Volume 39 | Number 1 Article 1 7-1-2011 MAC Newsletter (Vol. 39, No. 1) Midwest Archives Conference Follow this and additional works at: https://lib.dr.iastate.edu/macnewsletter Part of the Archival Science Commons Recommended Citation Midwest Archives Conference (2011) "MAC Newsletter (Vol. 39, No. 1)," MAC Newsletter: Vol. 39 : No. 1 , Article 1. Available at: https://lib.dr.iastate.edu/macnewsletter/vol39/iss1/1 This Complete Issue is brought to you for free and open access by Iowa State University Digital Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in MAC Newsletter by an authorized editor of Iowa State University Digital Repository. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Preserving the Documents of the Past and Making Them Accessible to the Future! Volume 39, Number 1 (152) http://www.midwestarchives.org/ July 2011 MAC Archivists Meet in Saint Paul Over 350 MAC members and friends descended on Saint Paul April 28–30, 2011, for the MAC Annual Meeting. The conference offered a wide selection of workshops, sessions, and other events organized by the Program Committee (PC) and Local Arrangements Committee (LAC), designed to appeal to archivists of all experience levels and repository types. Ellen Swain Joshua Ranger Despite the unseasonable snowflakes, groups enjoyed Wednesday evening outings to the Minnesota Twins game and a historic pub tour. Thursday morning brought a variety of tours to local repositories, in- cluding the Minnesota Historical Society, Minnesota Public Radio, and the Science Kathy Koch Janet Olson Museum of Minnesota. The meeting officially kicked off with plenary speaker Dr. Mark Neuzil’s address “The Mississippi River of Henry Bosse: MACers enjoy the baseball game Government Photography as History.” between the Minnesota Twins and Tampa Bay Devil Rays. Conference attendees then flocked to the Rebecca Bizonet Erik Moore (Continued on page 5) See page 15 for election results and ex officio appointments. Fall Symposium: Mysteries of Magnetic Tape Revealed! In This Issue… Sioux City, Iowa, October 19–21, 2011 President’s Page ...................2 MAC News .............................5 Test your Iowa trivia, MAC members! Treasurer's Report .............. 17 What do advice columnists Dear Abby (Pauline Friedman) and Ann Landers Archival Resources on (her sister, Esther), and actors Fred Grandy (Gopher of TV’s The Love Boat) and the Web .............................. 20 Jerry Mathers (Beaver Cleaver of TV’s Leave It To Beaver) all have in common? News from the Midwest .............................. 22 Answer: They were born and raised in Electronic Currents .............27 Sioux City, Iowa, site of the 2011 MAC Preservation Essentials ...... 29 Fall Symposium, Mysteries of Magnetic Tape Revealed! Take our advice—with or without Up-and-Comers ................... 32 a situation comedy laugh track—and plan to People and Posts ................ 34 attend this very informative two-day work- shop. If you have wondered how to better 1939 Postcard. Curt Teich and Regionalia .......................... 36 Co., Inc. MAC Officers ....................... 38 manage and make accessible those stacks of (Continued on page 6) President’s Page July 2011 Dear MACers, As expected, the annual meeting in Saint Paul did not fail to deliver—from the opening plenary to the ending sessions; our hardworking LAC and PC did a wonderful job! Special thanks are due to the committee members and cochairs of each one: LAC Cochairs Ann Kenne and Karen Spilman and PC Cochairs Alison Stankrauff and Lynn Smith. When incoming MAC President Ellen Swain asked me what my main responsibilities were as president, I responded: signing contracts and saying thank you. So, since this is my last President’s letter, I wanted to thank the former MAC officers (President Dennis Meissner, Vice President Doug Bicknese, and Treasurer Craig Wright) and Council members (Matt Blessing and Martha Briggs), who were there for the first year of my term. I also would like to extend my thanks to current MAC officers (Secretary Josh Ranger, Vice President Mark Shelstad, and Treasurer Anke Voss) and ongoing Council members (Dina Kellams, Michael Doylen, and Deirdre Scaggs), as well as outgoing MAC Council members Kim Butler and Sally Childs-Helton for their dedication to MAC. I also would like to thank both our ongoing and outgoing committee chairs for all of their hard work and service. At the annual meeting, MAC Council and this outgoing MAC president also designated a special thank you to Aleda Downs, who designs MAC’s publications. I cannot tell you how lucky we are to work with her—she has always watched out for MAC and helped us in any way she could. And now, I would like to share my “State of MAC” address, given at the members’ meeting on April 29: My goal this afternoon is to again share some of the topics and issues that Council has been working on over the past year. Some of these issues will need to be dealt with by President Ellen’s administration, but, all in all, I think MAC is in a very good place and has a solid foundation. As you heard from Anke, MAC is also in strong financial shape. Our real issue is that we have choices to make, and I know Council will be asking for membership input over the next few years, to determine where and how we proceed. Over this past year, Council drafted a strategic plan, which is now available on the MAC Web site. This plan will serve as a blueprint through 2015 with an emphasis and focus on: 1. Recruiting and retaining an active membership. 