Curating birds

Things have been mostly quiet around here, history-wise. The reorganization of our vertical file is nearing completion and we will soon begin to inventory our map and aerial photo collection. Our aerial photo collection is quite large, with approximately 270 photos of Bossier Parish from 1939 and another 150 from 1955. We have an index available in our research area, so patrons can easily find the photos they need.

While everything is under control inside the historical center, it's been a challenging week outside for the birds that built their nest under our awning. We think they are house finches. Their nest fell down on a windy day last week, dumping the 3 little baby birds onto the grass. We quickly put the nestlings into a cardboard box and attached their new nest-box back to the awning with the power of duct tape. Mama and Papa Bird approved of the renovations and have resumed their care of the babies. Hopefully we'll see the babies testing out their wings soon.

The Amazing Travels of Archival Boxes

We have recently embarked on a full inventory of our archives. This is the first inventory of the Historical Center’s collections since our opening ten years ago.

So what is an inventory and why is it important?

Every item in our collection has its own unique number that is tied to our records and our database. This number corresponds to the year in which we received the item and groups items from a particular collection together. Initially, each box and folder was assigned to a specific location in our archives, but things have traveled over the past decade.

Some boxes have made intrepid building-wide journeys, while others have seemingly leapt across aisles, and a few simply shuffled over to the next shelf. Finding a photo or letter in our collection can be a challenge. This is why we need to complete a thorough inventory. We need to pinpoint where everything is right now, so we can find items quickly when patrons request them or when we are creating a new exhibit.

During our inventory process, we are basically going through every photo, map, and document in our collection and checking its number and location. Moving shelf by shelf, we open every box and record the items that we find. Then this list is compared to our collections database and we note changes in location and fix any discrepancies. When we finish the inventory process, our archives will be well-organized and we will be able to locate individual items with ease.