Week Six at MSA

Last week, I visited the Baltimore City Archives to meet with Dr. Papenfuse about my projects during the fellowship. (In 2010, the Maryland State Archives signed a memorandum of understanding with the City of Baltimore to administer the city’s archives. As a result, the State Archivist is the acting City Archivist.)

I’ll have two primary projects. For the first, I’ll be mining the records of the Maryland State Colonization Society for information about people from Kent and Queen Anne’s Counties. This will include writing case studies of selected individuals and populating the Legacy of Slavery in Maryland database with information culled from manumission records and ship manifests.

My other long-term project will be the appraisal of Kent and Queen Anne’s County records. This will involve reviewing two extensive 20^th century historical records surveys to determine if county records are under the appropriate physical and intellectual control of MSA, if any records are missing, and if the county records related to African Americans and slavery are adequately described for discovery.

These are two major but exciting tasks that should provide excellent material for my outreach and social media work!

Krystal