April 2021 #Archive30

April brings the annual #Archive30 hashtag from the Archives & Records Association Scotland, providing daily prompts for archivists to highlight themes in their collections. It's a great way to get to know an archive from different angles, bringing individual items or whole collections into focus. The hashtags provide a great way for archivists, volunteers and researchers to think about how we present the stories in our own archives, and to get to know about repositories, fonds, projects and puzzles from a wide range of other archives.

Archival research hardly ever uses a one-stop shop approach - who knows where relevant material could turn up? Have a read through the hashtags each day and get to know the network! It's a series of fascinating glimpses into archival work, holdings, and ways of thinking. And sometimes (totally relevant) historic cat pictures.

Tweets are limited to 280 characters, including punctuation, so they have to be concise (and/or heavily abbreviated - palaeographers are thinking 'everything old is new again') but info-dense. They function well as attention catchers, tips of the icebergs, the opening sentences of a story - or many stories. What connections will readers find, or reveal? What questions will be sparked? Click through to the entries on Twitter @OakBayArchives to follow up some interesting conversation threads.

Here are my entries @OakBayArchives for this year:

for Archives Awareness Week, some posts for #Archive30 . 1. #MyArchive is in storage atm & I'm working from home, so I'll be mostly sharing photos from our online collection: search at https://www.oakbay.ca/our-community/archives/photographs-view . 2021#AAW

#Archive30 Day 2 #WhereYouStarted Near Oak Bay’s beginnings, ca 1911: Public Works paving crew with horse drawn cart, removing rock for road beds, Gonzales Hill . Later paved to become King George Terrace. https://www.oakbay.ca/our-community/archives/photographs/1994-001-024 #2021AAW

#Archive30 Day 3 #HealthArchives Larry Davenport and daughter Ann at Davenport's Pharmacy, 2020 Oak Bay Avenue, in 1968. https://www.oakbay.ca/our-community/archives/photographs/2017-011-001 #2021AAW

#Archive30 Day 4 #SomethingSmall a 1917 Oak Bay Dog Tax tag. Oak Bay dog licensing started in 1912 - letters, minutes, bylaws re controlling stray dogs (& other animals) recur in decades of Council minutes. See bit.ly/3sUfkjV for photos of early C20 Oak Bay dogs #2021AAW

from @DistrictOakBay Council minutes 6 Apr 1907 #OTD 114 yrs ago, on Pound By-Law: a cttee wd "see about obtaining a field, & that the Pathmaster [roads supervisor] be instructed only to enforce the By-Law where cattle were straying on the roads & where complaints had been made."

#Archive30 Day 5 #ArchivesFromHome Frank Burrell (1861-1928) of Pemberton & Sons was also a photographer & took many informal photos of his family at their home, ‘Summerdyne' (SW corner Oak Bay Ave x Monterey, now Royal Bank site). See more bit.ly/3sU1a2r #2021AAW

#Archive30 Day 6 #UnusualItem Not a shredder or complicated wastebasket but an early C20 (?) dough mixer. I have only this photo of the patent info & instructions on the lid (a drawback of #ArchivesFromHome)

but here’s a near cousin @smithsonian : https://www.si.edu/es/object/nmah_309748 #2021AAW

And spot another in this RBCM video! https://twitter.com/RoyalBCMuseum/status/1378059763251044358

#Archive30 Day 7 #ArchiveFoodAndDrink : Family Tea at Oak Bay Camp, ca 1905. A group of young OB men lived in tents on the beach @ foot of OB Ave & commuted by tram fr Windsor Pk, summers 1889-1909 More info bit.ly/31RP8KM, More vintage picnics: bit.ly/2Raphfe

#Archive30 0 Day 8 #ArchiveOutreach @SarahMcLeod_TL and I & @glenlyonnorfolk Grade 4 had a lot of fun with this virtual tour & talk about research using historical sources & what archivists do. Can I help you and your class with something similar? https://twitter.com/SarahMcLeod_TL/status/1351636260142477313 #2021AAW

#Archive30 Day 9 #ArchiveObject a selection of the many objects @OakBayArchives : school slate and trophies, pharmacy mortar & pestle, former municipal seal press, a toaster and china teacups. Objects give an extra dimension to history in archives! #2021AAW

#Archive30 Day10 #DigitalArchives Very little born-digital material in this archive yet, but lots of digital images of hard copy original records = access tools, not replacements. Here's Beach Drive, 'Blizzard of 1996', before we all had digital cameras: https://www.oakbay.ca/our-community/archives/photographs/2012-001-143

#Archive30 Day 11 #Misconceptions : archivists=librarians, archives=libraries, always wear white gloves, archives=academics only, digital images=original records, archives=collections... Here's BM Watson: https://bit.ly/3cPegZc Outreach =work in progress! https://www.oakbay.ca/our-community/archives/photographs/1994-049-004

#Archive30 Day 10 #DigitalArchives + Day 11 #Misconceptions Why Don't Archivists Digitize Everything? from @archivespama https://peelarchivesblog.com/2017/05/31/why-dont-archivists-digitize-everything/

#Archive30 Day12 #SportArchives @OakBayHigh Girls Field Hockey team (and Biddy the dog) 1930 https://www.oakbay.ca/our-community/archives/photographs/2003-005-005

Sorry single photo info pages don't link back to main photo search (work in progress, also keywords/tags): https://www.oakbay.ca/our-community/archives/photographs-view

