TPCGS Monthly Meeting

                                                   April 11, 2023

                                   Hybred in person and zoom meeting

 

President Liz Osborn held a quick business meeting first.

- A reminder of the April 29 Seminar via zoom with Tom Jones as our speaker.  Sign up on the website.

- A Nominating Committee is beginning to seek new officer and Board positions.  Email any Board member with nominees.

 

Melody Stepp then introduced our speaker for the evening: Anna Trammell fo the NorthWest Room from the Tacoma Public Library is the manager of Special Collections.  She gave us an update of the room and what is coming.

 

The N/W Room became the official archives for Tacoma and South Puget Sound Region in the 1970s.  They preserve and supply access to business, personal and craft organizations for the Tacoma area (diaries, business reports, organization reports etc.).  Richard's Photography and the Tacoma News Tribune have donated their photographs to be come part of the archives.

 

The nature of archive preservation is changing with the sharing of web sites.  They are trying to break down barriers to access by digitilizing collections.  They are also trying to be more inclusive in the local history record.  Many representational gaps exist in the collection.

 

They have launched the Community Archive Center to look at finding excluded voices and what is happening in Tacoma that needs to be preserved for the future.  They are focusing on the East Side and Hilltop neighborhoods.  The general public has been asked to share their stories and they are seeking to put out a generalized model for other libraries across the nation to use.  Many oral histories are recorded.

 

Northwest ORCA

Online Records and Collections Access at www.northwestroom.tacomalibrary.org for access to the digitalized records for research by anyone.  You can browse by collections, subject, place, author etc.  They also have access to the City Council meeting minutes going back to 1884.

 

The Northwest Room gets not only ORCA but other collections as well; obit index, properties etc.  They put out a blog "Under the Dome".

 

They are developing other research guides for resources beyond the N/W Room.

 

Also they are working on a Memory Lab Network to become part of the national network.  You can reserve the room for recordings and they have digital equipment to copy your own files.  It opens in 2024 with training classes.

 

They are partnering with local school districts giving workshops having students interact with library collection materials and getting students to interview local citizens.

 

The meeting adjorned after numerous questions.

 

Respectfully submitted;

Michael Jones, Secretary