|
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Institutional History Division Appendixes
|
The Archives Division provides information to the public, scholars, and Smithsonian staff with enthusiasm and professional grace. The foundation for this attitude dates back over thirty years to the creation of the Smithsonian Institution Archives. The range of information provided by the staff can be found in the appendixes to this report. Developing intellectual access to its holdings is a continuous function within the Division in order to support the work performed by the Division's Reference Team. During FY 2000, members of the Division contributed to the writing of agency (unit, office, and museum) histories as well as descriptions of records transferred to the Archives. This process started last year and led to the completion of 260 agency histories and 760 record series entered into the Smithsonian Institution Research Information System (SIRIS). In addition, the Division continued its authority control project and developed a list of over 7500 authorized terms. Building on the information gathered and entered into SIRIS, the RM Team, the A&D Team and the Reference Team set out to develop better internal controls over their activities, which ultimately will support increased reference services. The Teams, with help from the Technical Services Division, planned, developed, and implemented a new system for physically and intellectually controlling SIA holdings. Replacing the older dBase III+ system, the new Collections Management System (CMS) will also support the activities of all the Division's Teams in monitoring and controlling the records and special collections in the Archives. This system combined multiple applications, including the Division's accession system; priority controls for processing material based on use and preservation needs; physical control over materials in each of the Archives' four locations ; links to electronic folder lists; ability to migrate descriptive information to SIRIS without complex intervention; and reports for management. The Teams established performance requirements for the system and thoroughly reviewed the product to ensure that it met all requirements. Records Appraisal As part of its mission to the Institution, the Records Management Team surveyed over 1600 cubic feet of paper and electronic records at the Freer Gallery of Art/Arthur M. Sackler Gallery. Records disposition schedules will follow next year. An agreement between SIA and FGA/AMSG established during the year will allow for the transfer of inactive museum records to the Archives. Alan Bain continued to process the personal papers of Eugene Knez, located at the National Anthropological Archives, during FY 2000. The Knez papers contain outstanding research information documenting Asia, Korea and the Ryukyu Islands. Series 8 and 9, Geographical and Publications File, and Korean and Chinese Writings, were completed, and work began on series 10, the Photograph Collections. Bain also met with Joyce Lee of the National Portrait Gallery to discuss archival processing and the Knez papers and supervised a volunteer, Miho Matsuda, who translated some of the captions to photographs of Korean culture, taken by the Japanese Ministry of Education, circa 1906-1928. As intern coordinator Bain met with intern Celia Perez of Smithsonian Libraries to discuss archives as a profession. He and William Cox met with James Douglas, Office of the General Counsel, to discuss access to official Smithsonian records. Bain and Tammy Peters met with Riccardo Giacconi to discuss additional transfers of his papers; and Bain and Kathleen Williams met with Diane Bird, Archivist, National Museum of the American Indian, to discuss the NMAI archives program. Kathleen M. Williams was elected chair of the SIRIS Members Group (until January 2002). She continued to serve as the SIRIS coordinator for SIA and represented SIA at the Records Management Conference (RACO) in May 2000. Williams coordinated SIA's hosting the SAA workshop, "Advanced Concepts in Archival Authority Control" in June 2000. She attended the Symposium on Descriptive Standards for Photographs, hosted by the Smithsonian Archives and Special Collections Council in September 2000. She participated in two days of workshops and a staff retreat on electronic records during the year. Williams also participated in training sessions on SIRIS/Horizon, TRIM, RLIN searching, and Office of Sponsored Projects seminars on National Science Foundation "Fastlane" grants and financial compliance and audit issues. Ellen Alers attended the Federal Information and Records Managers Council meeting in November 1999. Later in the year she attended two workshops and a retreat on electronic records management. Alers was trained as Administrator for the TRIM records management system and also served as a judge at the University of Maryland's National History Day. Shawn Johnstone participated in two workshops and one staff retreat on electronic records during the year and attended the SAA Advanced Concepts in Authority Control workshop in June. He received training in the Horizon information system and in the TRIM records management system. Tammy Peters attended two workshops and a staff retreat on electronic records during the year, as well as receiving training for the Horizon information system and the TRIM records management system. In June she attended the SAA Advanced Concepts in Authority Control workshop as well. James Steed attended a training course for the Horizon information system in March 2000. In June he attended an SAA workshop, Advanced Concepts in Archival Authority Control; a two-day Smithsonian symposium on Descriptive Standards for Photographs; and a training session on the use of Research Library Group databases. In addition to daily operations and activities, the Archives Division continued several special projects from last year. Staff have undertaken these projects in order to improve services to our constituencies. Smithsonian On-Line Public Access Catalog (OPAC). As one of the members of and contributors to the Smithsonian Institution Research and Information System (SIRIS), SIA played an important role in the successful implementation of a new Horizon-based SIRIS during FY2000. In early February 2000 Archives Division staff oversaw the successful migration of all of SIA's collection level descriptions to the new system. Along with the SIRIS Office and colleagues from other SI archival units, SIA staff helped to fine tune the indexes and functions of the new system. In addition, Division staff added 1050 new records to SIRIS during FY2000 (see Record Series Project description). Division staff also began service on the SIRIS Members group, working on its WebPac and Form/Genre committees. Activity in all of these areas will continue next year. Record Series Project. All Archives Division staff participated in applying the dual concepts of record series and agency histories to our holdings during the year. Some staff wrote histories of selected Smithsonian offices and museums, the selection being based upon the high use, the high volume of records, or the functional importance of units to the Smithsonian. The research and writing efforts required were extensive, as all levels of record creating units within a larger entity (such as a museum) received attention