Join us for our next National Archives Researcher Forum! This forum will be held on Friday, May 18, at 1:00 p.m. in room G-25, the new classroom in the National Archives Building in Washington, DC (Archives I). NARA’s digitization partners will return for continued discussion of the digitization of archival records, begun at the September 16th forum. Reservations are not required and meetings are open to all researchers.
Today’s guest blog post comes from Rick Blondo, management and program analyst involved with NARA building projects.
A new Microfilm Research Room is scheduled to open on Monday, May 21, 2012, in the Robert M. Warner Research Center in the National Archives Building, Washington, DC. It will house 27 researcher carrels, 5 public use computers (and printer), custom millwork bookcases, and a custom millwork staff control desk at the entrance to the room. From the old room will come microfilm and microfiche cabinets, map cases, DVD spinners, and more than 150,000 microfilm reels. While systems furniture panels and work surfaces that form the carrels will be reused from the old room, the fabric and trim will be new.
The look of the room will be similar to the new Finding Aids/Consultation Room, with its oak millwork and cork floor. Ceiling lights can be dimmed, and wall washer lights are situated where microfilm cabinets line the walls.
Work to create the new room is taking place overnight and behind construction barrier walls. Relocation of the cabinets, film, and equipment from the old room to the new room will occur after research hours on Saturday, May 19, and continue non-stop into Sunday, May 20. If all goes as planned, the new room will open on Monday, May 21.
In honor of Earth Day, we have added a great new set of photographs from the Documerica collection to Flickr. Boyd Norton, a photographer who is still greatly involved with nature photography, took photos of the National Parks in the southwest, and documented solar energy projects in Arizona and strip mining in Montana as a part of the 1970s Documerica project. The Boyd Norton set on Flickr contains over 400 photos and they are ready for your viewing!
If you find these photos fascinating, consider contributing to these great records. Check out the Boyd Norton tagging mission on the Citizen Archivist Dashboard.
Mt. Wilson and West Dolores River, 05/1972 (544940).
Cleaning Up the Roadside in Onset, 05/1973 (photo by Ernst Halberstadt)
Every April 22nd, people around the world celebrate Earth Day, a coordinated event to bring awareness and show appreciation for the earth’s natural beauty and resources. Earth Day had a really big kickoff in US during the early 1970s as a way to teach others about issues that threatened our environment. It is no coincidence that the National Archives has a collection of photos from the 1970s that are all focused on the environment.
Cleaning Up After Lunch in Battery Park, in Lower Manhattan, 05/1973 (photo by Wil Blanche)
The Documerica collection contains over 15,000 photos from across the country; they provide a glimpse into the environmental scene of the times. In the spirit of Earth Day, take a look at these clean up photos from the collection, and head outside in your community and lend a hand to Mother Earth. While you’re out there, don’t forget to capture what our earth looks like today, over forty years after the first Earth Day was celebrated. Upload your photos to the EPA’s State of the Environment Flickr group to participate in the Environment in a Day project.
Workman on Way to Clean Up a Polluted Creek, 05/1972 (photo by LeRoy Woodson)
Keep an eye out for more Documerica photos and related news coming this week. Happy Earth Day!
Clean-Up Along Bank of Chattahoochee River, 05/1972 (photo by Chuck Rogers)
The National Archives and the Environmental Protection Agency have been working together to bring awareness to the 1970s Documerica photo collection. The EPA’s State of the Environment project on Flickr asks people to upload their environmental photos to a group as a Documerica for the current generation. This guest post is a reblog of a post written by Jeanethe Falvey of the EPA, and you can read more about this project on the Epplocations blog.
Photography in Arches National Park...05/1972, photo by Dave Hiser
Earth Day happens just once a year. What will this global moment look like? Get ready to share your best photo of the day.
How can you join in? Join Flickr if you haven’t yet and start thinking about what view of Earth Day is yours to share. Every shot counts and you do not need to be a professional photographer to share what you see. The best variety of images taken on 4.22.12 will be gathered in a map of the moment! That means scenes of things good (after Earth Day cleanups); bad (an area overlooked); landscapes, city-scapes, humans, wildlife, wild-humans - it’s really up to you! Check out how easy it is to even participate with your phone with Flickr mobile!
Take a photo any time during the twenty-four hour period of April 22 where you are, then upload it to your Flickr account to share it with the State of the Environment group.
Who will capture the first 2012 Earth Day sunrise? What will Earth Day look like in American Somoa, Utah, Maine?
We’re accepting one (1) contribution per Flickr member into the group from midnight ET Saturday, April 21 until midnight ET Saturday, April 28. You have a week to submit your single photo, but it must be taken on Earth Day April 22!
