Ardra Whitney: Week 6 @ Avery Research Center

(A motivational tune from my collections processing playlist)

Monday, October 8^th and Tuesday, October 9^th: On Monday morning, I met with Processing Archivist, Georgette Mayo and Manager of Archival Services, Aaron Spelbring to discuss archival staff updates. We’ve decided to do a mini social media campaign to celebrate American Archives Month, so I’m excited about the opportunity to highlight collections as well as archivists’ contributions at Avery. On Tuesday, I continued surveying the Edwina Harleston Whitlock Papers. I really enjoyed looking through all the birthday and holiday cards she received near the end of her life and was particularly touched by the ones from her children and granddaughter, Allison—who wrote to wish her grandmother a happy birthday and thank Harleston for convincing her to go to Howard University.
 

Wednesday, October 10^th: At noon, I took part in a conference call with The HistoryMakers’ Executive Director, Julieanna Richardson, Program Coordinator, Y’hoshua Murray and IMLS Fellows. Each of the fellows reported on the following: survey of completed work, status of archival processing, interview evaluations completed, participation in planned presentations and public/outreach programs. After the conference, I began learning about Avery Research Center’s reference room procedures from Reference Librarian, Deborah Wright. I also asked her about future participation in her preparation of the Avery Messenger (the Center’s seasonal newsletter). I also worked with Ms. Wright and Education Coordinator, Shelia Harell-Roye to post a photo album on Avery’s Facebook page of images from the Moja Arts Festival: 2012 Community Tribute Luncheon (featuring Education Honoree, Bernard E. Powers, Jr., Ph.D.)
 

Thursday, October 11^th and Friday, October 12^th: On Thursday, I began evaluating part two of Debra Lee’s video oral history interview. I am learning about her transition from a clerkship with the Honorable Judge Barrington Parker in Washington D.C. to an associate position with the law firm Steptoe & Johnson to her first years at BET, as the chief lawyer of the company’s legal department. By Friday, I had completed my survey of the Edwina Harleston Whitlock Papers. I also began winding down my work on the W. Melvin Brown, Jr. Papers: finalizing the collection’s arrangement and revising its corresponding processing proposal/finding aid draft. I spent the morning removing wooden backings from the award plaques in the collection and started digitizing a scrapbook belonging to the collection as well. In addition, I was invited to speak, along with Ms. Wright and Mr. Spelbring, to CofC students visiting Avery as part of a Charleston Archival Crawl event. Ms. Wright provided students with an overview of the institution’s history and reference room procedures. I chimed in with mentioning the importance of having researchers fill out an intake form and performing a reference interview in order for the reference librarian to get a better sense of the kinds of information the researcher is looking for (as well as for security purposes), while Mr. Spelbring answered specific questions the students had and told them about using the Lowcountry Digital Library for their research.