Archivists
Yes, I am unashamed of it. I assembled and kept 20 years of historical records based on public documents. This is what historians do. And nobody else has this stuff. I am not ashamed of that either. Haha.
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OK, that was wicked. Actually, that first paragraph was just designed to tweak the beards of trawling bots looking for certain things and trying to inspire their masters to virulent campaigns of verbal denunciation.
The real point is that I suddenly felt the urge to celebrate the lives of two very earnest young men who grew up to be very earnest old men, still (after many decades) holding true to their archival instincts and looking after large amounts of historical material. I learnt perhaps 60% of all my craft from these two men and I salute them and remember them fondly all the time.
I also visit them when I can. Both are spritely and vigorous, sane in mind and fit in body. And since one of them is my father and one of them was in loco parentis to me, it's very pleasing to the filial part of my psyche as well.
Lastly, this is also a shout-out to that guy who often spends his Saturdays at the National Archives, a building which used to be a home to me. May he find inspiration amidst the stacks of ancient raw material and once-processed stuff, and may he feel the benign spiritual residues of generations of archivists before him over his shoulder. Heh!
=====
OK, that was wicked. Actually, that first paragraph was just designed to tweak the beards of trawling bots looking for certain things and trying to inspire their masters to virulent campaigns of verbal denunciation.
The real point is that I suddenly felt the urge to celebrate the lives of two very earnest young men who grew up to be very earnest old men, still (after many decades) holding true to their archival instincts and looking after large amounts of historical material. I learnt perhaps 60% of all my craft from these two men and I salute them and remember them fondly all the time.
I also visit them when I can. Both are spritely and vigorous, sane in mind and fit in body. And since one of them is my father and one of them was in loco parentis to me, it's very pleasing to the filial part of my psyche as well.
Lastly, this is also a shout-out to that guy who often spends his Saturdays at the National Archives, a building which used to be a home to me. May he find inspiration amidst the stacks of ancient raw material and once-processed stuff, and may he feel the benign spiritual residues of generations of archivists before him over his shoulder. Heh!
Labels: Archiving
etched with acid at 6:10:00 am
2 Comments:
"virulent campaigns of verbal denunciation" - sounds like Two Minute Hate in Orwell's 1984.
I am currently ensconced in front of a Gideon 1000 machine in a room with 20% humidity, battling fatigue and boredom, while reading files from an age of typewriters and despatch boys.
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