2. Supporting and assisting in the professional development of MAC members (meetings, mentoring, publications). 3. Providing education resources for the archival profession and those who are charged with the care of archival materials. 4. Continuing to develop technological infrastructure and governance procedures. I thought I would focus on our activities over the past year, in the context of this strategic plan: 1. Recruiting and retaining an active membership. I wanted to make special note of the strategic efforts we have designated for our diversity efforts, as well as a newly implemented system for collecting the names of potential volunteers. But primarily, I wanted to share the results of the final report from the Marketing Tools Working Group. This group’s charge was “to assess, review, and develop potential marketing tools for MAC for the next two- to four-year time period.” Chaired by Kathy Koch and Josh Ranger, the membership also included Adriana Cuervo, Noah Lenstra, Erik Moore, Shari Christy, and Kevin Leonard. The Task Force conducted a market analysis to determine our potential audiences, examined MAC as a (Continued on page 3) 2 MAC Newsletter • July 2011 presiDents paGE—Continued Tanya Zanish-Belcher, President, Midwest Archives Conference (Continued from page 2) brand, looked at our competition, and, finally, developed tools time for MAC to move to the next level, and hire a planning/ for Council to consider and pursue, including a number of coordinating company to do this work for us, especially in “campaigns” for target audiences. My personal favorite? “Got regard to the local arrangements. Vice President Shelstad Archives? Get MAC” for those tasked with the responsibility presented a request for proposal (RFP) for review yesterday, of taking care of archival materials, while not necessarily and MAC will be doing a call for bids. being professionally trained to do so. 3. Providing education resources for the archival At the Council meeting yesterday, Council accepted and profession and those who are charged with the approved this report. The Task Force was also charged to care of archival materials. continue its work and further prioritize its recommendations At our fall meeting in Dayton, Council received the Task for the October Council meeting. (Aside: After the Annual Force on Education report. The Task Force was chaired by Meeting, all reports submitted to Council will be available Ellen Swain and included members Mary Ellen Ducey, Tim to the membership via the MAC Web site). Ericson, Katie Blank, Kate Theimer, David McCartney, 2. Supporting and assisting in the professional and Chad Owen, who examined all of MAC’s education development of MAC members (meetings, programming and made recommendations for the future. mentoring, publications). As part of that process, the Education Committee will be As MAC transitioned to a hybrid of print and digital infor- reconfigured. New Cochairs Amy Cooper Cary and Karen mation, we had several successes but also ran into several Spilman, the current committee membership, and at least issues during the past year. Archival Issues (AI) had two five to seven additional members will work on the following issues in 2010, and also is now up to date. Barbara Floyd is goals and projects: the incoming editor, and I know she has some big plans for • Continuing to offer a variety of workshops at the annual increasing the number of AI submissions. Please consider meeting. submitting an article—it is important for our profession. • Compiling a complete list of our current workshop offer- Council, Josh Ranger, and Michael Doylen also have been ings, who is teaching them, and how often. Do we need to working to make Archival Issues available on-line through have official procedures for reviewing evaluations? What two venues: the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee kind of assessments are we doing? institutional repository and JSTOR. • Compiling a list of potential new workshop topics based The bumps included our longtime printer, Art & Print, on previous evaluations and membership requests. going out of business and our copyeditor declining to renew Determining development procedures. her contract due to other commitments. Our new printer • Considering the development of a process whereby the responded well to our immediate need for program and Education Committee could put out a call for workshop ballot publishing; however, the printer had some difficulties proposals (including abstract, syllabus, bibliography, in adjusting to the MAC schedule.