MINING OUR
PAST TO INFORM OUR FUTURE:
A CHURCH
HISTORY PRESERVATION WORKSHOP
The resources contained in this web site represent
information presented during a day-long workshop held at the May Memorial
Unitarian Universalist Society (MMUUS) church, Syracuse, NY, on October 27,
2007, and at the Unitarian Church of Barneveld, Barneveld, NY, on November 10,
2007. We hope they will provide some assistance in your own church history
preservation and promotion activities.
MMUUS History Committee
Table of
Contents
Workshop Schedule
Opening Activity
Opening Presentation: Why Church History Is Important (PowerPoint slide show)
Workshop 1
Gathering, Inventorying,
and Storing Historical Material
May Memorial Unitarian
Church Records (Syracuse University)
Unitarian Universalist
Congregation of Atlanta (Records)
MMUUS History Committee
File Survey (four drawers)
Workshop 2
Why Preserve Media?
(PowerPoint slide show)
Supplemental Material
Workshop 3
Paper Preservation
Workshop
Is Laminating Old Paper a
Good Idea?
Typical Paper/Photo
Preservation Supply Needs
Workshop 4
Suggestions for an
Interviewing Project at Your Church
Examples of Interview
Questions
Sample of Permission Sheet
for Audio Recording
Guidelines for Making
Audio Recordings for History Archives
Afternoon Presentation: Portraying Church History (PowerPoint slide show)
Miscellaneous Material
History Collection Policy
and Guidelines
History Committee’s
Structure and Responsibility
History Committee’s
Activities and Plans – 2007
Historian: An Overview
Helpful Tips for
Preserving Your Precious Documents
Spiral Bindings in a Hard
Cover
Care of Books, Documents,
and Photographs
Sources of Help and Advice
for Your Church or Synagogue Archives
References/Future Study
Options
Workshop
Schedule
08:30-09:00 Registration, refreshments, and
getting acquainted – Social Hall
09:00-09:15 Opening ceremony (Alexa Carter) –
Social Hall
09:15-10:30 Introduction to workshop/why keeping
church history is important/policy needs (Rog Hiemstra) – Social Hall
10:30-10:45 Refreshment break – Social Hall
10:45-noon Workshop A. Gathering, inventorying,
and storing historical material (George Adams) – Memorial Room
10:45-noon Workshop B. Preserving and digitizing
media (Harsey Leonard) – Teen Room
noon-12:45 Lunch – Social Hall
12:45-02:00 Workshop A. Preserving paper products
(Alexa Carter) – Teen Room
12:45-02:00 Workshop B. Interviewing long term
members on history recollections (Mary Louise Edwards) – Memorial Room
02:00-02:15 Refreshment break – Social Hall
02:15-03:30 Using the World Wide
Web/displays/church services for portraying church history (Rog Hiemstra) –
Social Hall
03:30-04:00 Wrap up and charge for back home
activities – Social Hall
Opening
Activity
Chalice Lighting
May the flame of our candle help us to
focus today on our self-appointed task. May we bring our full attention to the
day and may our efforts be fruitful.
Responsive
Reading
Out of our occupations and
preoccupations, from the homes and churches that ask of us so much, we have
come here to this place.
Let us leave our daily concerns behind
for the next few hours and direct our energies to the subject at hand.
Let us honor those who have gone
before and strive to preserve their words and wisdom.
May we learn and grow during our time
together.
Announcements
Miscellaneous
program information
Introductions
of resource people and participants
Opening
Presentation
Why Church History Is Important
Overview
The purpose of the opening
presentation was to set the scene for the workshop, help participants
understand what to expect during the day, excite them about the possibilities,
and engage them in providing their own thoughts, questions, and answers
regarding the importance of church history. This was done through a PowerPoint
slide show, an oral presentation, and dialogue among participants and resource
people.
Workshop 1
Gathering, Inventorying, and Storing Historical
Material
Introduction
The purpose of this
workshop is to provide you with some ideas on what is needed in terms of
acquiring, inventorying, and storing the historical material of importance to
your church. We use the experiences of May Memorial and our current History
Committee as a basis for thinking about such tasks, but we recognize that each
church has unique needs, problems, and requirements for maintaining historical
material. We hope that this workshop can be a means for not only learning what
we have done at May Memorial, but also a sharing of your unique situation.
Realistically, gathering, inventorying, and storing archival material must be
ongoing and it requires time, resources, and dedicated people. However, we
believe that the rewards from doing it right and doing it well are immense.
They also are important for helping a church (and its members) maintain a sense
of self as a religious institution.
The management and storage
of records of past church activities raises many questions.
1.
How will the
material be acquired?
