SCHOAM! for January 2023

Special Collections, Historical Organizations, Archives & Museums

News from SCRLC

New Collection: Perry Browne Collection

Truthfully, Chenango County Historical Society finished up this ARPA-funded collection several months ago, but I hadn't yet included it in a SCHOAM newsletter. It's an excellent collection of photographs taken by Frank Pearsall Browne, who went by Perry, as he worked for the Norwich Sun in the first half of the 20th century. There are nearly 1,000 well-labeled photographs of the people, places and events of Chenango County, from high school sport teams to a crowd watching firefighters at work.

New Collection: Cayuga County Churches

The Cayuga Museum of History and Art uploaded dozens of pictures of churches, seen from inside and out, from around Cayuga County. Presbyterian, Methodist, Catholic, Universalist and other Christian denominations are represented, showing a variety of sacred spaces of the 20th century.

New Collection: Town of Montezuma Collection

As part of their ARPA-funded project, Seymour Public Library worked with the Montezuma Town Historian in Cayuga County to upload dozens of photos and ephemera of the picturesque hamlet. Subjects include churches, schoolhouses, baseball teams, street views, and even a self-taught taxidermist with his ducks.

Grants & Assistance

Society of American Archivists Awards

SAA offers twenty different awards for merit and need, so apply or nominate someone by February 28.

NEH Preservation Assistance Grants for Smaller Institutions

You still have a few days! NEH is offering grants of up to $10,000 to small or medium sized repositories that have never received an NEH grant before. These are not matching or cost-sharing grants and seem intended to pay for a professional conservator. The deadline is January 12, 2022.

Ideas & Inspiration

Happy Public Domain Day!

On January 1, 2023, copyrighted works from 1927 entered the public domain where they will be free for all to copy, share, and build upon. Newly added works also include those by people who died in 1952 for most European and South American creators and those in 1972 for most Asian and African creators. See a list of new additions here, which include Fritz Lang's Metropolis, Hermann Hesse's Steppenwolf, The Jazz Singer with Al Jolson, and works by creators like M. C. Escher, Ezra Pound and Maria Montessori.

Manuscript Thief Identified

I wish I could remember where I first heard about the spate of convincingly forged emails being sent to authors in order to get copies of their unpublished books ahead of print, but alas, I can't. It may have been at NYLA. In any case, police recently caught the guy doing it, and it's a fascinating story.

Happening in the Neighborhood

Happy Birthday to Chemung County Historical Society

CCHS turns 100 in 2023! As you wish them a happy centennial, check out their most recent blog post by Monica Groth, which describes a "gold cure" to treat alcoholism in the 19th century.

Awards in Oneonta

Congratulations to Marcela and her team at the Greater Oneonta Historical Society for earning three big grants recently: the NYSEG 2022 Economic Development-Small Business Customer COVID-19 Relief Program Grant, a 2022 Oneonta Community Initiative Grant from Destination Oneonta, and a 2022 Support for Organizations Grant from the New York State Council of the Arts (NYSCA). These grants helped GOHS pay for salaries, building costs, and safety improvements.

Resolutions in Cortland

Cortland County Historical Society shared a very funny old list of resolutions from 1880 on their Facebook page. Write a reminder to yourself in December 2023 to search through your old newspapers for similarly charming resolutions not to use cheap rouge or to mash as an art.

Diaries and Desserts in Delaware

This is a clever event we can all imitate! Delaware County Historical Association will read sections of historic diaries, letters and narratives from their collection while guests enjoy a big buffet of desserts. DCHA has very active Facebook presence, and they recently posted a great list of all the local Delaware County newspaper resources; this is a post worth replicating for your local audience!

Echo of Deco in Steuben

Kirk House of Steuben County Historical Society always posts great pictures on Facebook with charming descriptions. He recently posted about an artistic detail on a New-Deal-funded public school (which is surely similar to something in your backyard as well). It's wonderful to highlight the details on historic buildings that people tend to disregard over time.

