Artifacts and Information: Crossing into the Sciences

 One of the things I love most about being a librarian is the chance to be in the world of Shakespeare one day and to be exploring Marine animals the next. Usually I only get to do this through research, but yesterday they let me out of the school library to take a field trip. As an archivist who specializes in local history, I had quite a treat as we explored the shores of Rye beach in New Hampshire and took a boat trip off the Isle of Shoals. I took the trip in part to help me better assist students with a big biology research project they do each year. What I discovered is that this trip and project lend themselves to collaboration across multiple disciplines. I plan to inject what I learned into the library work that I do.

I started my day by bringing into school a bird's nest I found while gardening. I had been meaning to bring it in to share for awhile, but I think I finally remembered to actually do it since my head was anticipating a day in nature. I think that most people see birds' nests as part of the field of science. When I think birds nest I think about Audubon's drawings; I think about Wonder cabinets, stuffed birds in libraries that were popular in the nineteenth century, the specimens of birds I first saw at the Vanderbilt Mansion where I volunteered in high school; I think about the birds who frequent my garden who are different year to year ["the cardinals won the prized tree this year for their nest"]; I think of the stories behind the places where these animals go; I think of collecting; I think of the human hand in the natural world. In short, I think history.

The most perfect bird's nest I've ever seen. An outside layer
of flowering grasses, then a layer of leaves, then a layers of
flat wide twigs, then soft, fine grass. I want people to see
the information we can get from nature. I also threw in a little
Twitter bird to get my teacher and student patrons to connect
social media to the idea of the bird.

Doing some surveying work

So, it was a treat to visit the New Hampshire coast - so rich in history and sense of place. Students were brought to different stations to learn math and science concepts. History was popping up everywhere. One station in particular made me interject my librarian thoughts. Older students were teaching younger students about the science at the shore. At the salt marshes, they began talking about a business that had dumped sewage into the habitat years ago. The ecosystem was damaged by the actions of that institution. The students' sentences, so sure about their scientific information, were suddenly punctuated with "I think...this is what I was told...this could possibly have happened." I began thinking about our news database. I began thinking about the Portsmouth Athenaeum not far from where we are. I thought about the Seacoast Science Center that must have information about this event in their archives. 

I interruppted, "Finding out exactly what happened here would make a GREAT research project." They stopped, looked at me, said "Mmmmhmmm," and moved on. As a high school teacher librarian, in a moment like that, all I can hope is that I planted a seed in someone's brain. 

A "purring" fish.  Arawana? I'm not sure of my scientific labeling here

On our trip, I got to play with a vibrating fish, a star fish arm, periwinkles, crabs, rocks and more. These are the "artifacts" of my science colleagues. They collect them like I collect books and archives. They collect nature while I collect man-made material culture. Humans are all collectors, categorizers and information gatherers at heart!

It was seeing the Isles of Shoals  that got my liberal arts side purring. Author Celia Thaxter grew up here. This is where she and my beloved Childe Hassam drew inspiration. This is where Thaxter would bring the plants that she loaded on a small boat in Portsmouth to restock her famed gardens each spring. [see An Island Garden]

As we traveled out to the island, I told some of the students, teachers, and chaperones what I knew about Celia Thaxter. Right in this spot was science, math, history, literature and art rolled up and just waiting for us to explore. So much to see. So much information to take in. So much learning to be done!

I look forward to visiting the Island this summer. It's been calling me for twenty years. It's time to land there. Maybe some of my students' thoughts will follow me there too. Maybe there is another field trip in order.

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Many weeks ago I promised a post about the right to copy from archival collections. I will publish that post soon. I have been working hard on it and am backing what I know with research. Copyright is a complicated subject, so I do not want to start people off with basic misinformation. Stay tuned...

High School Archives as Independent Study

This is my second semester as a school librarian. With the third quarter coming to a close, I am happy to share one of this year's newest experiences, which has involved offering "directed study" to a few individual students. I outlined a plan for my school to have me teach students about library and information science in the areas of collection development, Internet resources, exhibits and programming or archives. To take my directed study, students must write a plan that focuses on one of these areas. This post, because of the nature of this blog, focuses on the archives option.

One student is working with me to explore the history of our school and is working on a project to jump start our school archives. In anticipation of the 50th anniversary of our school building, the student began working to compare students from the 60s with students today. Examining yearbooks, she listed areas of interest to teens, including such activities as sports, clubs, and studied subjects, noting differences between students "then" and students "now."

The project has grown and fleshed out in the past two months. We recently took a short field trip to the local historical society to check out the resources they have related to school history in our town. The student is now planning on a time line that she hopes to turn into a mural, showing milestones in our community story. The student has also begun helping me search for information about a school time capsule that is rumored to have been installed when the building was erected.

