Accessing our archival and manuscript heritage The Helpers system Steering group meeting May 2005 Richard Butterworth

Accessing our archival and manuscript heritage


The Helpers system

Steering group meeting May 2005

Richard Butterworth


Overview...

• Technical progress

• Helpers descriptions

• Liaison

• Evaluation

• Project completion


Technical progress

• The web interface is now up and working:helpers.shl.lon.ac.uk

• Limited amount of content, but all functionality is there

• Shmml editors are long finished and have been tested by generating both the AAMH site and Helpers site

• Some other supporting tools created: glossary editor, etc.


Technical things still to do...

• Get the comments system online

• Sort out error reporting

• Documentation

• Make transfer from local machines to server a bit more graceful


Helpers descriptions...

• When asked, archivists are happy to explain what their archives are used for...

• ...but this information is not in an ISAD(G) description of a collection

• A Helpers description is a subjective description of what a collection can be used for...

• ...as opposed to an objective description of what’s in it.

• Is this a novel idea?


Linking research questions to archives

You’re researching your family history, Great-great uncle Septimus is in the 1891 census, but not in 1901 census. You can’t trace any death certificate, so what happened to him?


AIM25 description...Title: MANSON, Sir Patrick (1844-1922)Scope and content/abstract: Papers of Sir Patrick Manson, 1865-1964,

including Manson's diaries, 1865-1879, containing notes on the discovery of mosquitoes as carriers of malaria and patient case notes; bound manuscript notes of his discovery of filaria, 1877; original drawings of eggs of bilharzias and embryos of guinea worms, 1893; drawings by Manson of filarial embryos, 1891; correspondence with Charles Wilberforce Daniels, Herbert Edward Durham and James Michelli on tropical medical matters, 1900-1914; photographs, including Manson's birthplace and the Manse (Manson's parents' house), Manson in 1864 and 1875, Manson lecturing in the original laboratory, original building and laboratory of LSHTM, Manson's grave; certificates and medals awarded to Manson; correspondence between Mary Rose Hossack (Manson's daughter) and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine over his papers, including a memorandum on Manson's will, 1963-1964; certificates of election as Fellow of the Royal Society 1900, and awards of CMG, KCMG and GCMG; medals including Fothergill Medal, 1902, Bisset Hawkins Medal, 1905, Mary Kingsley Medal, 1905, and Jenner Medal, 1912.


LSHTM archive site

Manson, Sir Patrick (1844-1922) correspondence and papers; research papers; lectures; publications; diaries; photographs; scientific artefacts; volumes of medical examinations of candidates for service in the colonies and protectorates (1898-1919). Dates: 1865-1964.

http://www.aim25.ac.uk/cgi-bin/frames/browse2?inst_id=37&coll_id=4044&expand=


Helpers description...

Use: Family historyThemes: Mobility, occupationsDetailed use description: The London School of Hygiene and Tropical

Medicine holds an archive of the medical examinations of people who emigrated to the British colonies and protectorates between 1898 and 1919. As well as giving a detailed account of the subject’s health, each record gives a small amount of family history parents, children and siblings) as well as some details about their current job, the job that they were intending to take up in the colonies and its location.

If you have a relative who apparently 'disappeared' at the end of the 19th Century, e.g. they’re in the 1891 census, but not in the 1901 census, they may have emigrated, and this collection may give you a clue as to where and when they went. Also, although the family history on the record is brief, it could be useful to give supporting evidence to clarify ambiguities in your family history.


A Helpers description...

• Collection name• Hosting institution• Detailed usage

description• How to find out if

the collection is useful

• Access arrangements

• More information

• Overview• Usage• Themes• Geographic area• Dates• Size


Helpers implementation

• Stored as a databaseCurrently read from XML text files

May use MySQL database if efficiency a problem

Fields not ‘hardwired’ in... yet.

• Fields as Shmml data

• Search/browsable on siteSearch or browse?

• User comments invited online


Liaison

• UL archivistsSOAS, LSE and LSHTM...

• TNA life long learner section

• Nick BarrattFamily history themes

• West Middlesex Family History, LAUF...

• Birkbeck CE genealogy course

• Croydon Local History Library...


Focus groups...

• Problem...Two arranged in March, two on Saturdays in April...

• Solution?Use of experts over users?

Invitation to solve research problems

Prototype now exists, so there is an artefact to test...

...emailing various interested parties for comment.


Next round of liaison and evaluation...

• All UL archivistsProduce critical mass of Helpers descriptions

• Pick up TNA etc contacts...

• Advertise research offer

• Gradually roll out the web-site


Promotion

• Reporting to usersLocal and history ‘trade’ magazines

• Reporting to professionalsCILIP, GLAN etc...

• Reporting to academicsJCDL, ECDL, Journal of Documentation

• Launch eventEarly SeptemberLeaflets, mail outs, etc...


Project completion

• Writing and uploading the Helpers descriptions

• Tutorials, annotated links

• Mop up remaining technicalities

• Maybe systematic description of library holdings...


What we said we’d do...

• Christmas 2004Prototype tutorials, finish backend system, finish digitisation

system Done• Easter 2005

Finish tutorials, finish discussion boards, finish annotated links Partial

• May 2005Finish question/archive database Partial

• Rest of projectEvaluate Ongoing

Documents

Accessing our archival and manuscript heritage The Helpers system Steering group meeting May 2005 Richard Butterworth