Archives and Special Collections Interest Group

Tuesday, May 15, 2007

ARC Special Collections Interest Group Meeting April 25, 2007

A meeting of the ARC Special Collections Interest Group was held April 25, 2007 at 10:30 a.m. in the Staff Conference Room at the George C. Gordon Library of Worcester Polytechnic Institute. Rodney Obien, Curator of the WPI Archives and Special Collections, hosted the meeting.

Present were: Debbie Aframe, Librarian, Worcester Art Museum; Margaret Anderson, Assistant Archivist, WPI; Dodie Gaudet, Technology/Digitization Specialist, CMRLS; Lois Hamill, Assistant Archivist, College of the Holy Cross; Alice Howe, Curator, New England Province of Jesuits; Tom Knoles, Head Librarian, American Antiquarian Society; Kathy Markees, Conservation Librarian, WPI; Ellen More, Head of Medical History Archives, UMass Medical School; Rodney Obien, Curator, Special Collections and Archives, WPI; Paul Spring, who is working on First Democratization Project with AAS and Tufts.

Meeting
A brief meeting was held before the program. Rodney asked for suggestions of places the Special Collections Interest Group might visit. Ellen said she would like the group to visit the UMass Medical History Archives, and would like to have a brainstorming session on some of the issues she is facing there. Rodney said we have an open invitation from Fitchburg State College to visit in the future. Tom said AAS would be happy to have us visit. Rodney asked that people e-mail the webserv with other suggestions.

Dodie reminded us that CMRLS has continuing education workshops, and welcomes suggestions for workshop topics. CMRLS wants to include programs for academic libraries as well as other types of libraries.

Program
Krista Ferrante, project director for the First Democratization Project, a collaboration between the American Antiquarian Society and the Tufts Digital Collections and Archives, gave a presentation on the project to digitize the Philip Lampi collection of electoral returns from 1788-1825 for all 24 states in the Union. These returns are for all local elections in the states, as well as wider ones. Mr. Lampi has spent many years compiling the material which is being digitized. A description of the project can be seen at http://www.americanantiquarian.org/fdp.htm.

The meeting and program adjourned about 11:45, and those who were able had lunch at WPI's Higgins House.

--Margaret Anderson, Secretary of ARC Special Collections Interest Group
mandersn@wpi.edu

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