Long island Archives
Upcoming Archival Workshops Ask An Archivist: Establishing a Local History Collection March 20, 2024, 11:00 AM – 12:00 PM @ Zoom Register: https://lilrc.org/event-5640869 (An updated version of the program given in May of 2021.) So much time is spent talking about managing existing collections, but what if you are a library just beginning to create a local history collection? This presentation offers thoughts on what to consider when planning your strategy and how to take those first steps. The discussion will include: Collections development policies Creating the right environment Public access and research This program is being recordrd at Sachem Public Library's Local History Room. Flag Preservation: Handling, Housing and Display Best Practices April 4, 2024, 10:30 AM - 11:30 AM @ Zoom Register: https://lilrc.org/event-5634366 As Memorial Day, 4th of July and Flag Day are soon to be upon us, it's a good time to think about the flags in our historic collections. This program will discuss the proper handling, storage and short-term display of flags. Hosting the program is the Franklin Square Historical Society who have volunteered some of their flags for use in this program. Who should register: individuals who wish to grow their local history collections, or need some direction for an existing collection in a historical society or small archive. Coming soon... May: Ask An Archivist: Archival Description For Beginners June: Safe Labeling of Objects - In person workshops held in Nassau and Suffolk counties July: Ask An Archivist: Archival Access For Beginners
Transcending Barriers: Opening Archives, Opening Minds
March/April 2024 Volume 31 Issue 2
Cover image: "Spring along a winding country road," courtesy of Mastics-Moriches-Shirley Local History Collection accessed on New York Heritage Digital Collections website.
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Donation Dialogue with Melanie Cardone-Leathers and Georgiana O'Neill at Longwood Public Library By Nicole Menchise Donald Bayles, son of Thomas Bayles, is the caretaker of his family's history. He has been working with historian Paul Infranco to write books about the history of towns in eastern Long Island (more on that later). One at a time, Infranco has been bringing boxes of envelopes containing negatives of images taken by Albert E. Bayless for Georgiana O'Neill to digitize at the Bayles Local History Room at Longwood Public Library. Albert E. Bayless, Donald's uncle, bought his fist camera as a teenager and took photographs of Long Island's everyday people, places and events until his death in 1963. He took hundreds of photos documenting the history of Long Island. The negatives are of varying sizes, stored in small boxes, in envelopes that are placed in chronological order. Sometimes the envelopes have labels that give clues to the subject matter. While digitizing and cataloging the current box of negatives - begining with the date July 1st, 1939 - O'Neill came across something odd. There were three negatives in an envelope from around 1940 in Westhampton. The positive image showed two gentleman. One gentleman was holding an organ grinder and the other was holding a leash with a small monkey dressed like a bellhop on the other end. Charmed and confused, O'Neill implored the help of her Department Head Melanie Cardone-Leathers. They started with the book Albert E. Bayles 1897-1963: A Lifetime in Middle Island, created by his family to honor his life through transcriptions from his diaries alongside his photographs. O'Neill and Cardone-Leathers found a passage where Albert had written about visiting his grandmother who had beed hospitalized in Westhampton at "Dr. Kellers hospital." Insde the same envelope was another negative. When re-developed through digitization, the positive showed an image of a white building. One tremendous benefit of digitization is the ability to zoom in on tiny details. This allowed them to read a sign that indicated Doctor Keller's parking space. From there, a quick internet search turned up a postcard titled "Dr. Keller's Hospital and Residence, Westhampton Beach, Long Island, NY". It was a match. Cardone-Leathers explained, "So we were able to piece it together because the family was so well documented and they took photos. We were able to put two and two together and not just have a [mystery] monkey. Wondering 'why is it here?'" We speculated together that perhaps the trained monkey was brought in to entertain the patients. Cardone-Leathers told me that Mr. Enfranco is working actively with the Bayles family to write books about the histories of different towns using the Bayles family photographs, memories and surveys. "They have a lot of [Long Island] history; it's houses, it's people, it's events, it's everything."