In the meantime, a teacher has donated copies of his photographs of school events to our archives. Slowly, word of our efforts is getting out. The library staff has done a couple of displays that have included archival material. I've begun taking my own photos of events in the library that we display on a continual slideshow on the library's television. These images will be added to our archives. The school information center will continue to work with the local historical society to build stronger local archives related to our history. I have offered to digitize their images related to school history so that we may keep copies on school premises for learning purposes. We are in discussions with the high school class of 1968 to complete some oral histories with them.  

I am offering copies of diary pages and other interesting personal papers I have collected over the years from outside sources to assist teachers with their lessons. Most recently, a teacher mentioned beginning a unit on the Industrial Revolution and I told her of my Waltham experience and how I can provide interesting stories and materials related to my work in the city where the American Industrial Revolution began. I hope that exposure to archives in the classroom will help make history come alive. I also know that introducing these materials will give our students a greater understanding of different types of information and the differences between primary and secondary sources. Perhaps tying archives directly to the curriculum will encourage even more students to pursue independent study in the archives field.

In my own life, I have found that my independent studies have been a good anchor for my interests and general education. They have allowed me to explore core topics, giving them a twist that best suits my personality. Independent studies in the a few different areas challenged me intellectually and creatively. Independent study has allowed me to flesh out the context of the subjects I studied. It allowed me to better define the purpose and value of my education through a personalized lens. [The most memorable independent study I did was as an undergraduate. I spent 1 1/2 years studying gravestone iconography, which gave  me a better understanding of history, art, cultural identity, religion, business, and more. The work culminated in a trip from New England to California to speak in an undergraduate research conference at CalTech University - my first public speaking engagement. In high school, I was lucky enough to have an independent study in the arts, that helped set me up for my future degree in art history.]

Exposure to archives should begin earlier than we have traditionally provided it in the United States. It is imperative as we move more into a digital world that students have a solid understanding of materials that are produced close to events as opposed to less solid and reliable sources. Students tend to believe what they see on the Internet. A solid understanding of provenance is very important to overcome this naivete. Before the line between primary and secondary sources fully blurs, we need to set up methods to make distinctions so that people better understand and examine the materials that provide them information. Directed study in archives has provided one way to capture a student's interest and to prepare her to better evaluate the world around her.

Give a student a thread and let them work to unravel the sweater. Let a student find one thing of interest that leads them to another jewel of information, and then another. Let the librarian be the guide to a path of learning that puts a student at the center. Let her understand that information swirls all around us and it is up to us to take it in, organize it, seek context, and connect thoughts that lead us to bigger and better ideas.

The History Books Forgot About Us

In the 1960s, the study of history began to change. My teachers in the decades that followed compared the "new social history" to the study of what they called "dead white men." The 1960s shift lead to the development of various branches of history including research based on gender, ethnicity, and more. We weren't just studying the famous or powerful in the late twentieth century. We began considering how various communities influenced society, molding and changing civilization.

The shift continues today with the Internet. Outside the scholarly world of history, individuals are finding their own voices. They are recording their memories for posterity -- perhaps not always consciously. They broadcast their ideas to the world. Archivists are paying attention. We are thinking about how we are going to save these individual voices for the future.

Our words are important to the study of history

The Voices

The Internet, and social media in particular, provides a unique platform for the history of the future. And the platform is quickly changing to emphasize those individual voices. Consider Facebook's shift to its "timeline," for example. The platform are giving us the tools to share our life stories as completely as possible. If we can save these voices and stories, historians will have a new unique tool to explore our heritage in a whole new way. The history of dead white men is truly dead. Millions of voices are replacing it.

History is About Us


I am curious to see how history books will not forget us in the future. How will historians sort out the voices to project them in a logical way to students? A few years ago, I came across a theory about teaching history backwards. The concept behind this is that if students see themselves as part of history, they can reach back to better understand the context of events. How did historical events get us to where we are today as a society? How has history helped create the life you live today? History is about us and if we start from that perspective, the context and importance of it all can neatly line up from there.

An Archivist's View

This is my own view and does not necessarily reflect the views of my fellow archivists. (I am interested to hear their comments.) Over the past ten years, I've promoted the idea that caring for your personal papers and caring for the papers of your community can lays a foundation for our archives work in small institutions. This approach fits quite well with the idea of studying history backwards. If we take care of what is most important to us -- our own personal papers and digital records -- and learn to recognize how they fit in with a larger society or collections of papers, than we have more of a vested interest in saving archives. Society has an opportunity to ensure that history books will no longer forget about the general populace. Saving our own memories in recorded form gives historians the tools they need to consider larger groups. Furthermore, a plethora of safely stored recorded information cannot be ignored.

The Internet gives us a unique new tool for the study of history. It is changing our ideas of what a "community" is. It is giving us more communities to consider. Still, our presence is recorded beyond the computer. The papers in our homes still provide a valuable perspective on our lives. Our individual histories exist online and offline. We have the opportunity to care for these recorded perspectives so that history remembers us. Our descendants will look to our lives to better understand their own if we give them the tools.