Sessions started at 10:15. I attended Session I (parts A & B) since I was presenting IB. The first presentation was delivered by Brooke Fox, the university archivist of the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC). Ms. Fox’s talk addressed the immediate impact of Hurricane Hugo (Sept. 1989) on the MUSC campus, the aftermath of the hurricane, and the attempt to document the disaster on the campus. While Ms. Fox could not address how the Archives reacted to the disaster (it had not yet been created), she did describe how doctors, nurses, and hospital staff prepared for the storm and documented it themselves. She also described how the campus began to reform after the fact. Once the 20 year anniversary of Hurricane Hugo rolled around and Ms. Fox thought about creating an exhibit of remembrance, she realized what scant documentation there was. With only a cubic foot of physical documentation, Ms. Fox supplemented the library’s holdings of Hurricane Hugo materials by conducting oral histories with 11 different member of the campus community from a dean to a nurse. She used the existing physical materials along with other solicited deposits and the oral histories to build a physical and an online exhibit of Hurricane Hugo and how it affected MUSC. You may see the online exhibit here. Ms. Fox finished with some lessons learned. I did not take notes, so I may have missed some. The ones that stuck with me though are as follows:
- Have a disaster preparedness plan
- Be prepared to collect during and immediately after a critical event (disaster, protest, etc.)
- It’s never too late to collect
- Reach out to the community
Next, I attended Session IV at 11:15 on architectural materials in the archives. Beth Bilderback and Jim Cross, from USC and Clemson respectively, spoke on storing, describing, and collecting architectural materials. Jim Cross is the current head of the new architectural archives developed at Clemson. The architectural archives grew out of an initiative between Clemson, USC, and the South Carolina Chapter of the American Institute of Architects. Beth Bilderback addressed holdings in USC’s collections that include everything from small manuscript drawings to large landscape architecture plans from Robert Marvin.
During lunch, the SCAA held their annual business meeting. The election of 2015 officers was held, awards were presented, and reports by the treasurer and membership officer delivered. Mary Jo Fairchild passed on the torch of SCAA presidency to Steve Smith. Beth Bilderback reminded the audience of the Regional Archival Associations Consortium (RAAC) hosted by SAA. Ms. Bilderback is the current contact for SCAA.
After lunch, we had the pleasure of hearing Dr. Patrick McMillan of Clemson University and the SC Botanical Gardens speak on South Carolina’s historical landscapes. A mixture of ecology, botany, zoology, history, research, environmentalism, and archives, the presentation focused on Mark Catesby’s journals and diaries documenting his trips to the Carolinas. Because the conference had been originally scheduled to end at 2:30 and Dr. McMillan finished at 2:15 with one session left, I was unable to stay for the last session on herbaria as archives.
Overall, the meeting was a success, and I applaud the organizers and officers! The site was well chosen, and the sessions and theme interesting. I greatly appreciated the opportunity to solicit feedback on my own project and to hear about the work of others. Thank you, SCAA for a wonderful meeting! Until next year!