and treatment. Simultaneously, other staff wrote descriptions of the types of records created, maintained and preserved by these same Smithsonian units. Work on this important project will continue next year. Collections Management System. Archives Division staff, working with computer staff from the Technical Services Division, planned and then implemented a new Collections Management System (CMS), retiring an old dBASE III+ system that offered minimal control over and access to SIA accessions. The new system provides SIA with important refinements in our physical and intellectual control over all holdings. The CMS was designed to be compatible with US MARC data fields, so that the accession data could be migrated to SIRIS at a future time. Staff designed the new CMS with improved methods for measuring and quantifying archival containers at the collection and facility levels. New procedures for standardizing terminology, headings, and index terms were implemented, all of which greatly improved the accuracy of search results. New search and print functions were added as was the ability to submit requests for retrieval of collections stored off-site. In addition, staff completed a significant amount of record cleanup during the data migration process. Authority Control Project. Members of the RM and A&D teams carried out data cleanup work in both the CMS and SIRIS systems during the year. In the CMS system all personal and corporate names, record titles, subject headings (including exhibition titles, publications, etc.), form/genre terms, and index terms were brought under authority control conformity with Library of Congress (LC) rules and headings. As a temporary measure, Division staff compiled a spreadsheet of over 7500 authorized terms which is currently used for authority work in lieu of direct search and download access to LC terms. We expect such access in the next fiscal year. Along with colleagues from other SI archival units, SIA staff participated in a joint effort to bring under authority control the form and genre terms (US MARC 655 data field) in the archives database of the SIRIS system. Standardization of form/genre terms is considered a good "beta test" for similar joint cleanup efforts in the archives database of Horizon-based SIRIS. Work began during FY2000 and will continue next fiscal year. Under SIA's direction, IRM Pool funds were granted during FY2000 for two projects relating to authority control. One project supported the training of SIRIS non-library members in authority control. SIA contracted with the Society of American Archivists (SAA) to offer its workshop, Advanced Concepts in Archival Authority Control. The workshop took place in June 2000 and was attended by 30 representatives from nine SI archival repositories and the SIRIS Office. The workshop provided all attendees with a basic understanding of the role of authority control in a non-library setting. SIA also received IRM Pool funds to gain access to and export thousands of LC authority records, based on our previous cleanup work. At year's end, the Archives Division began preparing to contract with vendors to carry out these complex authority export/import activities. Special Collections: Acquisition Highlights This year the Archives received accretions to the papers of Sidney Fay Blake (1892-1959), Botanist in the United States Department of Agriculture; Philip K. Lundeberg, Curator Emeritus of Naval History in the National Museum of American History; and Israel Gregory Sohn 1911-2000), Research Associate in the United States Geological Survey who focused on Ostracodes, marine and non-marine microscopic shelled Crustacea of the Late Paleozoic to the present. The Archives established agreements to be the official archival repository for two professional societies--the IUCN/SSC Declining Amphibian Populations Task Force, and the Meteoritical Society. The Archives also received transfers from several professional organizations. Of special note are transfers from the American Ornithologists' Union, the American Research Center in Egypt, the American Society of Zoologists, the History of Science Society, the Society for Marine Mammalogy, the Society for the Preservation of Natural History Collections; and the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology. A complete list of acquisitions appears in Appendix D: Sources of Holdings. Arrangement and Description The A&D Team prepared 260 agency histories as part of the Archives' conversion to a series-based arrangement system. To these were attached the 760 series records created by the Records Management Team. This work represents the first stage of an on-going effort and included the Board of Regents, the Office of the Secretary, the United States National Museum, the National Museum of Natural History, the National Museum of American History, the National Museum of American Art, the National Portrait Gallery, the Cooper-Hewitt Museum, the National Museum of African Art, the Anacostia Museum, the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, the National Zoological Park, the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, the Chesapeake Bay Center for Environmental Studies, the National Air and Space Museum, the Freer Gallery of Art, the Archives of American Art, and the Joseph H. Hirshhorn Museum. Agency histories and series will be prepared for additional offices in the coming year. In a related undertaking the A&D Team participated in the implementation of the new authority term system required by the arrival of Horizon, the new Smithsonian Institution Research Information System. In FY2000 the A&D and RM teams revised and streamlined the process of making information on SIA collections more readily accessible to users by HTML-coding available accession folder lists and posting them on the Archives website. Laura Bennett, a student intern from Williams College, was instrumental in adding finding aids to the website. See Electronic Access and Outreach in this report for details. She also processed 15 cubic feet of records related to the Enola Gay exhibition at the National Air and Space Museum (Accession 96-140). Records Management/Records Center Operations The SIA Records Management Team assists Smithsonian Institution museums, bureaus, and offices in determining which records to keep and which to discard. Inactive records that have historical and research value are accessioned into the Archives' permanent holdings. Those with short-term value are transferred to the Archives' Records Center facility for scheduled destruction after all legal, fiscal, and administrative requirements for their retention have been met. Duringthe year, 730.5 cubic feet (approximately 1,314,900 pages) of records scheduled for eventual disposal were deposited in the Center. The archives staff disposed of 606 cubic feet (approximately 1,090,800 pages) of records in accordance with established disposition schedules and procedures. A list of records that were transferred or destroyed during the fiscal year appears in Appendix E: Records Center Services. Jane Livermore, a veteran volunteer at SIA, continued her work on the records of Science Service (record unit 7091), processing 24.5 cubic feet during the year.  Smithsonian Institution Archives || Archives Division Institutional History Division || Joseph Henry Papers Project National Collection Program |