The morning of July 7, the majority of our group visited the Archives at the British Museum. The tour was conducted primarily by the Archivist, Stephanie Clarke and supplemented by Bryony Levenhall an archives record assistant.
The archives contain, primarily, the administrative documents related to the British Museum. Records date back to its foundation in 1753. The primary source material for research in the minutes of the meetings of the Museum Trustees. The records are stores in bound copies on shelves located immediately behind the entrance door. Additionally, all correspondence, both incoming and outgoing is stored in bound volumes. There is no central catalog, but Trustee's Minutes have indexes are available. A spreadsheet is used by not only the archives but also by several of the departments to keep a running list of available sources of information. The majority of the records pertain to the building itself and the day-to-day running of the museum. Records related to the items in the collection relate mainly to accession.
Ms. Clarke also had several items of intrinsic value including several photographs of the museum's collections on display prior to WWII and several photographs of the damage sustained in the blitzkrieg. I asked if the removal of the collections was planned and organized or done "on the fly" as the evacuation of the Louvre in Paris was. I was informed that the move was well planned an executed with the majority of the collection being housed in a nearby tube station. The remainder was shipped off to be stored in the mines in Wales. Later, at lunch, Andrew told us that during the war, the curators insisted upon displaying one painting for two weeks because they felt that culture was central to life in spite of the war.
Bryony showed us the readers cards and registration from the period that the British Library was still housed at the British Museum. We were able to see the signatures of T.S. Eliot and Karl Marx from when they were preforming their research.
I specifically questioned Miss Clarke regarding the "greying" of the profession in the US and any similar trends in the UK. She says that she has noted a marked increase in the number of students enrolled in courses related to curacy and archiving. The problem here, as at home, will be the limited number of positions open versus the number of applicants. She provided the example that the singular position currently held by Bryony is a temporary post that may not be renewed designed for a student between undergraduate and post graduate work. There were about 200 applications for that one position. It is nice to see that people are increasing considering preservation and conservation, it will create increased competition and may not be good for the profession.
Additional information regarding the archive specifically can be found at: www.britishmuseum.org.
Good questions.
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