History Commons^™

University Archives And Community Organizations: Ensuring Access Through Collaboration, Jessica R. Holden, Andrew Elder, Joanne Riley

Joseph P. Healey Library Publications

How can a university archives establish a successful ongoing relationship with a community organization? What are the benefits and challenges of such a collaboration? University of Massachusetts Boston’s Archives and Special Collections (UASC) explored these questions while working with The Irish Ancestral Research Association (TIARA) to preserve and provide access to 79,000 mortuary records from the Massachusetts Catholic Order of Foresters. Elements of the collaboration included shifting stewardship of the records from the Foresters to TIARA to UMass Boston, integrating TIARA’s efforts in processing and indexing the records into the Archives’ workflow, providing in-person and electronic access to the records, …