This is open for global participation, but EPA will be highlighting one photo from each U.S. state or territory and featuring the state with the most participation!
Spread the word. Get outside. Have some fun and capture the moment where humankind celebrates our planet Earth.
President Franklin D. Roosevelt delivering his fourth Inaugural Address, 01/20/1945 (National Archives Identifier 199054)
This question just came in from a fan of the National Archives:
Is there a consensus as to which presidential inaugural address was the best? I recognize that in this case “beauty is in the eye of the beholder” and it may be more accurate to think of the top five rather than single one out. Any advice would be appreciated.
We are looking for the wisdom of the NARAtions crowd to help answer the question. What’s your answer?
911: President George W. Bush Takes Notes, 09/11/2001 (National Archives Identifier 5997217)
Calling all Citizen Archivists! The 1940 census has been online for two weeks now. We have heard many great stories about people you have found in the census. We also know there are some of you who don’t know where people were living in 1940 and therefore cannot search the census without an name index.
The good news is that efforts have begun to create a name index and YOU can help! Join the 1940 Census Community Indexing Project at www.the1940census.com to help create a name index so the census may be searched by name. To get started you will need to download and install the indexing software, register as an indexing volunteer, and download a batch of images to transcribe.
This project is a collaborative effort of volunteers, supported by the National Archives, Family Search, Archives.com, Findmypast.com, the National Genealogical Society, the Federation of Genealogical Societies, the Association of Professional Genealogists, and many other archives and societies. When the index is completed, the National Archives will make the named index available for free.
Get started today and join the 253,514 people who have already signed up to create the index!
“Errors of opinion may be tolerated where reason is left free to combat it.” – Thomas Jefferson
In my last post I raised the question of the role of museums in a digital world. There are some obvious answers. No one standing at the edge of the Grand Canyon would believe that a picture or even a movie would be a good substitute for the experience. Students standing in front of the Mercury space capsule, Friendship 7, in the Air and Space Museum wonder how John Glenn stuffed his almost 6 foot frame into that small object. A picture of the capsule doesn’t capture that very well. Clearly, for objects museums have a strong advantage. Is the same true for documents?
Nearly anyone who has worked at the National Archives has at one time or another experienced walking into the Rotunda or one of our exhibits and seeing someone moved to tears. Our exhibit, “Eyewitness,” opened with a document written by Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson was walking down the streets of Paris in 1789 and witnessed the storming of the Bastille. He returned to his room and wrote one of the first accounts of the French Revolution. Imagine the founder of our revolution documenting the French revolution. Just talking about that document sends chills down my spine, and it was a magnificent opening to an excellent exhibit.
How are digital reproductions different from “the real thing”? That was one of the questions in my mind when I started reading Sherry Turkle’s book Alone Together. Her answers set me back on my heels. According to Turkle, more and more people prefer the digital imitation or reproduction, to the original. To try to answer my question requires looking at two threads of thought – education and experience.
Some documents have iconic value. Interestingly, if you look up the meaning of iconic, one of the definitions is “a graphic symbol on a computer display screen.” That’s not the meaning I want here. Another definition given by Webster’s is “an object of uncritical devotion.” Whenever or wherever we display the Emancipation Proclamation the crowds almost overwhelm our ability to allow them to see the document. That is an iconic document. And yet anyone can walk through The Public Vaults and see a reproduction of the Emancipation Proclamation.
Every year over a million people pass through the Rotunda to view the Bill of Rights, the Constitution, and the Declaration of Independence. Those documents resonate with the public in ways few other documents do. Every December we celebrate the Bill of Rights by holding a citizenship ceremony in the Rotunda. The symbolism of that event to all and the meaning to those being sworn in as citizens is powerful and overwhelming emotion. Seeing these iconic documents “live” clearly has meaning and value.
Inside the Rotunda for the Charters of Freedom at the National Archives in Washington, DC
Why is education important to the digital v paper debate? Part of what makes these documents iconic is that we have learned the special place they hold in American history. What about those documents that are not icons? Putting a document on display doesn’t do much unless that document means something. We have an excellent staff of educators at the National Archives who spend their working days and often their evenings and weekends teaching about the meaning of our documents. They provide materials so that teachers throughout the country can teach the meaning of literally thousands of the documents that describe American history. They don’t stop there. They teach about the importance of all those documents sitting in boxes on our shelves to uncover new stories about how our government works.
During Sunshine Week (see the FOIA blog for an explanation of Sunshine Week) we put the Freedom of Information Act on display. A group of individuals dedicated to the principles of open government came to pay tribute. For them, that act is iconic and seeing the page the President Johnson signed on July 4, 1964 was a moment to reflect on the meaning of what they do.
