Tag Archive

collections

Metadata as restorative justice: a case study of the Sanders-Bullitt digital collection—Part II

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This is the second of two posts about the Sanders-Bullitt Digital Collection at the Filson Historical Society. Part 1 was published on December 30, 2021.

The Bullitt family enslaved over two hundred people at the Oxmoor plantation in Jefferson County, Kentucky, and the Cottonwood plantation in Henderson County, Kentucky. Read More

Metadata as restorative justice: a case study of the Sanders-Bullitt digital collection—Part I

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Editor’s note: This is the first of two posts about the Sanders-Bullitt Digital Collection at the Filson Historical Society.

The core component of The Filson Historical Society’s latest digital collection featured a reworking of the Bullitt Family Papers to highlight the people they enslaved, including the Sanders, Green, and Taylor families, among others. Read More

Archiving the Pandemic @ the CDC Museum

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In March 2020, working from home, curators and archivists from the David J. Sencer CDC Museum began to plan for how best to collect the tsunami of pandemic content being generated amid the emerging COVID-19 public health crisis. A collection solely focused on CDC internal responses would be inadequate to show the breadth of the pandemic. Read More

Roads Not Taken: record-making in historical perspective

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In 1814, philanthropist Isaiah Thomas (1749-1831) spearheaded the establishment of the American Antiquarian Society in Worcester, MA. One of his earliest actions, as president and librarian, was to create and maintain the society’s records. He dedicated a volume to documenting gifts, and decided what information to include in the records, for the sake of posterity. Read More

Inquiring minds want to know: Speaking to the public about museum collections management

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We all know that people are curious about the stories behind objects and the events and people those objects represent. And as public historians, we are in the business of bringing those stories to light. Yet, after doing collections management for over twenty-five years, I have learned that people are equally curious about the creative process behind our educational programs including how we document and care for the objects that serve as the foundation for that programming. Read More

Museum Super Heroes: New England Museum Association 2018 Day of Service

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Museum collections are in danger. The 2011 ICCROM-UNESCO International Storage Survey found that many museums worldwide lack proper storage space for their collections and that 40% of surveyed museums may not even know what they hold. Often, there is not the support, staff, or time to keep up best practices in collections management. Read More