Tag: Roland Jackson Papers

Archives space has been by far the most challenging part of this whole experience. Upon my return to work on Monday morning, I sat down with Lisa to look over the work I had down on ArchivesSpace. Overall I did a pretty good job of inputting all of the collections information, but there was one issue that put me back. 

This week I have finished up processing the collection. Next week I will begin the task of creating the finding aid using ArchivesSpace. 

This week I am still swimming deep within the waves of boxes and folders. I just wanted to do a quick overview of what I have done since the very start of my internship.

• Conducted a collection survey which helped me become familiar with the records within the collection. I took notes on collection’s arrangement, materials, preservation problems, and the events documented within the collection. I also make sure the collection contained no sensitive information and took the necessary step to address those issues.
• Created a processing plan in which I wrote down information about the collection as a whole, issues to be aware of when processing the collection, and a proposal about how to arrange the collection. What I learned this week is that the processing plan is constantly changing. If my initial processing plan is not working, I can always add, remove, and edit the processing plan.
• Execute processing plan by removing clips, duplicates, acidic materials, and materials with no research value. Every action done during processing, should be written and documented in the process plan.
• As of right now I am happy to report that I am more than half way done with processing the collection! Hopefully, within the next two weeks I will begin to create the finding aid.

In the mean time, I wanted to share some photos of Roland Jackson.

REUNION- Former students of Wauwatosa High School, including many veterans, got together in the school cafeteria for an informal open house. During the evening. Roland Jackson, 1535 St. Charles St., obligingly pounded out some “hot licks” on the piano to entertain the crowed. Fall 1945.

Spring 1947

Northland College faculty 1949

Roland top right

May 1950

This picture taken in Freiberg German. 1952. While at the University. 

The past few weeks of my CCEPS internship has been comprised of me sorting and cleaning up the folders and boxes in order to create a cohesive system for researchers to easily find what they are looking for within the collection. I have been slowly relabeling and re-foldering the records into acid-free folders, which will help preserve the records.

While walking through Target this week, I got the faintest hint of harsh reality. Target had taken their patio section and transformed it into their back to school section. this yearly ritual can strike fear into any kid who would rather have summer last forever. As for me this reminded me of my college days at the University of California Riverside, which were filled with hard work, embarrassing moments, and memories I will cherish for life. With that said I do admit to having some strong UCR pride.

In 1978 UCR hosted the annual winter meeting for the Souther California Chapter of the American Musicological Society (AMS), and Jackson was a chairman of the society. When going through his papers I came across a black and white flier which provided driving directions and a campus map of UCR, where the meeting was to take place. If you notice on the directions the 210 freeway does not exist past the 57.

When you compare the 1978 campus map to a current campus map, it shows just how much the university has grown in the past 40 years. It was interesting to see just how old some of the buildings and classrooms are. According to the newsletter, the AMS had their meeting in the humanities building, which is the same building I had most of the classes in. It is also the building where the top of my desk broke off during my final. It is mind-blowing for me to think about the people who walked the halls of UCR before me, and those whose are currently there. It is interesting to think how every student from the past, present, and future, whether they know it or not, will leave a mark.

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Update 1: The Case of the Missing Box 9

On July 17th box 9 successfully rescued. Box 9
secretly kidnapped by a collection of Craven playbills and was given a new
identity as box 14! Early Monday morning, the archival police were able to
track down his last known whereabouts and uncovered clues that lead to the
recovery and rescue of box 9. I am happy to report that box 9 is in good condition
and has been returned to the Jackson family. 

In other words, box 9 was accidentally labeled
as box 14 of the Craven Playbill Collection and went into storage with the
wrong collection. But it sounds more edgy when described as a kidnapping
mystery.

And with that my friends, the case of the missing
box 9 is officially closed! 

Update 2: Ethics and Legal

The
hardest part of this week was doing research into whether I needed to take
steps toward protecting the names of those mentioned within the legal papers. With
the help and guidance from professor Gabriele Carey, I learned a lot about the
issues and concerns that go along with sensitive and private records.

I
learned that the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act
(FERPA) requires all schools receiving federal funding to protect the privacy
of student educational records. However, the records in the collection discuss
a lawsuit and are technically not considered educational records, and are not
protected under FERPA. However, if the lawsuit deals with unfair grading
practices, or harassment of students by their professor, or unfair/false
evaluations/references, these papers might fall under FERPA.

Another issue is whether the records are confidential
or not.

Since the lawsuit was settled out of court, the
parties may have agreed not to disclose information about the lawsuit or its
settlement as part of the settlement agreement. These letters and records
within the Jackson collection might fall under the protection of the settlement
agreement if they agreed to protect the records dealing with the lawsuit. 

Confusing right?

To be continued…

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Whenever I tell people I am pursuing a masters degree in
History and Archival Studies, the conservation always shoots right past the front half of my degree only to arrive at same
three questions everyone asks me about archiving.

Questions 1: What is Archival Studies?

Question 2: What does an archivist do?

Question 3: Why do you even want to be an archivist?

These are all great questions, but for the sake of time I
will only address the last question and highlight one of the reasons why I want to
be an archivist.

One reason comes from something I like to call “the find,”
it is a discovery that is always unexpected (and not to mention totally
awesome). When I was first given the Roland Jackson Papers, I was told the
collection had materials related to Roland’s career as an educator. However, no
matter how prepared one is to process a collection, you never know what you might “find”. Despite having an idea of what the collection contained, I found
something unexpected and interesting.

When doing the survey, I came across a letter written in 1981 to Jackson from a man he met in Poland. His name was Wojciech J. Kowalczyk and the letter is asking for help in going to the United
States. After doing to a quick internet search, I discovered that the letter
was written during a period of economic turmoil within Poland and right before
the introduction of martial law. Kowalczyk was one of many Poles trying to
emigrate to the west. Roland and Kowalczyk wrote to each other a few more times,
but it is unclear if Kowalczyk ever made it out of Poland.

These unexpected finds are one of the reasons I want to
become an archivist. History to me has not always been about just knowing the
who, what, when, where and why, but knowing the how. I always want to know how certain
events and experiences influenced the actions, opinions, and emotions of those
living through it. Letters like the ones between Jackson and Kowalczyk give
insight into how Kowalczyk and Jackson’s opinions, actions, and emotions were
affected by Poland’s economic crisis and martial law. There are even letters written by Roland to a colleague asking for help to bring Kowalczyk to the United States. These types of finds are what I enjoy about being an archivist. 

I have finally completed the extensive task of conducting my first solo survey (WHOOOOO!). My overall feelings and impressions of conducting a survey left me conflicted and struggling to find balance. 

During the survey, I was struggling with the desire be very meticulous with each box and move quickly through the collection. Nonetheless, there were many occasions where I got caught up in reading letters Jackson wrote and received from colleagues, relatives, and friends. There will always be a need to find the perfect balance between being detailed and efficient.

As an archivist, there are core values and ethics that every archivist needs to be aware of. During processing an archivist must be thorough and aware of protecting the rights, personal, and confidential information of those individuals and organizations mentioned within a collection. While going through the collection I did uncover legal material which contained the names of the individuals involved. As a result, these names may need to be protected. I will attempt to follow up on this topic later down the line.

Another issue I discovered with conducting the survey was when I came across box 9. According to the container list, box 9 was supposed to contain correspondences from May 2003 to July 2004. However, the box contained material from an entirely different collection, the Craven Playbill Collection. I did not panic and I was hopeful I would find the letters within another box. Sadly, I have yet to find them and the case of the missing letters remains a mystery.