2.
What material
will be saved and stored?
3.
How will it be
organized?
4.
What steps are
needed to preserve it?
5.
Where and how
will it be stored?
6.
What retrieval
and procedure for use and review of the material will be established?
We will be discussing 1,
2, 3, and 5 and considering 6 as it applies to how 1, 2, 3, and 5 are
undertaken. Step 4 is covered in another workshop. During this morning
workshop, we can talk about changes and additions based on your experiences and
specific needs.
The material for permanent
church storage comes from many sources:
1.
Material that
church members from previous years set aside for storage
2.
Material from
church administrative offices and from various church committees that have been
accumulating for years (it is important to set up procedures to receive this
material on a yearly basis – see the History
Collection Policy and Guidelines in the miscellaneous section of your
resource packet)
a.
Board of
Directors’ Minutes
b.
Treasurer’s
records
c.
Buildings and
Grounds information
d.
Worship committee
e.
Social Justice
committee
f.
and many more
3.
Sunday School
records and curriculum plans
4.
Church bulletins
and newsletters
5.
Minister’s
records
a.
Sermons –
written/stored digitally or by other means
b.
Letters,
including acceptance and resignation
c.
Activities
6.
Scrapbooks,
newspaper clippings, bulletin board material
7.
Other
Organizing An Archival Collection
How the historical
material a church gathers is organized is affected by what material the church
decides to keep. May Memorial, for example, has stored material in the archives
at Syracuse University through a special agreement with them. A partial list of this material is
attached (see Attachment A). You can see from this list the scope of the
material and how it was organized. (Material kept in files at your church may
have a different organizational scheme, i.e., in the case of May Memorial, not
all materials go to the Syracuse University archives.)
A list of archived
material from The Unitarian Universalist
Congregation of Atlanta is also attached (see Attachment B), so you can see
the scope and organization of their material. It is interesting to see the
effect of their history on what they have archived.
How your material will be
organized is completely up to you – the nature of the material, the storage
facilities (space) available, the time and effort you want to put into
establishing and maintaining the files. However, the organizational scheme used
by the Atlanta church, some of the suggestions from the May Memorial Collection
Guidelines, and the Syracuse University material will give you some ideas for
your own organizational efforts.
Our Current Organizational Efforts
The where and how of
church record storage is dependent on the individual church situation. Judging
from the files we have in our church and those stored at Syracuse University,
May Memorial has been very active in storing church history over the years,
with a rich collection of material going back to the church’s founding in 1838.
In the 1980s there had been a very active and dedicated committee working with
church history. This committee produced an excellent booklet on church history
which we hold in high regard (an interactive version of this history was
completed by Rog Hiemstra and is available on the web).
They also were the people responsible for placing material in the Syracuse
University archives (the Syracuse University attachment represents the result
of many of those efforts). After the work of that committee, the files were
less well managed. Material was placed in the files or in the vicinity of the
files by people working on various church activities who were naturally more
focused on their own activities rather than on organizing the history files –
still, they felt the material was important enough that it should be saved.
When the current History
Committee became active in early 2006, five full metal and two cardboard filing
cabinets were found in the church furnace room, with cardboard boxes of file
material piled on top of them. Other materials were found stashed away in
cabinets and closets around the church building. Those metal files have been
moved from the furnace room to a more suitable but cramped office location and
one fire resistant metal cabinet and one extra wide metal cabinet added. All
these metal cabinets are now locked and History Committee members and selected
church leaders have keys or access to keys.
The material in these
files includes quantities of old newsletters, Sunday School (religious
education) files, and general church files. As we have been examining these
files, we have discovered many gems and some things we don’t need to keep. We
are now in the process of inventorying the material in these files. (A partial
list of this file survey activity is
also attached as a sample of these efforts – see Attachment C.) We also
have fairly complete boxes of files with information about the work of two past
ministers and are collecting information on recent ministers. The minister
files are being reviewed and preserved in preparation for transfer to the
Syracuse University archives.
There are other church
records including old photos and slides, scrapbooks, microfilms, audio and
video tapes and other media, and a few archival objects. Various History
Committee members are working with the preservation of these materials.
In addition to all of
this, there is, or should be, an annual influx of additional records from all
activities of the church (see item 2 in the second list on page one). For
example, records of annual meetings could be a partial basis for this yearly
addition to the archives. Materials in the church administrative office and
other activity centers should also be reviewed for material from past years
which should be moved to the history files. It should be noted that physical
space must always be a consideration, so figure this limitation into all your
planning, inventorying, and decisions on what to keep and even solicit.
