Category Archives: Reading Summary / Reflection

Reflection #5: NYPL Archives: Robert Moses Papers

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The amount of Robert Moses Papers are vast and give deep, extensive insight to Moses’ career as a public official. His papers have been filed in different ways over the years. Some of the files are in chronological order and others are organized alphabetically due to subject. The Robert Moses Papers have been divided into sixteen principle series.

The Robert Moses Papers consist of his plans for projects involving parks, bridges, housing, and tunnels to name a few. The series consists of correspondences, magazines, clippings, speeches, official reports, and photographs. These sources may be accessed by contacting the New York Public Library’s Manuscripts and Archives Division in advance. By filling out and submitting a request form, the library may grant access to the Robert Moses Papers.

I think that it is a prudent idea that the library requires a person to fill out a request form in advance before granting access to the Robert Moses Papers. This is a way to protect and preserve such valuable sources.

Fifth 100 Word Reflection: Robert Moses Papers

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The Robert Moses Papers are first divided into sixteen series, in addition to some of them being alphabetized and others being put in chronological order.  The materials included range from correspondence, speeches, memorandum, press releases, reports, plans, photographs, clippings, and public records. There are three ways to gain access to using these resources and those three ways are to either physically go to the New York Public Library Archives and Manuscripts, the address is listed on the website, request access to the collection, there is a hyperlink provided on the website, or to get some of the work on microfilm.

Homework#5 Archives

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This article definitely has a lot of in depth and historic information regarding the creation of important roads, tunnels, highways, parks and bridges around New York City. Many of us, including myself, are sometimes guilty of not paying much attention to the bridges that connect boroughs and states, or roads and tunnels that gets us from place to place. It’s easy to take these little things for granted as we go about our everyday lives. But thanks to the New York Public Library for collecting and archiving such important and historic information for us so we are able to have an understanding and appreciation for all these incredible paths around us.

Robert Moses work and information were changed after a period of time. His papers were filed alphabetically by subject and others were filed chronological. The materials used to archive his work and life achievements were personal correspondence, speeches, press releases, reports, magazine and newspaper clippings and blue prints. These resources are easy to access through the internet and the New York Public Library archive by filling out a request form to view documents with specific dates, time frame and segments.

Reflections #5: Archiving Robert Moses

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The NYPL Robert Moses archives contain a wide breadth of information. The archive encompasses his personality and his being, whereby it is cohesive and stark as a whole, but in pieces are sporadic and heavily concentrated. That being said, it includes a variety of documents: photographs, printed matter, speeches, correspondence papers that record his reign in numerous office, and his invention of several major public transportation and parks projects.

These papers are organized chronologically, although sometimes events and projects in his life overlapped, therefore some timelines bled over each other.  Each paper is linked to a page which further summarizes the contents of the document. Some papers are highly dense, thus they are further segmented (ex. the 1st Series: Personal and Library Correspondence) or highly organized and indexed. All of these documents however, facilitate the need to contact the NYPL ARCHIVES & MANUSCRIPTS division to plan for a visit to study these documents.

 

Archives: Robert Moses papers

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* How are the papers organized? The papers are organized by 16 series, some are categorized by chronological order and others by alphabetical order. I think that if the archival department were able to afford to pay someone to simply set hyperlinks from both chronological and alphabetical categories, searches would be much easier and simpler. Technology (scanners) today is already available and capable of reading, organizing, and categorizing documents. All someone would have to do is to load the feed tray with the documents. How difficult is this? After, someone can verify if the scanner had not made any mistake or faulty scans of the documents. Even if there were not enough funds available to pay for someone to check for mistakes, ordinary researchers who stumble on or discover mistakes could report their findings and have the necessary/appropriate corrections made.

* What kinds of materials are included? The kinds of materials that are included are “correspondence, related press releases, reports, speeches, magazine and clippings.” Someone/people had endured a lot of trouble or simply went out of his/her/their way to gather all of these documents. Is there anyone who could “step-in” to continue this work of contribution in the archival system/technology? What are the duties and responsibilities of the archival employees? Maybe someone who is working on a library project can contribute some time to this effort.

* How could you access these resources? Access to these resources could be accomplished by clicking on the link under the heading “ACCESS TO MATERIALS,” where a pop-up window will appear containing a form for the requester to fill-in. Advanced notice is advised for accessing this resource. It may be put away in archival storage and the time for the archivist to retrieve it may be overwhelmed by numbers of other requests, so prior notice may aid in simplifying his/her work load (and in relieving stress); or maybe the archivist may not be aware in time to coordinate his/her activities or efforts to coincide with your arrival to the library. So, acquiring access to the archives and its resources may not be as simple as checking a book out of the library. Good luck with your research involving the use of archival materials and resources. There may be an uphill battle ahead!

