Archives & Manuscripts

About 2,000 linear feet of Archives and Manuscripts collections were described in the old card catalog at the item level, i.e., each document was cataloged as a separate item. All Brooklyn repository collections were described in the mid-1980's in RLIN, a national on-line bibliographic utility that in 2005 needs substantial revisions of the Library's holdings. Database control from the 1990's was incomplete, and the warehousing of the materials during the renovation further disturbed their order, so much of the collection is being re-inventoried according to modern archival practice; e.g., we are creating a single inventory for the 1863 Brooklyn Sanitary Fair materials (a war-time women's fund-raising fair that was a precursor of the American Red Cross) instead of listing each document, publication, and map as single items in a card catalog. We are creating a single inventory for the correspondence and papers of historian Henry Onderdonk, Jr. instead of cataloging and filing each letter and set of notes separately; we will create lists for all slave bills of sale, all contracts of indenture, all Long Island land deeds. This is costly, time-consuming, labor-intensive work that will require some little time to complete, and we are grateful for assistance from volunteers and student interns.

We are also moving to acquire archival collections that broaden the scope of the Archives and Manuscript Collections to reflect twentieth century Brooklyn, in addition to our unique materials from the seventeenth, eighteenth, and nineteenth centuries.

Five important archival collections were fully inventoried and made Internet-accessible with resources from the NHPRC in 1997-99. Those five collections are described under Electronic Resources, and we expect to add more finding aids to the website as they are created.

• Pierrepont Papers
• Plymouth Church of the Pilgrims-Henry Ward Beecher Collection
• Brooklyn Firefighting Collection
• Brooklyn Civitas Club Collection
• Brooklyn Council of Churches Collection
• Col. Joshua Sands, candidate for New York State Senator, March 10, 1791

BHS and Pratt Institute's GATEWAI (Graduate Archival Training and Education: Work and Information)

BHS has partnered with Pratt's SLIS on a three-year IMLS "Librarians for the 21st Century" grant (2005-2008), which funds an archival staff position at BHS and brings MLS archival students to BHS for internships in order to improve inventory control over the archives and manuscripts. Pratt SLIS was also recently given permission from the State of New York to award a certificate in archival management to qualified students who complete the required curriculum; for more information on the Pratt GATEWAI program, visit: http://www.pratt.edu/sils/gatewai/ .

BACK TO TOP