Image courtesy of Stuart Miles at FreeDigitalPhotos.net.
Reading archivist Samantha Thompson’s article, How do archivists organize collections?, on the Peel Art Gallery, Museum and Archives blog, can help genealogists better conduct research.
Ms. Thompson’s article will also likely make many genealogists think about how they organize and manage their own family history collection.
If you are expecting an article written by an archivist would be filled with stuffy, technical terms, you will be pleasantly surprised.
Ms. Thompson uses language we can all understand and she structures her article in a way that draws a clear picture.
Without giving away the story, here are some of the points:
- Unlike libraries, archivists don’t organize records by topic.
- Records have so much more to say to us when we know why, how, and by whom they were used and gathered.
- This word 〈fonds〉 is taken from the French phrase respect des fonds, an archival principle which tells us to acknowledge the source, or provenance, of records when we organize them.
So what is the difference between fonds and collection and why should you care? You’ll have to read the article on the Peel Art Gallery, Museum and Archives blog to find out. Ms. Thompson’s earlier article, What do archivists do all day?, is also worth a read.
The Region of Peel’s archives form part of PAMA, the Peel Art Gallery, Museum and Archives, located in Brampton, Ontario. In the archives, they collect, organize, store, and make available the historical records of the Region of Peel and the municipalities within it (Brampton, Mississauga, and Caledon). Their records cover the old County of Peel and the numerous small hamlets, villages, and towns within it from the early 19th century onwards.
My Gooderham ancestors, George Gooderham and his wife Emily Burrows, from Suffolk, England settled in Brampton possibly soon after they arrived at the Port of New York in July 1861. Why they settled in Brampton, not Toronto, has always been a mystery to me.
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Thank you very much for spreading the word about archives. Your comments mean a great deal to us, as we’re trying to do exactly what you say: make the archival world accessible.