Archive papers Organization, Materials, and Resources, Reflection # 4

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After reading the articles which were really informative, I will say archives are collections of materials and artifacts kept and preserved by organizations like universities or historical societies. Archival materials are often unpublished and are preserved for their research value. In general just like prof Nora Almeida mentioned in todays class, that archives are consist of records that have been selected for permanent or long-term preservation on grounds of their enduring cultural, historical, or evidentiary value. Archival records are normally unpublished and almost always unique, unlike books or magazines for which many identical copies. To find the archive materials we can go to archive.gov where you can find national archives and much more. Archives can hold both published and unpublished materials, and those materials can be in any format. Some examples are manuscripts, letters, photographs, moving image and sound materials, artwork, books, diaries, artifacts, and the digital equivalents of all of these things. Materials in an archives are often unique, specialized, or rare objects, meaning very few of them exist in the world, or they are the only ones of their kind. The Rober Moses paper are really great example to show that archives are really important, because i think archives really help us to reconnect us with our history, culture and values.

Brooklyn’s “Auld Irishtown” Reflection

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Although there was not and is not any Brooklyn neighborhood that was officially named “Irishtown”, we know that in articles like the Whiskey Wars that we previously read that areas like Vinegar Hill, DUMBO and the Brooklyn Navy Yard were referred to Irishtown because of the Irish immigrants that came here in the 19th century.  Eamon Loingsigh was informed about “Irishtown” through his elderly relatives who had family who had lived in those areas and experienced life in these Brooklyn neighborhoods.  I think with word of mouth information given to Eamon Loingsigh based on his family history, this was the base for the research he needed for his book on Irishtown, and he used these historical stories to branch out and dig deeper with secondary sources to find more.

My Reflection on the Loingsigh Reading

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Application of the RECAP criteria to the Loingsigh reading:
RECAP
Mr. Eamon Loingsigh’s article “The power of family lore: uncovering Brooklyn’s “Auld Irishtown”,” is written on the official Brooklyn Daily Eagle’s newspaper website: http://www.brooklyneagle.com/articles/power-family-lore-uncovering-brooklyn%E2%80%99s-%E2%80%9Cauld-irishtown%E2%80%9D-2013-04-08-193600 This makes Mr. Loingsigh article a reliable secondary source, which can be used and referred to in a research project.
Relevance: This information would be relevant to my needs if I were conducting research on Brooklyn’s Irishtown.
– The source helps me research my topic and/or answers my questions.
– The source meets the requirements of my assignment.
Expertise: The author is a direct relative of the primary sources in his article, and the publisher is an official newspaper.
– The author is qualified or an expert who knows about the topic.
– There is information about the author on the web page.
Currency: The information was written on April 8, 2013.
– The source is almost three years old.
– This website does get its information from up-to-date sources.
Accuracy: The source’s information is reliable but may have the potential for some falsification.
– The source states where the information comes from.
– I can verify any of the information by checking other sources.
Purpose: My information source was created for career and a sense of family duty.
– My source was designed to inform, educate, entertain, and/or to make money.
– I do not think that my source was designed to further a political, religious, or institutional cause; but it is biased towards the Irish perspective. Consider the point of view of “Whiskey Wars,” for instance.

I strongly believe that this is a “credible source,” because the author’s article was published in a credible newspaper; however, the information, though acquired from primary source interviews and secondary literature, was not purely taken from historical archives of governmental sources, such as libraries or historical documents. There is no official document claiming that Vinegar Hill was once called or known as “Irish-town.” I would use this source in the context of an unofficial historical research project.

Homework#4: Applying RECAP

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I would say Loingsigh definitely used the RECAP criteria in his research about the Irish community. He surely proved his grandparent’s story to be true and accurate with current and updated information he researched. After reading Loingsigh’s article the first thing that came to my mind was how the Irish was connected to Brooklyn’s Vinegar Hill, the Navy Yard, Brooklyn Heights know as DUMBO and the Whiskey War that begun in 1869. We have also used the RECAP criteria in our research to get to this point of learning about the Irish community that played such a significant part in the history of these famous places in Brooklyn.

Fourth 100 Word Reflection: RECAP-Loingsigh

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The Loingsigh article is a credible source. He got word of this old town and he didn’t just take his grandparents word for it, he made it his mission to prove that this town actually did exist. The way he went about finding that information was carefully sought out. He didn’t look to collect more oral stories, he went into books and records, and he extracted the information, allowing him to then match up the written words to what was currently present, and proved that this town did exist in the 1900’s. All of this makes the article very reliable.