What we do

Collecting | Preserving | Making available

Collecting

What did you do today? Work? Volunteer? Go to school? Travel?

What records did you create?

Throughout our lives, we create evidence of our experiences in various forms. While we may need that photograph, diary or set of minutes now, what happens when they've outgrown their original purpose? The archives works with institutions, congregations, families and individuals to collect these records and give them new life and new purpose in the archives.

Preserving

Can you still play that 8-track collection? How about those computer files on floppy disk? Is that rare book from your grandmother vulnerable to water or pest damage?

How archives preserve records for the future depends on their unique formats and requirements. Our facilities include a climate-controlled, fire resistant vault for our most unique items. Making digital copies of original records is one way to preserve the information they contain; the digitized copies can be played on current equipment and used for research and reproduction. This minimizes the handling of the original.

Because of the volatility of electronic formats and equipment, printing important records to paper is still the better way to preserve them. This is why our print collections continue to expand.

Archivists will talk at great length (if you let them) about the value of the original. Original records contain more information than copies and have greater intrinsic value.

Making available

Did a German bureaucrat in 1911 create his records just for you?

Of course not. Governments, organizations, families and individuals create records for their own reasons. Researchers use records for different purposes than record creators. To help bridge this gap, we produce finding aids and offer reference services to help researchers locate the historical records they are seeking.

Collecting | Preserving | Making available