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Drive Home the Funds! 2024 Deadlines for Grant Opportunities 04/17 - CLIR Recordings at Risk | Award supports audio preservation. 05/21 - NEH Research and Development | Award supports preservation, conservation, and audio preservation. 05/31 - NYSCA/GHHN Site Assessment | Award supports site visit by a collections consultant to discuss specific areas of stewardship, including identifying collections issues and prioritizing basic steps to improve the care of your collections, followed by a written report. 07/16 -NEH Humanities Collections and Reference Resources Grants (HCRR) | Award supports planning, assessments, digitization, rehousing, and conservation treatment leading to enhanced access. 09/03 - NYSCA/GHHN Conservation Treatment | Award supports conservation treatment of paintings, works on paper, textiles, sculpture, and decorative objects by professional conservators. 11/15 - IMLS Museums of America | Award supports surveys and assessments, conservation treatment, and digitization. 11/15 - IMLS Museums Grants for African American History and Culture | Award supports training and conservation. 11/15 - IMLS Native American/Native Hawaiian Museum Services Program | Award supports collection assessments, digitization and digital assessments, conservation surveys and treatment. 11/15 - IMLS Inspire! Grants for Small Museums | Award supports training, collection assessments, digitization, conservation surveys and treatment.
GOVERNMENT RESOURCES AND RECORDS MANAGEMENT COMMITTEE The Committee provides a forum for information professionals of Nassau and Suffolk Counties to: Monitor public policy trends and legislative developments in the area of government resources. Promote responsible records and information management practices, and encourage discussions and training in records management technologies. Provide educational opportunities to the Long Island community regarding U.S. government information generated by the state, counties, towns, villages, cities, and special districts. Want to join? Go to LILRC.org/government-information-committee
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Image courtesy of Bellmore Memorial Library, "Bellmore Postcards", New York Heritage Digital Collections
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Hello gentle members of LILRC and elsewhere, I recently wrapped up another successful Accessing Archives Program (AAP) partnership with the Franklin Square Historical Society at the Franklin Square Museum. This project was an abbreviated one compared to the standard time frame of six weeks. As with every project, Nicole Menchise and I did everything we could in the time we were given. The main task was to digitize the museum’s catalog cards that were handwritten on index cards in order for the volunteer staff of the museum to work on them from home. Along with that, the other main task of the project was to inventory and digitize a small collection of audiovisual material that were made up of home movies and tapes. The staff and I then selected which of those were to be uploaded to New York Heritage. This small but mighty collection contains home movies of Franklin Square and Elmont that date from 1952 to 1959 as well as some audio tapes of Franklin Square events that date from 1969 to 1978 and a video tape from 2003 about the history of Hempstead Turnpike. The collection can be found here: Franklin Square Audiovisual Collection | New York Heritage (nyheritage.org). Since we are on the subject of film and home movies, I have an excellent piece of news to share with all who read this column. LILRC now offers film digitization for both 8mm film and Super 8mm film. These two film formats are the most popular film formats used by the American consumer from the 1930s to the 1980s until videotape became an affordable medium for Americans to purchase and use. To take advantage of this new digitization service, log in to your LILRC account, take your cursor and hover over the three black dots next to “Newsletters” on our home page and then to “Members Only”. Click on “Digitization Service” and on the right on that page will be a link that reads, “Digitization Request Form”. Fill that out and submit your request. Here’s the link to that page: Digitization Service. The last thing I wanted to mention, which I wanted to include in my last newsletter but couldn’t for spatial reasons, is the list of the collections we added to New York Heritage in 2023 because of the Accessing Archives Program: Hallockville Museum Farm: Oral History Collection (1972-2002) | New York Heritage (nyheritage.org) Old Westbury Gardens: Phipps Home Movies | New York Heritage (nyheritage.org) Westbury House and Gardens Photograph Collection | New York Heritage (nyheritage.org) Long Island Museum: The Long Island Museum Photograph Collection | New York Heritage (nyheritage.org) Walt Whitman Birthplace Association: Walt Whitman Birthplace Association Archives | New York Heritage (nyheritage.org) Historical Society of East Rockaway and Lynbrook: John J. Cribbin Collection | New York Heritage (nyheritage.org) SUNY Old Westbury: SUNY Old Westbury Senior Projects and Research | New York Heritage (nyheritage.org) Manhasset Public Library: Manhasset Public Library Oral History Collection (1953-1988) | New York Heritage (nyheritage.org)
LATEST FROM THE ACCESSING ARCHIVES PROGRAM By Robert Anen
