Special Collections Research Center: Key Activities and Accomplishments

FY 19-20

Added approximately 335 feet of material to SCRC’s holdings, including Cedar Park Neighbors records, the David Jacobs UFO book collection, Shirley Road Productions records, Arthur C. Hall/Ile Ife records, Austermuhl Walter de la Mare collection, Flashpoint Theatre Company records, Jon Jager (TYL ‘68) Viet Nam Psy Ops art work; and TU student COVID scrapbooks.
Migrated data to a new collection management database, ArchivesSpace. *Taught 98 individual and custom instruction session for Temple and other classes.
Mounted an opening exhibit, “The Architecture of the Book: Design and Structure in Artists’ Books“ in Charles Library’s new exhibit space. *Loaned three medieval manuscripts to exhibits at the University of Pennsylvania and the Free Library of Philadelphia to celebrate medieval manuscripts in the Philadelphia region. For coming year: *Increase digitization of collection materials for remote users.
Address digital infrastructure needs for users, accessions, preservation storage.
Hire university archivist to address increased reference load and ensure preservation of core administrative records currently scattered around campus and the cloud.
Move instruction to virtual platforms and create 'canned' videos with core introductory and instruction content.
Train staff and implement use of ArchivesSpace as new collection management system.
Continue finding aid clean up and preparation for migration into ArchivesSpace finding aids module.
Using endowed fund and other income sources, process collections for research use.

FY18-19

CRC staff surveyed and prepared over 20,000 feet of archival material, and thousands of shelf feet of rare books for moves to the library depository and the Charles Library. SCRC staff, in cooperation with MADS staff, digitized and updated or created metadata for 43 medieval and early modern manuscripts in SCRC collections for the CLIR-funded Philadelphia Area Consortium of Special Collections Libraries’ project Bibliotheca Philadelphiensis, which has digitized and make available online over 160,000 pages of medieval manuscripts from 15 institutions in the Philadelphia area.
SCRC is hosting a significant phase of a Philadelphia Area Consortium of Special Collections Libraries’ project to digitize, contextualize, and build an aggregator for content about women’s activism, 1820-1920, in anticipation of the 100th anniversary of woman suffrage. Launched with a 2016-17 National Endowment for the Humanities Foundations grant, TUL is the fiscal agent for a $497,000 grant from the Council on Library and Information Resources. The grant funded digitization of 117,000 pages from 10 institutions in the region.
In April 2019, NEH awarded a $347,000 implementation grant to digitize an additional 48,000 pages, as well as infrastructure improvements and a modest research project to identify collections relating to underrepresented women.
Staff completed processing the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Philadelphia Records, 1920 – 2004. This large (240 feet) and significant collection documents the JCRC’s mission of “…help[ing] members of all religious, racial and ethnic groups to work and live together democratically and cooperatively by equalizing their treatment, enlarging their opportunities and deepening their mutual appreciation.” Exposing this collection on the web resulted in immediate and sustained research use, with 52 boxes used in the first 6 months.
SCRC staff taught 87 customized instruction sessions to 1600 students in Temple classes, and offered an additional 12 sessions to classes from regional institutions and other groups, totally over 125 attendees.

FY 17-18

Instruction/Class Use:

Use of SCRC holdings by Temple students continues to increase as we reach out to faculty to build SCRC materials into their assignments. We taught 70 instruction
classes to a total of 1269 Temple students, including courses in Criminal Justice, Architecture, Urban Studies, Intellectual Heritage, Education, Tyler, Film and Media Studies,
Social Work, American Studies, History, and other disciplines. Among the classes that used SCRC but did not receive instruction session are the fall and spring offerings of Criminal
Justice’s Criminal Behavior and Victims in Society with approximately 100 students in each. Seven other presentations to classes from other institutions and community groups reached an additional 99 individuals.

Research Use:

Approximately 50% of our use comes from the Temple community (faculty, staff, and students). We continue to serve the international research community, hosting
researchers from all over the country and world and responding to remote inquiries as well. In addition, local and national media outlets used our content, as well as a range of
documentarians. The Philadelphia community continues to rely on us for content to support genealogy and local history, including Martin Luther King, Jr., day commemorations.
Additional statistics appear in the appendices.

