mark a. greene, american heritage center dennis meissner, minnesota historical society

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Twin Cities Archives Roun dtable April 18, 2007 1 More Product, Less Process: A Low-Calorie, High-Fiber Alternative to Traditional Archival Processing Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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More Product, Less Process: A Low-Calorie, High-Fiber Alternative to Traditional Archival Processing. Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society. The Problem. Archival processing does not keep pace with the growth of collections. The Problem. - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

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Page 1: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

Twin Cities Archives Roundtable April 18, 2007

1

More Product, Less Process:

A Low-Calorie, High-Fiber Alternative to Traditional Archival Processing

Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center

Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

Page 2: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

Twin Cities Archives Roundtable April 18, 2007

2

The Problem Archival processing does not keep

pace with the growth of collections

Page 3: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

Twin Cities Archives Roundtable April 18, 2007

3

The Problem Archival processing does not keep

pace with the growth of collections• Unprocessed backlogs continue to grow

Page 4: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

Twin Cities Archives Roundtable April 18, 2007

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The Problem Archival processing does not keep

pace with the growth of collections• Unprocessed backlogs continue to grow• Researchers denied access to collections

Page 5: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

Twin Cities Archives Roundtable April 18, 2007

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The Problem Archival processing does not keep

pace with the growth of collections• Unprocessed backlogs continue to grow• Researchers denied access to collections• Our image with donors and resource

allocators suffers

Page 6: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

Twin Cities Archives Roundtable April 18, 2007

6

Hypotheses Increasing breadth and scale of

contemporary collections

Page 7: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

Twin Cities Archives Roundtable April 18, 2007

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Hypotheses Increasing breadth and scale of

contemporary collections Failure to revise processing

benchmarks to deal with problem

Page 8: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

Twin Cities Archives Roundtable April 18, 2007

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Methodology Literature review

Page 9: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

Twin Cities Archives Roundtable April 18, 2007

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Methodology Literature review Repository survey

Page 10: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

Twin Cities Archives Roundtable April 18, 2007

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Repository Survey Respondents

C&U Archives

Research Libraries

Religious Institutions

State Archives/HistoricalAgencies

County/Local Govt. Archives

Museum Archives

Public Libraries

Other

Page 11: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

Twin Cities Archives Roundtable April 18, 2007

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Methodology Literature review Repository survey Grant project survey (NHPRC files)

Page 12: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

Twin Cities Archives Roundtable April 18, 2007

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Methodology Literature review Repository survey Grant project survey (NHPRC files) User survey

Page 13: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

Twin Cities Archives Roundtable April 18, 2007

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Methodology Literature review Repository survey Grant project survey (NHPRC files) User survey Review of related surveys

Page 14: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

Twin Cities Archives Roundtable April 18, 2007

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Findings Processing benchmarks and

practices are inappropriate to deal with problems posed by large contemporary collections

Page 15: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

Twin Cities Archives Roundtable April 18, 2007

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Findings Processing benchmarks and

practices are inappropriate to deal with problems posed by large contemporary collections

• Ideal vs. necessary

Page 16: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

Twin Cities Archives Roundtable April 18, 2007

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Findings Processing benchmarks and

practices are inappropriate to deal with problems posed by large contemporary collections

• Ideal vs. necessary• Fixation on item level tasks

Page 17: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

Twin Cities Archives Roundtable April 18, 2007

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Findings Processing benchmarks and

practices are inappropriate to deal with problems posed by large contemporary collections

• Ideal vs. necessary• Fixation on item level tasks• Preservation anxieties trump user needs

Page 18: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

Twin Cities Archives Roundtable April 18, 2007

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Findings Arrangement

•Practice: Still often at the item level

Page 19: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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92

60

68

0 20 40 60 80 100

WeedDuplicates(20th C.)

SeparatePhotos

Arrange atI tem Level

Survey: Arrangement Practice

Page 20: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Findings Arrangement

• Practice: Still often at the item level•Warrant: Literature mixed, but much

advises against item level work

Page 21: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

Twin Cities Archives Roundtable April 18, 2007

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Findings Description

Practice:• Weak commitment to online access• Little focus on item level

Page 22: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Survey: Descriptive Practice

We "sometimes, usually, or always"...

31

38

72

0 20 40 60 80

HTML (in lieu of EAD)

EAD Finding Aids

Cat. Records in OPAC

Page 23: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

Twin Cities Archives Roundtable April 18, 2007

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Findings Description

Practice:• Weak commitment to online access• Little focus on item level

Warrant:• Describe all holdings, in general, before

describing some in detail• Descriptive level follows arrangement level• Level varies from collection to collection

Page 24: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

Twin Cities Archives Roundtable April 18, 2007

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Findings Conservation

•Practice: Strong commitment to item level work

Page 25: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Survey: Conservation Practice

We "sometimes, usually, or always"...