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Franklin Square Historical Society Digitization of Microfilms of the Franklin Square Bulletin (1940-1986) "Franklin Square is a community on Long Island first settled by German immigrants and later by Italian immigrants. Franklin Square was comprised of small farms that grew vegetables and fruits to be trucked into nearby N.Y.C.. The Italian immigrants had small plots and would come on the weekends from the city to grow their own vegetables and camp on the site. Later those small plots were turned into small cottages and the Italian immigrants moved into the community." Glen Cove Public Library Digitization of Glen Cove Historical Newspapers "The Davis family, as editors of the local newspaper, played an important role in incorporating Glen Cove as a city when it separated itself from the Town of Oyster Bay. It was published weekly for 85 years until 1960 when it was consolidated with the Record, to become the Glen Cove Record Pilot. Today, the Glen Cove/Oyster Bay Record Pilot is owned by the Anton Media Group." Island Park Public Library Sharing the History of Island Park "This project will result in digitizing unprocessed historical documents, photographs, catalogs, and maps and creating oral history recordings related to the town of Island Park. In addition to the materials already owned by the library, we will source new materials from community members." Lake Ronkonkoma Historical Society Digitizing Ronkonkoma Review Newspapers "The obituaries and articles about active and deceased soldiers and veterans are of particular interest to our libraries’ genealogy programs and people in general researching their ancestry. News articles capture stories of the famous and the infamous such as local opera singers, jewel thieves, movie producers, major league baseball players and even the former President Ronald Reagan using MacArthur Airport on a fairly regular basis." SUNY Old Westbury Preserving SUNY Old Westbury's History: Digitizing the College’s Newsletters and Photographs "SUNY Old Westbury has always been a community that serves the underprivileged, ethnic minorities and non-traditional students from all over New York, but especially the inner-city boroughs. Former professors and staff, alumni and current students and any interested Long Island or New York residents are the intended audience of this collection." West Hempstead Public Library West Hempstead Historical Society (part 1) "There are three different papers, two of which are out of print. The differences in how each of the papers represented the same community are apparent when analyzing the materials. Comparing and contrasting the different papers/timeframes gives a glimpse into how our current living situations have evolved." Whaling Museum and Education Center of Cold Spring Harbor Prints, Photography, and "Frances A. Barstow" Logbook "The logbook is the daily record of the vessel’s last whaling voyage, covering the period June 5, 1894 and June 30, 1896. This well-written journal gives directions of weather and winds, vessels encountered, whales seen and whales taken, and duties performed on board. The log mentions desertions by members of the crew at various ports, including a “crime committed” by the boat steerer."
LILRC's 2024 Digitization Grant Recipients Announced Congratulation to the following organizations. Read about their projects with excerpts from their application narratives below.
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Documentary Heritage and Preservation Services for New York (DHPSNY) Dialogue: We the People/American Experiment: Intersectionality and the 250th Thursday, March 14, 2024, 2:00 PM - 4:00 PM (Webinar) We invite individuals working in libraries, museums, archives, historical societies, and other collecting institutions to explore the intersectional narratives of "We the People" and the American Experiment in what is present-day New York State during the 250th commemoration and beyond. We encourage participants to critically examine their organizations' collections, exhibits, programs, and institutional planning through the lens of intersectionality. How will we reach all of our audiences? How do we get hard to reach people involved in this work? How do we keep folks engaged over multiple years? This program is designed for anyone who works in or volunteers for a library, archive, museum, historical society, or history/culture site in New York State. The upcoming 250th anniversary of the United States in 2026 is a crucial moment for New York collecting institutions to advance the field through intentional commemoration planning and programming. Inspired by the American Association for State and Local History (AASLH) Making History at 250 Field Guide and the New York State 250th Field Guide, the focus of the DHPSNY’s 2024 antiracism programming revolves around building an inclusive 250th and the guiding question: "How do we make our collecting organizations interdisciplinary and representative of the realities of our many New York histories?" Register for DHPSNY Dialogue: We the People/American Experiment: Intersectionality and the 250th
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Long Island Archives - March/April 2024 Editor: Nicole Menchise, Digitization and Archives Coordinator LILRC - 627 N. Sunrise Service Rd., Bellport, NY 11713, www.lilrc.org.
Register Here!