Our use of the Aeon system continues to enable us to provide better service to our users, track and therefore practically eliminate missing and strayed materials, and to gather reliable
statistics. Atlas’ introduction of more powerful analytic tools will help us in this regard. We are still learning how to track certain statistical categories such as class use.

Community Engagement:

In Fall 2017, we celebrated the Urban Archives’ 50th anniversary with a screening at International House; a symposium; and an exhibit in Paley (see appendix). Our presentations to community groups continue to build awareness of Temple and the
richness of our holdings—and often include alumni participants. During October, we participated in the DVAG Archives Month event at the Free Library of Philadelphia’s recipe event. The Book Club attracted participants from Temple and the community, with use reading
this year’s One Book, One Philadelphia book as well as two additional selections. We mounted a spring exhibit featuring student work created through their interaction with
SCRC holdings: “Inspired by the Archives: An Exhibition of Student Work.”

Special projects:

SCRC staff continues to work with university and community organizations on documentary and history projects. We again participated in the National Archives and
Records Administration/Temple University College of Education Cultural Fieldwork Initiative, hosting two interns in Fall 2017 who were assigned to build new resources for National
History Day and “Civil Rights in a Northern City: Philadelphia” and learn how to integrate primary sources into the curriculum. We continued our ongoing partnership with Philadelphia
Dance Projects to promote dance and dance history in the region by supplying resources for
their website and housing content.

SCRC continued to participate in two Philadelphia Area Consortium of Special Collections Libraries grant projects: BiblioPhilly which is supporting TUL’s work to digitize and create
robust metadata for medieval manuscripts in the region, including a second round this year. And “In Her Own Right: Women Asserting Their Civil Rights, 1820-1920,” which entered a
second phase funded by CLIR to digitize additional primary sources documenting women working for their own and other’s rights in the century leading up to the woman suffrage vote
in 1920. We are grateful to Digital Library Initiatives/MDS for their support of these projects.

Access: Processing, Cataloging, Surveying

We have seen a direct increase in use of newly exposed materials as students and researchers 􀂡nd the 􀂡nding aids, and cataloging records,
Using existing and project staff, volunteers, and some grant support, SCRC processed almost 400 linear feet of previously inaccessible materials, adding finding aids to the website and
bibliographic records to Alma. Previously “hidden” finding aids, available only on paper were put on-line.Matt Ducmanus, CAMS/MDS Special Collections Cataloger, continues to make excellent progress cataloging the extensive SCRC backlog, including Whiteman, Ellis, post 1850, and artists’ books, and keeping up with new acquisitions.

Under the supervision of Jessica Lydon, spring Feinstein Center intern Maya Levy processed a large accrual to the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society records. Also under Jessica’s supervision,
PJAC Project Archivist Casey Babcock continued work on the Jewish Christian Relations Council records. Resident Librarian Urooj Nizami assisted Courtney Smerz in processing the
Anna Crusis Women’s Choir records and Casey Babcock in his work on the JCRC records.

Courtney Smerz processed the Joe Hoeffel Papers and the records of the Philadelphia Society for the Preservation of Landmarks Records.

Project Archivist Jessica Hoffman processed the Elizabeth Thoman Media Literacy Archives and began work on the Karlen Weiss Papers.

Dickinson College Extern Natalie Ginez created a folder list for the Alternative Comics Collection, and Katy Rawdon completed a finding aid and record for that collection.

The majority of the staff continue to participate in the survey project, which focuses on creating database records for all collections, identify location, access issues, processing and
cataloging needs, preservation concerns, reappraisal projects, grant funding opportunities, and enables us to plan for the move to the new building (and Kardon). This year staff
surveyed 1762 linear feet of materials. The project also identifies material with no permanent value or that would be more appropriately located elsewhere, and we deaccessioned multiple
collections, sending them to other libraries and archives.