I am proud to say that at the close of my internship this week, I completed arrangement of the Financial series, cleared up some confusion in the Photographs series, cleaned up minor issues that I had set aside along the way, and began some refoldering work--it's all downhill from here! Though I will not be 100% finished processing Mystery Writers of America mss. by the time my internship officially ends next week, I feel really good about the progress I made thus far, given that this is the third collection (a decently sizable one at that) I will have worked on over the course of less than five months. All the difficult work is largely finished, and what remains is brushing up the collection description, building the collection level catalog record, chronologically arranging all correspondence as per Lilly Library popular practice, and physically rehousing each folder of materials.
Rehousing will entail hand-labeling new folders and building new, archival quality boxes which will be best for long term preservation. These activities are in line with professional ethics, though rehousing is not a uniform practice across all repositories. For example, at some institutions, I know that refoldering is not always an option given budgetary constraints and the time required to hand-label each one. I am admittedly not a preservation expert by any means, but from what I understand in layman's terms: Acid free folders are ideal as buffers to control acidic paper's deleterious effects on surrounding papers. Documents made with highly acidic ingredients (i.e. most of those produced in the late 19th through mid twentieth centuries) releases acidic compounds, which may cause surrounding papers to become brittle. However, as I learned from my whirlwind day at the IU Preservation lab, acid free folders do not actually stop acidic deterioration. Simply because papers are stored inside an acid free folder does not mean that they are protected from one another, as no buffers exist directly between individual items. Rehousing in acid free folders does, however, provide some peace of mind in knowing that storage materials are not contributing additional harm to collection contents, and they also give a clean, polished look to a collection. Though appearances don't necessarily contribute to preservation objectives, they do appeal to donors and users, representing that a repository cares for its collections.
I am not exactly looking forward to the laborious penciled labeling of new folders, however I am excited about the final product which will debut as a fully processed collection in the not so distant future. I plan to finish up my processing work with Mystery Writers of America mss. after the semester closes. Over all the hours we've spent bonding together--looking at old photos from the organization's youth, peering in at intimate monetary details, and watching the group's overall development from a small group of like-minded authors to a comparatively renowned organization with members from all corners of the United States--I want to see the collection through to completion. This also seems wise, as I imagine it will be much easier for me than for anyone else to compose the collection description and catalog record content since I've spend so much time with the materials. Because I am still busy on the job-hunting front, I'll be living in Bloomington possibly as long as late July, so I will volunteer at the Lilly (at least) one day per week. With work at the IU Archives, volunteering at the Lilly, volunteering at Wylie House Museum, and applying for jobs, I will most definitely have no problem staying busy, though I also hope to spend a bit of time enjoying the outdoor air.
That's all for right now. I'll post a few more collection photos over the weekend!
Amy
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