Guest Post! #miniobjects from Essex

Mini objects

Hannah Salisbury, Access and Participation Officer, Essex Record Office

I like things that are the wrong size, both giant things and miniature things, but here I am going to be focusing on the smaller end of that scale. As well as entertaining me, our smallest items can also entertain and interest our visitors and readers of our blog.

Tiny things can also of course present their own conservation and storage challenges; they are much more vulnerable to being lost, and need special looking after.

Here are two of the smallest things we look after at the Essex Record Office, which have both featured on our blog and have both had special packaging designed for them by our Conservators to help keep them that little bit safer.

The first miniature document to feature on our blog was this one:

It measures just 36 x 26 mm and it now lives in a specially made folder that protects it and makes it harder to lose.

It is a tiny sketchbook containing miniature drawings of local places by Clarissa Sandford Bramston, wife of Reverend John Bramston from 1832 (vicar of Great Baddow, 1830-40; vicar of Witham, 1840-72; Dean of Winchester, 1872-1883). We don’t know exactly when the drawings were made but they must date to before 1844 when Clarissa died. Perhaps someone with a strong magnifying glass and an interest in Essex architecture may be able to suggest a date?

The next miniature item to feature on our blog may well be the smallest book in our collection. It is just 2.5 inches tall, and is seventeenth-century book of Psalms written in a kind of shorthand developed by a man named Jeremiah Rich.

The tiny book now has its own small folder to protect it back in its box amongst larger neighbours.

What is the smallest item in your collection? How do you use it with your visitors, and has caring for it presented you with any particular challenges?

Thanks Hannah for this fantastic post! Here's a bit more about our guest contributor:

I am Access and Participation Officer at the Essex Record Office, the storehouse of Essex History. It’s my job to find ways to engage people with our varied collections, from medieval Latin texts to twentieth-century oral history recordings. I grew up in Essex but have only really got to know the place through working at ERO. Essex has a bit of a reputation as a loud, brash, tacky place, but it’s an incredibly varied county, which includes coastal communities, historic market towns, acres and acres of agricultural land, and post-war New Towns. One of my main historical interests in the First World War, so it has been fascinating over the last year or so to explore the First World War documents in our collections and to share the stories that they tell. Out of work I enjoy photography, especially trying to show the more picturesque side of our county. You can see some of the results of my attempts here: http://toomanyphotos.wordpress.com/

The Ministry Explains It All: The life of an archivist

At the Ministry we tend to focus on the glamorous world of museums, but that doesn't mean to say we don't also love our sexy allied profession: the Archives. We seem to spend all of our time talking about what museum people really do, how we really are, and how you can get to be one of us, but what about all you budding archivists out there? To right this terrible wrong we approached a good friend of the Ministry Kate Tyte, who also happens to be giving a talk at Museums Showoff on the 4th of February called, 'The totally unorthodox guide to museum archives! Featuring Robots! Nicholas Cage! Indiana Jones! And Beards!'

Kate wears this t-shirt literally every day.

Kate graciously explains for the Ministry exactly what an Archivist does, why they are all tough as nail and most importantly why the bizarre and wonderful objects they work with are as amazing as anything in a museum store.

Life in the Archives

Deep in the bowels of the museum basement, in an area few humans venture into, we finally catch a glimpse of our one of the most elusive of all the animals that dwell in the museum ecosystem – the archivist. The archivist’s usual habitat is in quiet storerooms and overcrowded offices, amongst stacks of boxes and rustling papers. Let’s take a closer look at this interesting creature…

What are archives?

Archives are materials that have been created by individuals, groups or organisations during the course of their life or work and deemed to be worth keeping permanently for the purposes of research. They can be in any format, from notebooks, maps and architects drawings to betamax videos and digital files.

How can you become an archivist?

You’ll need about 1 year’s work experience to get a place on a 1 year masters course in archives and records management. Many archives offer 1 year pre-course training positions, though there’s a lot of competition for these jobs so many people do voluntary work.

What do archivists actually do?

Archivists spend a lot of time appraising records – in other words putting the rubbish stuff in the shredder – and cataloguing.  Archives catalogues are hierarchical, with records arranged into groups of similar records, and designed to preserve the context, provenance, and value of records as historical and legal evidence. Archivists also spend a lot of time answering enquiries, supervising researchers, and promoting our service with leaflets, articles, displays, online content and educational activities. We also drink lots of tea.

Skills needed

Archivists need deep reserves of patience for cataloguing, as well as good people skills, because researchers are often quite mad. Whether it’s a history of cow breeding in eighteenth century Berkshire or the adventures of great aunt Ethel, they do like to drone on about their tedious projects. It’s your job to nod and smile. Sometimes it’s also your job to politely explain that they’re barking up the wrong tree or have wandered into completely the wrong forest altogether. All job descriptions will specify ‘the ability to lift and carry heavy boxes’ as an essential skill, and they’re not kidding. Lifting boxes on and off shelves gives archivists great upper body strength. This will be a bonus should you ever decide to take up pole dancing to supplement you meagre income. Other stuff they don’t specify on job descriptions can be equally important – archivists love tea and cake. Curators are more trendy coffee drinking types, but a coffee drinking archivist will be looked on with suspicion. But what archivists REALLY need is an overwhelming passion for the past. If you can’t get hours of excitement from a photo of a funny 1950s hat, an account of a Victorian fistfight or a random graph about eighteenth century cow breeding statistics, then this really isn’t the job for you.

Why it’s great to be an archivist!

It’s mainly great because of all those records about eighteenth century cows. No, really – I love discovering weird stuff about the past. A previously unknown letter by Darwin or a baffling statistic about the likelihood of dying in a horse and cart traffic accident in the 1820s are just some of the things you might come across in an average day. No matter how much people think ‘everything is on google these days’, many things really aren’t. Archivists provide access to the raw, unmediated evidence of the past – and it’s up to our readers to decide what to make of it. We won’t tell you that the First World War was glorious and just and we won’t tell you that it was a pointless omnishambles. We simply provide you with the evidence and empower you to judge for yourself. I love helping people with their research, whether it’s a personal quest or an academic pursuit. From the repatriation of Aboriginal skeletons to Auntie Ethel’s lonely death in a lunatic asylum and burial in an unmarked grave, it’s the archivists who really know where all the bodies are buried. 

What archivists think of the rest of the museum staff

Museum people are such sushi-nibbling, hashtag-using hipsters that the humble and tweedy archivist sometimes feels a bit inadequate. Museum curators have an awe-inspiring depth of knowledge about their collections and museum educators are startlingly creative – two things archivists can only ever dream of matching. On the other hand, your filing systems are universally terrible. You find archives baffling, and you’re always coming up to us, needing an obscure fact about a dissected Panda. But the more obscure the fact you need, the happier your archivist will be. It helps us to feel like the eccentric aunt of the museum family - We think you cool kids are amazing, and crazy, and we want to get drunk with you at Christmas.

Kate has been an Archivist for 8 years. She enjoys cocktails, cake and putting things in alphabetical order. Check our her blog about archives, the Victorians and mental health at katetyte.com or follow her on twitter @katetyte.