skjanes.com

Today being a stat holiday (and me being home enjoying the sunshine and fresh air) — means that we’re finished with all the big outreach events that have been going on this week.

Yesterday, nothing was planned except for tours, and we did indeed run those. Considerably more people turned up than had in the previous days. The main “what I learned” from yesterday thus was that scale is important, and that presenting the mini-exhibits to a group of 12 people is a lot harder than only 4 or 5 at once.

Haven’t got the official numbers yet, but it looks like there were close to 40 drop-ins yesterday, which is actually close to what I was expecting for the whole week. A few of those people also had their own particular research interests, that I was able to address. I know of at least 3 that are coming back next week to work. Another couple, based on what they read in the paper, brought in a family photograph and a story which augments one of the files we were discussing.

Part of me is thinking “this is what Archives is supposed to be” — at least, based on all available literature about outreach and engaging the public. This institution hasn’t had much opportunity to make that first step, in the past. There’s always a lot to do, of course, but for years and years it seems that getting control over the collections was the only priority.

I think that might be changing a bit. I’m glad to be involved in that.

Children!

And also, many many meetings.

And  drop-ins, which was neat, too. The press we had yesterday seems to have an impact — despite not starting the official tours until 1 today there were still more visitors than yesterday.

I’m a bit tired, though. There was a lot more running around — mostly in that I had to set up and take down one of the exhibits twice in order to make room for the meetings, and spent the extra time I had writing a press release for something unrelated.

The kids were great. They were pretty interested in all the old stuff, and were utterly thrilled by some things I wasn’t expecting: riding the freight elevator, wearing the white gloves, and using the microfilm machine. Though I suppose from the perspective of someone that young, microfilm is a weird, mysterious, antique technology. Same way I’d feel playing around with anything using punch cards.

Anyway, there’s one day left of all this madness, and it should be just regular tours with no extras.

As tired as I was by the end of today (also stayed 45 min late) I’m very, very pleased that we did this. It’s been great for the Archives, great for the public (I hope!) and a fantastic learning experience.

Fame!

Looks as though all the media contact yesterday paid off: last night the Archives tours were covered on the local news, and this morning we were also featured in the newspaper.

Of course, just for fun, it was the very same day that Thunder Bay made international news, and an excellent photograph of one of our staff was displayed on the front page right next to the “Runaway Pilot” headline. It was an interesting juxtaposition, I’d have to say.

The media coverage did us well: even though today’s tours were originally billed “for City staff” we had a number of members of the general public drop by — including one fellow who heard about this all on the classic rock station.

Aside from the increased numbers, today was pretty much the same. Tomorrow there will be children. I’ve also had to take down one of the exhibits to make room for a meeting tomorrow; I’ll then put it up again, then take it down again, then put it up again. (And I suppose take it down one final time once the week is finished.) There is something to be said for the simplicity of “lay it all out on a table.”

Got the mini-exhibits set up last week in a hurry, and began running the public tours today. So far those tours have included television, radio, and print media, a couple of “regular” researchers, a city councillor, and a single new member of the general public. A decent start, though. Later this week we have city staff, heritage committees, a Grade 5 class, and another day of “public.” By the end of it I’ll probably have some things memorized that I never expected to.

So what’s this table about, then? Turns out that Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, creator of Sherlock Holmes, stopped in Fort William one afternoon in 1914 and bought a piece of land on a whim. (It was an investment property — he was just that taken by the city’s potential. As far as I can tell he wasn’t in the habit of buying land in Canadian cities he’d never been to before.) The exhibit uses this property, and the famous name attached to it, to demonstrate the variety of resources that the Archives has for researching the history of land and buildings. People use these to find out who used to live in their houses. (Hint: not Sir Arthur.)

Incidentally, the place is now a bakery (and a pretty good one.)

We also have set up a display of maquettes of public art, a display of assorted visual materials (photos, maps, blueprints) and a couple of “strange but true” files (including one documenting the controversial move to accept Daylight Savings Time in painstaking detail.)

A full set of photographs can be found here, on my flickr account.