August 2006
Staff at the Ian Matheson City Archives, Palmerston North, have begun reporting records to the National Register of Archives and Manuscripts. Lesley Courtney, City Archivist, says they are very excited about getting their records on NRAM. With additional staffing NRAM has been made a priority and over 120 records have been added, with more being added each week.
The Ian Matheson City Archives is the main archives repository for the Manawatu District and holdings include personal papers, school records, photographs, maps and plans, newspapers, records of local businesses, sporting groups and local organisations (such as CWI, Scouts and Guides, Co-operative Societies, Jaycees to name a few). Much of this material was collected by Ian Matheson during his 30 years as Palmerston North City Archivist.
17 November 2005
Hamilton City Libraries Archives staff are working at getting a backlog of accessions catalogued and put on to the library catalogue. A staff member from the Information & Heritage team has been seconded for one day each week to help with this. Another part of the project involves putting the Archive’s holdings onto NRAM as they are catalogued and also making sure all of the collection is eventually added. At the start there were less than 100 entries, but there are now more than 250 and the total is growing each week!
Interesting additions to the collection recently catalogued include: AFFCO New Zealand records, 1898-2002; minute books of the Waikato King Country Croquet Association, 1936 to 1999; records of the Ngaruawahia Union Church; and Cinemas of the Waikato by Allan Webb. Allan Webb has had a long association with the Regent Theatre, an independently owned cinema in Te Awamutu. The volumes contain a history of cinema in Hamilton and the Waikato and include a timeline, cinema records, photographs, plans, newspaper clippings, advertisements and notes on various cinemas.
14 August 2005
Methodist Church appoints new Archivist
Jo-Anne Smith, Curator of Manuscripts at Canterbury Museum, has recently been appointed to the position of Archivist for the Methodist Church. Jo-Anne has been a regular contributor to NRAM and has added many new entries describing the Museum's collections. During 2003 she sent NRAM approximately 300 new entries describing the Canterbury Museum's Antarctica Collections. She has also been vigilant in ensuring that older entries are correct and up-to-date.
Jo-Anne believes that NRAM is an invaluable tool for small archives and, once she is settled into her new position, she is looking forward to considerably extending NRAM's coverage of the Methodist Archives. Jo-Anne takes up her new position on 5 September.
26 June 2005
NRAM was cited as one of a number of valuable internet resources for family historians during a recent episode of Good Morning New Zealand. Rachel Brown, who runs community education classes in family history at a number of colleges in the Wellington Region, was included in an interview on 26 May which focused on the value of community education classes in society. Following this interview, Ms Brown was invited to return for two further interviews about family history resources.
Today many internet resources are available to assist family historians with their research. Ms Brown believes that providing access to information via the internet enables archivists to break down some of the barriers which have previously made family history resources difficult for many people to access. Geographical remoteness is one of these barriers. Another, and perhaps one which archivists are less aware of, is the forbidding appearance and atmosphere of many archives repositories.
Websites such as NRAM are particularly valuable to family historians who can find out about resources held in archives all around the country. Wherever they live, the internet enables them to make their first enquiries from the familiar surrounds of their own homes.
Ms Brown believes that NRAM entries such as that provided by the Marton Historical Society are particularly valuable. This entry is thorough and detailed. It lists the name of virtually every family which ever lived in the town. “If your family came from Marton, you are sure to find something on NRAM”.
16 May 2005
Hutt City Archives just north of Wellington has launched a new feature on the Hutt City website highlighting interesting archival material.
For May, the Archive of the Month is the Petone Borough Council Minute Book 1915-1918.
Hutt City archivist Alison Scott said the Minute Book was one of a large number of records to have been saved from a deliberately set fire in the old Petone Municipal Buildings in 1985.
“Hundreds of early Petone records were burnt, some beyond hope without expensive conservation treatment but some legible if badly singed round the edges,” Ms Scott said.
Ongoing damage to the volumes meant they had to be closed to researchers but the first four Minute Books covering the period 1915-1926 were microfilmed at the end of last year.
“We got the microfilms back recently, which means these can be used in place of the originals, keeping them safe from further damage,” Ms Scott said.
“They cover just about every topic under the sun. Obituaries of the great and the good are alongside the more usual municipal concerns such as regulating access to the beach and the development of Korokoro.
”International events impinged on life in Petone too - the influenza epidemic is mentioned and, of course, the First World War with one moving meeting commencing with the names of the Petone dead being read out followed by a minute’s silence.”
As well as the microfilming, the earliest surviving Petone Minute book, dated 1884-1888, has received painstaking conservation work over a period of four months by conservators at Triptych Ltd in Wellington.
The volume was taken apart and each page cleaned and repaired.
Ms Scott said the cost of microfilming was about $250 a volume, with another 32 volumes to go.
Information about many of the holdings of the Hutt City Archive can be found by searching NRAM. For more complete information, email archivist@huttcity.govt.nz.
18 April 2005
Earlier this month the Tinui Historical Society agreed to transfer its complete archive to the custody of the Wairarapa Archive in Masterton. Over 25 linear metres of photograph albums, school and local government records, private papers and records of community organisations dating back as early as the 1850s have been moved from the Tinui Community Centre to the Wairarapa Archive.
Tinui is a small settlement about fifty kilometres east of Masterton. Most of the items in the collection relate to Tinui and nearby areas including the coastal settlements of Castlepoint and Mataikona. A few of the records have come from as far away as Eketahuna in the north and Greytown in the south.
The Tinui Historical Society listed some of its archives on NRAM several years ago. However, most were unprocessed and the collection was relatively unknown outside the Wairarapa. With the move to the Wairarapa Archive this interesting collection will become much more widely accessible.