Significant Elements in Ithaca

One of our members, Historic Ithaca, runs a salvage shop for furniture and architectural pieces. It's called Significant Elements and if you have time to daydream about redecorating, check out their website or Instagram feed. Historic Ithaca recently shared an upcoming event from Preservation Buffalo & Niagara that might be useful to historical societies with a pre-1946 barn, carriage house or other agricultural building: a February 8 webinar about the NYS Historic Barn Rehabilitation Tax Credit.

Zooms & Webinars Up Your Alley

NEDCC: Care and Reformatting of Microfilm ($45)

Tuesday, January 10 at 12:30 pm

Ask An Archivist: Archival Appraisal For Beginners

Tuesday, January 10 at 1 pm

Building a Diverse Collection

Tuesday, January 10 at 3:30 pm

Conservator’s Corner: Where Does The Mold Go? A Conservator’s Decisions About Dry-Cleaning

Thursday, January 12 at 12 pm

NEDCC: Creating Preservation-Quality Oral Histories ($45)

Thursday, January 12 at 12:30 pm

Linked Data, What's in it for Me

Thursday, January 12 at 1 pm

DHPSNY Dialogue: Centering Indigenous Perspectives in Collecting Organizations

Thursday, January 12 at 2 pm

Communicating with Elected Officials about your Library

Thursday, January 12 at 2 pm

NYSL Digital Inclusion Asset Mapping Webinar

Thursday, January 12 at 2 pm

Your Compensation Philosophy

Tuesday, January 17 at 1 pm

NEDCC: Caring for Paper-Based Collections ($95)

Tuesday, January 17 at 2 pm

NYSL: Reaching for the Ideal Community: Three American Utopias

Wednesday, January 18 at 11 am

A Day In The Life: A Panel Discussion with School Media Specialists

Wednesday, January 18 at 4 pm

Your Role as Local Government Records Management Officer

Wednesday, January 25 at 10 am

Valuing Libraries: What We Can and Cannot Know

Wednesday, January 25 at 1 pm

Sustainable Living Library Programs

Wednesday, January 25 at 2 pm

Imagine Belonging | Commit to Advancing Your 2023 DEI Goals

Monday, January 30 at 1 pm

Discover New York through 10,000+ Maps preserved at the State Archives

Tuesday, January 31 at 12:30 pm

What’s the Point of APA Style? Relevance of a Writing Style to Life After Graduation

Tuesday, January 31 at 2 pm

NEDCC: Surveying, Selecting and Testing Digital Preservation Software ($95)

Thursday, February 2 at 2 pm

How to Effectively Communicate, Manage Difficult Conversations and Personalities in the Workplace

Friday, February 3 at 10 am

SUNYLA Midwinter Online Conference 2023

Library Data: The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly

Friday, February 3 from 9:30 am to 4:15 pm

Recordings

ESLN Academic Institutional Repository Demo 12/13/2022

Openings In The Field

• Adult and Teen Services Librarian at the George F. Johnson Memorial Library (Broome Co.)
• Library Director at the Chemung County Library District
• Reference Associate (Temporary) at Corning Museum of Glass Rakow Research Library
• Head of Information Services (Librarian III) at Broome County Public Library
• Director of Libraries at Bard College (Dutchess Co.)
• Library Director I at Red Hook Public Library (Dutchess Co.)
• Library Director II at Grinnell Public Library District (Dutchess Co.)
• Digital Archivist at the Rochester Institute of Technology
• Administrative Assistant, Office of the University Librarian at Cornell University
• Director of Library and Information Services at SUNY Polytechnic Institute (Utica)
• Executive Director of Museums at Schuyler County Historical Society
• Museum Curator at the Susquehanna County Historical Society (Montrose, PA)
• Lead Collections Manager at the University of Rochester
• Junior Systems Administrator at OWWL Library System (Canandaigua)
• Systems and Discovery Librarian at SUNY Brockport (Monroe Co.)