I hope we move into the word of animated document exhibits on our web site. I would love to see more interactive online exhibits. I would not trade for any of those the opportunity to stand in the Rotunda and listen to the buzz of people moved by just a piece of paper.
Today’s post comes from Peter A. Shulman, Assistant Professor of History at Case Western Reserve University. In 2011 he held the inaugural Legislative Archives Fellowship at the National Archives. The National Archives is now accepting applications for the 2012 Fellowship position. For an application and more information, please visit the Center for Legislative Archives.
I’d spent a lot of time at the National Archives before learning that (a) the records of Congress are housed there and (b) those records might be very valuable to my research. I’m grateful that I did, as it led last year to working in the collection as a Legislative Archives fellow.
My book examines how Americans came to think about energy in terms of security and the national interest. Many historians have written about the emergence of energy politics and the importance of energy, particularly oil, to national defense. But these works usually begin with the widespread adoption of oil fuel in the early twentieth century. It turns out that since the 1840s, Americans have been very concerned with the security dimensions of coal, both for domestic defense as well as projecting American influence around the world. My research connects these histories, exploring how the long nineteenth century experience with coal shaped how Americans dealt with oil in the century that followed.
Until last year, I had focused my research on the activities of Navy Department, the branch of government most concerned with securing both fuel and national defense, and all those Americans who advocated in its name. But once I began working among congressional records, I found the Washington that is familiar to those who have lived and worked there. It was complicated, contradictory, and chaotic, its own community and also connected in thousands of ways to the rest of the country. I realized I could not begin to tell this story without understanding what was going on in the House and Senate.
There were letters of engineers asking Congress for compensation when their inventions were adopted in the steam engines of government vessels. Other correspondence pushed Congress to investigate or adopt particular innovations. There were packets of documents debating legislation, and in which I found the unexpected connections between technological change and subjects as diverse as postal policy, Chinese exclusion, and the nineteenth century peace movement. There were reams of testimony, like on why to annex Hawaii as a coaling station. There were boxes of evidence gathered in investigations, as on east Asian communication policy and the Pacific Mail Steamship Company. There were the final drafts of committee reports, marked up with changes by their authors and on their way to becoming part of the familiar serial set. And most strikingly, there were innumerable petitions and memorials, some signed by single individuals and others by thousands, each asking Congress to pass some bill, change some policy, or provide some relief. Here was the heart of the conversation Americans have with their government.
“Highly Important Improvement in Ocean Steam Navigation and Every Purpose of Steam,” 1860; Committee on Naval Affairs; Petitions and Memorials Referred to Committees (HR 36A-G12.2); 36th Congress; Records of the U.S. House of Representatives, Records Group 233; National Archives, Washington, DC.
What surprised me most about working in the Center’s collections wasn’t that I found tons of useful documents (after all, my hope for these discoveries was why I applied for the fellowship in the first place)—but that what I found has helped reframe my own understanding of this project. I had expected congressional documents to complement my earlier research; instead, in many instances, the actions of Congress have become the center of the story.
Along the way, I had the constant support of the Center’s staff—people who know this collection inside and out. I began making connections with the historians working in both the House and Senate. At a colloquium presentation, I received invaluable feedback from scholars in and out of the federal government. It was a privilege to hold the first Legislative Archives fellowship, and I look forward to learning of the fruits of future scholars plumbing the depths of this extraordinary collection.
Using the app, you can choose a topic, such as “Civics & Government” or “Postwar U.S. 1945 – early 1970s,” and challenge yourself with a DocsTeach activity to interact with stories, events, and ideas of the past. All activities are based on primary source documents from the holdings of the National Archives, such as the U.S. Constitution, the canceled check for the purchase of Alaska, and Thomas Edison’s patent drawing for the light bulb. The activities were created by the National Archives education team and an army of DocsTeach users.
On the DocsTeach website, you can discover thousands of primary sources and learning activities related to history and government. Since the National Archives and the Foundation for the National Archives launched DocsTeach.org for the education community in September 2010, over 15,000 teachers, parents, and school administrators have joined. As registered users, they can borrow from and modify an ever-expanding collection of activities, and create new ones using the online tools. DocsTeach activities help their students practice historical thinking by: focusing on details, making connections, finding a sequence, mapping history, weighing the evidence, and seeing the big picture. Once teachers have logged into DocsTeach.org, they can create one or more classrooms full of activities, then share the classrooms’ auto generated codes with students to access through the DocsTeach App on their iPads.