The above description of
our experience with church record storage is given as an example of one
church’s experience. It may provide you with some ideas of the situations,
needs, and even surprises that can arise.
A clean, dry, roomy church
record storage facility is ideal, but seldom achievable. Transfer to an outside
facility has advantages and disadvantages. It releases storage space.
Researchers can find and access the material more easily. Once the
material has been given over to the facility, you may not be able to access it
as freely as you would like.
Miscellaneous
As
new communication and storage devices become available our storage capabilities
could increase. May Memorial now includes its newsletter on its web site, along
with audio of the sermons. The church’s PR Committee is discussing the
feasibility of archiving such digital material. Church services also are
recorded on DVDs for those who prefer to listen to or view such information in
their own home. A question we have been asking ourselves, can or also should we
store such media in our file cabinets? Such action has advantages and
disadvantages. An obvious advantage is that future researchers and interested
church members can revisit such information whenever it is appropriate.
However, you also have to maintain a good index of what you have on the DVDs,
as looking at a DVD case and perhaps a title is not the same as looking at a
typed sermon. In addition, in the future will DVD players become obsolete and
unavailable, such as with the difficulty today in access floppy discs or
viewing microfilm?
Attachment A
Syracuse University Archives Collection of May
Memorial Material
A Sample of the Material Stored There (use the web link shown below for more information)
May Memorial
Unitarian Church Records
An inventory of its records at Syracuse University
(http://library.syr.edu/digital/guides/m/may_mem.htm)
|
Creator:
|
May
Memorial Unitarian Church |
|
Title:
|
May
Memorial Unitarian Church Records |
|
Inclusive
Dates: |
1830-1988 |
|
Bulk
Dates: |
1839-1952 |
|
Quantity:
|
5
boxes |
|
Abstract:
|
Records
of May Memorial Unitarian Church in Syracuse, NY. Collection includes
letters, photographs, newsletters, printed matter, audiotapes, brochures,
Order of Worship handouts, etc. |
|
Language:
|
English |
|
Repository:
|
Special
Collections Research Center, |
May
Memorial Unitarian Church began in 1838 in Syracuse, New York. Its founders had
left the Congregational Church of New England in Boston, preferring to study
the gospels for themselves and worship according to individual conscience. The
church was originally named "Church of the Messiah." Members of the
congregation were active in the community; their second minister, Samuel Joseph
May, was a well-known abolitionist and reformer best remembered in Syracuse for
his part in the escape of Jerry, a runaway slave, memorialized in the
"Jerry Rescue" sculpture in downtown Syracuse’s Clinton Square. In
1885 the church moved to James Street and named their new stone building
"May Memorial Church" in his honor; some time later the group voted
to change their name to May Memorial Unitarian Universalist Society.
Scope and Contents of the Collection
The
May Memorial Unitarian Church Records, comprising the papers and records
of seven ministers beginning with Samuel Joseph May, covers over 100 years. The
collection is only roughly organized, divided according to the tenure of each
minister:
John
Storer, Minister 1839-1844
Samuel
Joseph May, Minister 1845-1868
Samuel
R. Calthrop, Minister 1868-1911
John
H. Applebee, Minister 1911-1929
Waldemar
W. Argow, Minister 1930-1941
Robert
E. Romig, Minister 1941-1946
Glenn O. Canfield, Minister 1946-1952
Contents
include letters, photographs, deeds, wills, pew rental contracts, legal papers,
marriage records, clippings, articles, books, Orders of Service, Sunday School
reports, and many other items.
Restrictions: There are no access restrictions on this material.
Use Restrictions: Some
restrictions on reproduction.
Subject Headings - Persons
Applebee,
John H.
Argow,
Waldemar W.
Calthrop,
Samuel R.
Canfield,
Glenn O.
May,
Samuel J. (Samuel Joseph), 1797-1871
Romig,
Robert E.
Storer,
John, Rev.
Corporate Bodies
May Memorial Unitarian Church
Subjects
Unitarian
churches, History
Unitarian
churches, New York (State)
Places
Syracuse (N.Y.), Social life and customs
Genres and Forms
Correspondence
Legal
files
Photographs
Programs
Sermons
May
Memorial Unitarian Church Records,
Special Collections Research Center,
Syracuse University Library
Gift of May Memorial Unitarian Society, 1998.
