

Figure 8: Roodepoort Station

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Appendix D: RCAHMW Case StudyFigure 9: Collection level catalogue record

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Catalogue Details

Cassidy-Quinn Collection Level Collection Level Cat No. Collection Level: Cassidy-Quinn Collection Collection Cassidy-Quinn Collection Acc. No.

Title Cassidy-Quinn Collection Duplicate

Ref. No. Date Copydate Medium Text

Orig.Ref.No Graphic

Store Shelf Entrydate Enter By

Scope and ContentVarious postcards sent from members of the Cassidy family to the Quinn family, from various locations

AccessFull Access Extent

1 Binder containing

184 postcards

and assorted

photographs

Archival History Deposited with E. Downes

Notes

Admin History

Collected by E. Cassidy

System Arrange

Arranged by Address, then Date

Related Material

Accruals

Figure 10: Collection level catalogue record applied to the Cassidy-Quinn Collection

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Catalogue Details Cassidy-Quinn Collection Level Collection Level Cat No.Collection Level: Collection Cassidy-Quinn Collection Acc. No. Group Level: Hospital Cards Title Cassidy-Quinn Collection Duplicate

Sub-group Level: N/A Ref. No. Batch Level: PC003 Date 9th November 1938Item Level: PCWS003 Copydate Medium

Orig.Ref.No Store Shelf Entrydate Enter By

Scope and Content Cards send during a stay at Romsley Hill Sanatorium, Birmingham

Access Full Access Extent 1 item Archival History

Deposited with E. Downes

Notes

Dear Maire, Do you remember how long we’ve had this p.card? Thank you for letter re’cd today and list. Glad to know you’re happy and improving will write you a letter tomorrow evg, D. V. Love from all at home, yours always (Irish Name here)

Admin History

Collected by E. Cassidy

System Arrange

Material arranged by address, the date

Related Material Accruals

Linked People/Organisations Name Surname Organisation Role

Ellie Downes Independent Originator

Catalogue Details Cassidy-Quinn Collection Level Collection

LevelCat No.:

Collection Level: Collection Cassidy-Quinn Collection

Sender: John Cassidy

Group Level: Hospital Cards Title Cassidy-Quinn Collection

Receiver: Mary Quinn

Sub-group Level: N/A Ref. No. Address: Ward 4 T. C.Romsley Hill SanatoriumHallsowenBirmingham

Batch Level: PC003 Date 9th November 1938

Item Level: PCWS003 Copydate Medium: Text Orig.Ref.N

o Graphic

Store Shelf:

Figure 11: Item Level catalogue record applied to the Cassidy-Quinn Collection

Figure 12: Item Level Record with supplementary fields suggested

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Catalogue Details Cassidy-Quinn Collection Level Collection

LevelCat No.:

Collection Level: Collection Cassidy-Quinn Collection

Sender: John Cassidy

Group Level: Hospital Cards Title Cassidy-Quinn Collection

Receiver: Mary Quinn

Sub-group Level: N/A Ref. No. Address: Ward 4 T. C.Romsley Hill SanatoriumHallsowenBirmingham

Batch Level: PC003 Date 9th November 1938

Item Level: PCWS003 Copydate Medium: Text Orig.Ref.N

o Graphic

Store Shelf:

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