#Archive30 Day 13 So many #UntoldStories are in family archives! @OakBayArchives holds local family/business/community org/personal papers as well as historic municipal corporate records. (old) St Mary's church interior 1938, photo Pattinson family papers https://www.oakbay.ca/our-community/archives/photographs/2015-010-055

#Archive30 Day 14 #FavouriteItem Many, but can't help mentioning this again: 1909-10 Oak Bay wildflower sketches by Ada Hope Leeder (1896-1990), later Yarrow and Stuart Taylor, for the sketches & for connections with other collections: https://connect.oakbay.ca/archives/news_feed/hope-leeder

#Archive30 Day 15 #YourWorkplace Municipal Staff on the steps of the original Oak Bay Municipal Hall, 1956: https://www.oakbay.ca/our-community/archives/photographs/2016-005-015

Must be one of the last taken at the old MH: https://www.oakbay.ca/our-community/archives/photographs/2016-005-002

#Archive30 Day 16 #ArchiveEnvironment Rather than a photo of a thermohygrograph, here's the forested bank above the shoreline at McNeill Bay, ca 1915 https://www.oakbay.ca/our-community/archives/photographs/2006-006-007

More WW1-era views around Oak Bay from this family album: https://bit.ly/3fHn6d9

#Archive30 Day 17 #ArchiveAdvice short & sweet #AskAnArchivist #AskArchivists Enquiries accepted and *welcome* from anyone anywhere. We may not have the answers, but we'll have suggestions. Or new questions! Or we might be able to help you find just what you're looking for. Ask!

#Archive30 Day 18 Our #ArchiveBuilding is being worked on, so instead, a couple of amazing, alas no longer extant #ArchivedBuildings of Oak Bay : Willows Exhibition hall (Carnarvon Park site) https://www.oakbay.ca/our-community/archives/photographs/2013-016-001

and Mt Baker Hotel (nr Beach x Orchard) https://www.oakbay.ca/our-community/archives/photographs/1994-001-014

#Archive30 Day 19 #ArchiveMystery Does anyone recognize this smart pair, or the porch of the house? (house number 113). From Frank Burrell's photos, ca. 1900. https://www.oakbay.ca/our-community/archives/photographs/2010-010-242

#Archive30 Day 20 This rather fabulous Model A Ford Special Coupe (vintage car experts?) was #SomethingNew when this photo was taken in 1929.

A Burrell family photo - Frank and Kate Burrell's granddaughter Muriel Armstrong is seated on the running board. https://www.oakbay.ca/our-community/archives/photographs/2010-010-250

#Archive30 Day 21 #ArchivePeople Ada Beaven, nee Pemberton (1867-1958), is well remembered in Oak Bay as the founder of both Windsor Park's rose garden and the OB Native Plant Garden.

Did you know she enjoyed the occasional well-dressed campfire as well? https://www.oakbay.ca/our-community/archives/photographs/2010-010-039

#Archive30 Day 22 #ArchiveFashion Roy Pattinson (1919-1944) and friends model 1930s cycling chic: https://www.oakbay.ca/our-community/archives/photographs/2015-010-082

More from @OakBayNews about Roy Pattinson and the Pattinson papers @OakBayArchives: https://www.oakbaynews.com/community/92-year-old-wwii-veteran-united-with-family-of-fallen-soldier-after-decades-long-search/

#Archive30 Day 23 #ArchiveInclusion What gets included in archives, what's left out, & why? Which records are deemed worthy of permanent preservation? What survives to be donated? How do archivists decide? Here’s @margotnote on appraising old photographs: https://www.margotnote.com/blog/2019/08/26/picture-edge

#Archive30 Day 24 Closing up @OakBayArchives on time for Municipal Hall's big reno was a major milestone - now setting many #MiniMilestones for this year in #WFH projects: disaster response planning & online cataloguing @ https://www.memorybc.ca/oak-bay-archives .

#Archive30 Day 25 A big #ConservationWin for @OakBayArchives was Jean Topham's work on the Hampshire Road Methodist Church #WW1 Roll of Honour in 2019: https://www.oakbaynews.com/community/historic-document-discovered-in-oak-bay-attic/

#Archive30 Day 26 Over the years, Oak Bay has lost a number of buildings to fires, and the photos are really #SomethingScary: here, the Olson Arena burning in 1944 https://www.oakbay.ca/our-community/archives/photographs/1994-001-073

and the first @OakBayBeach Hotel after its 1930 fire https://www.oakbay.ca/our-community/archives/photographs/2002-001-009

#Archive30 Day 27 #ArchiveCollection An important collection supporting all kinds of work in @OakBayArchives is our reference library! Check out the catalogue: https://www.librarything.com/catalog/OakBayArchives/yourlibrary

#Archive30 Day 28 #SomethingBig that we use a lot: the huge bound volumes of early C20 BC fire insurance maps for Victoria. Each volume is more than 2' sq and several inches thick, and needs 2 people to move or shelve it. Digital images are much easier to handle!

#Archive30 Day 29 #ArchiveGoals oh wait that doesn't say #ArchiveGoats? Here are some #ArchiveGoats, in the fields behind the Unwin home (2178 Beaver Street, now Beaverbrooke) in Oak Bay, ca. 1915. https://www.oakbay.ca/our-community/archives/photographs/2006-013-001

#Archive30 Day 30 #WhyArchives? For me - never the same day twice, never stop learning, all knowledge is useful (eventually), endless research puzzles & some satisfying answers!

Thanks @ARAScot for another great month of hashtags and highlights!

https://www.oakbay.ca/our-community/archives/photographs/2010-010-074