88

46.9

81

89

0 20 40 60 80 100

Separate and/ orSleeve Photos

Encapsulate/ MendTorn I tems

PhotocopyNewsprint, etc.

Remve MetalFasteners

Page 26: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Findings Conservation

•Practice: Strong commitment to item level work

•Warrant: Item-focused conservation prescriptions often contradict advice on arrangement and description

Page 27: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

Twin Cities Archives Roundtable April 18, 2007

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Findings Metrics

•Literature: Range of 4-40 hours per cubic foot

Page 28: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Findings Metrics

•Literature: Range of 4-40 hours per cubic foot

• However, a convincing body of experience coalesces at the high-productivity end:

• Maher, 1982 (3.4 hours per cubic foot)• Haller, 1987 (3.8 hours per cubic foot)• Northeastern University Processing Manual

(4-10 hours per cubic foot)

Page 29: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

Twin Cities Archives Roundtable April 18, 2007

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Productivity Expectations(Hours/cubic foot)

0 20 40

RepositorySurvey

Grant FileSurvey

Literature

MeanMode

Page 30: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Findings Metrics

•Literature: Range of 4 - 40 hours per cubic foot

•Grant Project Survey: 0.6 – 67 hours per cubic foot (Mode = 33 hours ; Mean = 9 hours)

Page 31: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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0.00

1.00

2.00

3.00

4.00

5.00

6.001 3 5 7 9 11 13 15 17 19 21 23 25 27 29 31 33 35 37 39 41 43 45

Repository Identifier

Cub

ic F

eet

NHPRC Grant Files Survey: Cubic Feet Processed Per Day

Page 32: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Findings Metrics

•Literature: Range of 4 - 40 hours per cubic foot

•Grant Project Survey: 0.6 – 67 hours per cubic foot (Mode = 33 ; Mean = 9)

•Survey of Archivists: 2 – 250 hours per cubic foot (Mode = 8 ; Mean = 14.8)

Page 33: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Repository Survey: Quantity that Archivist Can Process in a Year

0

100

200

300

400

500

600

700

800

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90

Respondent identifier

Cub

ic F

eet p

er Y

ear

Page 34: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Recommendations General Principles for Change

Page 35: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Recommendations General Principles for Change

• Establish acceptable minimum level of work, and make it the processing benchmark

Page 36: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Recommendations General Principles for Change

• Establish acceptable minimum level of work, and make it the benchmark

• Don’t assume all collections, or all collection components, will be processed to same level

Page 37: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Recommendations Arrangement Description Conservation Productivity

Page 38: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Recommendations Arrangement

• In normal or typical situations, the physical arrangement of materials in archival groups and manuscript collections should not take place below the series level

Page 39: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Recommendations Arrangement

• In normal or typical situations, the physical arrangement of materials in archival groups and manuscript collections should not take place below the series level

• Not all series and all files in a collection need to be arranged to the same level

Page 40: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Recommendations Description

• Since description represents arrangement: describe materials at a level of detail appropriate to that level of arrangement

Page 41: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Recommendations Description

• Since description represents arrangement: describe materials at a level of detail appropriate to that level of arrangement

• Keep description brief and simple

Page 42: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

Twin Cities Archives Roundtable April 18, 2007

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Recommendations Description

• Since description represents arrangement: describe materials at a level of detail appropriate to that level of arrangement

• Keep description brief and simple• Level of description should vary across

collections, and across components within a collection

Page 43: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

Twin Cities Archives Roundtable April 18, 2007

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Recommendations Conservation

• Rely on storage area environmental controls to carry the conservation burden

Page 44: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

Twin Cities Archives Roundtable April 18, 2007

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Recommendations Conservation

• Rely on storage area environmental controls to carry the conservation burden

• Avoid wholesale refoldering

Page 45: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Recommendations Conservation

• Rely on storage area environmental controls to carry the conservation burden

• Avoid wholesale refoldering• Avoid removing and replacing metal fasteners

Page 46: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Recommendations Conservation

• Rely on storage area environmental controls to carry the conservation burden

• Avoid wholesale refoldering• Avoid removing and replacing metal fasteners• Avoid photocopying items on poor paper

Page 47: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Recommendations Conservation