Finding Aid Information
Revision history: 30 Oct 2006 - converted to EAD (AMCon)
|
Box 1, Folder 1 |
Two copies of letter
from church members 1844 |
||||||||||
|
Box 1, Folder 2 |
Portrait of John Storer
undated |
||||||||||
|
Box 1, Folder 3 |
Text of memorial plaque
undated |
||||||||||
|
Box 1, Folder 4 |
Xerox copies of archival
material gathered by J. Hoefer and I. Baros-Johnson at On. Hist. Soc., UUA
and Harvard libraries |
||||||||||
Attachment B
Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Atlanta
Archival Material Stored at Emory University
A Sample of the Material Stored There (use the web link shown below for more information)
PITTS THEOLOGY LIBRARY, ARCHIVES AND MANUSCRIPTS DEPT.
UNITARIAN UNIVERSALIST CONGREGATION OF ATLANTA
Records, 1832-2001
(http://www.pitts.emory.edu/ARCHIVES/text/rg026.html)
RECORD GROUP NUMBER
026
EXTENT: 32.5 cubic ft. (63
legal-size archives boxes; 3 legal half-size archives boxes; 11 letter-size
archives boxes; 2 letter half-size archives boxes; 3 slide boxes; and 3 oversize
boxes)
ACCESS:
Unrestricted
REPRODUCTION:
All requests subject to limitations noted in departmental policies on
reproduction.
COPYRIGHT:
Information on copyright (literary rights) available from repository.
CITATION:
Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Atlanta Records, RG 026, Archives and
Manuscripts Dept., Pitts Theology Library, Emory University.
Historical Note
The Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Atlanta has its
roots in two separate congregations that were established in Atlanta in the
late 19th century. In 1879 Rev. W. C. Bowman established a Universalist
congregation that lasted less than a year. The next attempt was in1893
when Rev. Q. H. Shinn succeeded in organizing a congregation that became the
First Universalist Church in 1895.
George Chaney, a northern Unitarian minister and educator
who founded the Artisan's Institute, a vocational school that later became
Georgia Institute of Technology, conducted the first Unitarian service for a
congregation of eight on February 19, 1882. The following year this
congregation established the Church of our Father. The church experienced
growth and decline in its membership and ultimately changed its name to The
Unitarian Church of Atlanta on June 9, 1904. In 1915 the American
Unitarian Association (AUA) financed construction of a church building at 669
West Peachtree Street.
On November 14, 1918 the Unitarians merged with the
Universalist congregation to form the Liberal Christian Church. This
merger is particularly noteworthy because it occurred 43 years before the
national bodies of these two denominations merged. Under the dynamic
leadership of Rev. Clinton Lee Scott from 1926 to 1929, the congregation
approved another name change in June 1927 and became the United Liberal
Church. The effects of the Great Depression, however, almost caused the
church to close its doors in 1934 but the congregation managed to persevere
until the 1940s.
The congregation's position on race almost destroyed the
church during the late forties. In 1944, after the AUA criticized the
church's policy on segregation, the congregation broke its ties with the national
body. The ultimate crisis occurred in 1948, however, when the Rev. Isaiah
Jonathan Domas resigned after the congregation refused membership to Dr. Thomas
Baker Jones, an African-American Unitarian who chaired the Department of Social
Work at Atlanta University. In response to this incident, the American
Unitarian Ministers' Association urged its members to boycott the pastorate at
the Atlanta church. The congregation stood its ground and turned to a
minister from the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) during part of this
struggle. In 1951 the American Unitarian Association resolved the crisis
by selling the church building out from under the congregation.
The AUA provided an opportunity for a fresh start by
sending Rev. Glenn O. Canfield to officially reorganize the church in the
spring of 1952. A church building was purchased in 1953 and on January
20, 1954 the new United Liberal Church was officially reestablished.
During the 1950s and 1960s the congregation demonstrated a commitment to the fight
for human and civil rights. Rev. Edward A. Cahill and Rev. Eugene Pickett
followed Canfield in providing the leadership the congregation needed during
these tumultuous decades. On February 21, 1965, the congregation adopted
a new constitution and changed the name of the church to the Unitarian
Universalist Congregation of Atlanta. That same year construction began
on the new church building located on Cliff Valley Way.
The church is governed by a Board of Trustees in accordance
with instructions by the congregation and the authority delegated by the
congregation through the bylaws and polices. The Board consists of
eighteen members, including the president of the congregation, the chief
financial officer and the two additional trustees of finance. All of
these officials are elected by the congregation. The Executive Committee
of the Board consists of the president of the congregation, vice-president of
the congregation, chief financial officer of the congregation, and as
ex-officio members, the senior minister and church administrator. This
committee attends to details of business that are delegated by the Board of
Trustees and reports its recommendations to the Board. The church's
ministry consists of the senior minister, an associate minister and an
assistant minister.
Scope and Content Note
This collection consists of the minutes, correspondence,
bulletins, brochures and publications, reports, newsletters, sermons,
photographs, and other material that document the history and activities of the
congregation.