What I did this week – 11/4, 11/6
I continued on the negatives this week: re-labeling the folders, entering the data into an excel sheet, and then making copies of the old folders. I made these copies on acid-free archiving paper, and I will put them in the folders with the negatives. This way, the information is retained, but the paper won’t deteriorate as quickly.
On Tuesday, I found a few broken negatives and a folder that held two of the same negative, and I marked the folders accordingly. On Thursday, I found the first picture that had to do with Seattle Pacific. It was a large group standing outside of Peterson Hall, and the writing on the picture read “Seattle Seminary, May 1910.” I also found some pictures of the Petersons themselves, and of their house. These have been especially interesting to me, and I think will constitute one of the reasons why the University should keep this collection in its archives. But more on that later.
This is how my workspace looked on Thursday. The blue box on the right contains all the glass-plate negatives in their original folders. The tan box in the middle is where the negatives go when they have been put in their new folders. I enter the information about the negatives into the laptop on the left. The reference librarians are graciously loaning it to me to use on this project. The yellow legal pad in the middle functions as a guide for when I am writing on the new folders.
Here are the old folders on the copier, and the printout on the nice archival paper in the tray. Perhaps you could have pictured this yourself, but I enjoy using the camera. Besides, I set out to document all parts of the process, and this is an integral part. So there you have it.