• Rely on storage area environmental controls to carry the conservation burden

• Don’t perform conservation tasks at a lower hierarchical level than you perform arrangement and description

Page 48: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Recommendations Productivity

• A processing archivist ought to be able to arrange and describe large twentieth century archival materials at an average rate of 4 hours per cubic foot

Page 49: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

Twin Cities Archives Roundtable April 18, 2007

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GOAL: Effective collection management strategies

User access is preeminent objective

Page 50: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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GOAL: Effective collection management strategies

User access is preeminent objective Resource management is crucial

strategy

Page 51: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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GOAL: Effective collection management strategies

User access is preeminent objective Resource management is crucial

strategy We must understand the practical

consequences of our processing decisions

Page 52: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Lessons learned What do our users really need and

expect?

•Access• Online discovery tools• Effective finding aids

Page 53: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Lessons learned What are the essentials of effective

arrangement work?

• Respect des fonds• Original order• Series-level arrangement

Page 54: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Lessons learned What preservation activities are

truly necessary?

• Protection from light• Protection from atmospheric pollutants• Protection from excessive heat• Protection from moisture

Page 55: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Lessons learned

What productivity levels can realistically be achieved and expected?

Page 56: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Understanding our behavior

Our processing actions contradict our managerial self image

Page 57: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Past Model

Process driven Resource insensitive Artisan quality High unit cost Lengthy turnaround Stable resources

Page 58: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Future Model

Audience driven Resource sensitive Production quality Low unit cost Rapid turnaround Uncertain resources

Page 59: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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A better model

Make user access paramount: the most material available in a usable form

Page 60: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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A better model

Expend the greatest effort on the most deserving or needful materials

Page 61: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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A better model     Establish acceptable minimum level

of work, and make it the processing benchmark

Page 62: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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A better model

Embrace flexibility : Don’t assume all collections, or all collection components, will be processed to same level

Page 63: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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A better model Embrace ambiguity : Stop

pretending that you know what will be important in the future

• User needs and interests• Access and description needs•See every collection as a potential work

in progress• Let future events drive further work

Page 64: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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A better model

Don’t allow preservation anxieties to trump user access and higher managerial values

Page 65: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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A better model

Establish good risk management models

Page 66: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Early Implementers University of Montana—Missoula

• Donna McCrea [email protected]

• No physical work within file folders• Uniform collection-level descriptive access• No weeding below series level for backlog • No notable user acceptance problems• 2 hours per linear foot on average

Page 67: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Early Implementers Yale Univ.—Manuscripts & Archives

• Christine Weideman [email protected]

• Minimal but adequate processing at point of accessioning

• Offer to share processing work with donors• Emphasize flexibility in approach each

collection

Page 68: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Early Implementers Texas Christian University Archives

• Michael Strom [email protected]

• Jim Wright Congressional Papers (huge)• Minimal processing on most series, reserving

intensive work for others• Restricted appraisal to high-level decisions

only• Proved effective for guiding student workers• Productivity increases have impressed deans

Page 69: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Early Implementers Yale—Beinecke Library

• Tom Hyry [email protected]

• Use drives processing: priorities and levels• Minimum standard used on vast majority • All collections should have basic

descriptions before any receive more detailed description

• All collections are not created equal

Page 70: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Early Implementers Univ. of WI—Eau Claire

• Colleen McFarland [email protected]

• Be flexible: rigid standards don’t work• Be imperfect: keep focused on the forest• Focus on users: Access is their priority

Page 71: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Early Implementers Univ. of Alaska—Fairbanks

• Anne Foster [email protected]

• Series level processing of extensive photographs

• Lets use drive more intensive processing• Involves donor in processing continuum• Solicits $$ donations from donors for more

processing

Page 72: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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Early Implementers Univ. of WI—Oshkosh

• Joshua Ranger [email protected]

•Series level processing of digitized collections

•High-speed bi-tonal scanning of photocopied collection materials

•The perfect is the enemy of the good•Move metadata level from item to folder

level

Page 73: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

Twin Cities Archives Roundtable April 18, 2007

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Early Implementers Library of Congress—Prints &

Photos• Helena Zinkham [email protected]

• Minimal processing of photo collections• Prioritize level and sequencing of

processing work based on collection characteristics: use, value, viability

• Save big efforts for the neediest materials

Page 74: Mark A. Greene, American Heritage Center Dennis Meissner, Minnesota Historical Society

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“Insanity is when you do things the way you’ve always done them, but expect a different result.”

--adage ascribed to both Albert Einstein and Ralph Waldo Emerson.