The Montana Historical Society (MHS) and the Genealogical Society of Utah(GSU) are currently sponsoring a project to capture Montana’s records ofhistorical and genealogical value. In 1993 the two joined forces to microfilmmarriage records in each county. A complete copy of the microfilm that wasproduced is available at the Historical Society and is used heavily by many ofour researchers. Participating counties in this phase included Deer Lodge,Fallon, Fergus, Gallatin, Hill, Jefferson, Lewis and Clark, Madison, Missoula,Phillips, Pondera, Roosevelt, Rosebud, Sanders, Silver Bow, Stillwater, SweetGrass, Teton, Valley, Wheatland, and Yellowstone.

The follow-up project, which began in October 2001, concentrates onfilming genealogically significant records in each county’s Clerk of DistrictCourt and the Clerk and Recorder offices (ca1860’s to 1950). GSU volunteersconduct the digital imaging, using their own camera and supplies. Thevolunteers create DVD’s of the following types of records:

• Birth Certificates• Death Certificates• Divorces• Probate Records• Land Records• School Census Records• Tax Records• Cemetery / Death Records• Voter Registrations• Any other categories that you might have to add to the list.

For example, Flathead County added the jail registers andsheriff’s fee books.

continued on page 2

1

TheMONTANA Archivist SUMMER/FALL 2007, VOL. 8 NO. 2

�

Upcoming Events

October 18-20 Helena, MT, Montana History ConferenceOctober 23-25 Oklahoma City, OK, National Tribal Archives,

Libraries and Museums Conference

MONTANA NEWS

2

To date, the project has completed digitizingin Lewis and Clark, Broadwater, Jefferson,Gallatin, Ravalli, Silver Bow, Deer Lodge, andPowell counties.

Jan Hardesty, Flathead County RecordsManager, recently explained the cost savingsrealized by using this service, “This service doesnot cost Flathead County anything. Thevolunteers have been here since the middle ofMarch and they have already saved our county$47,543 for having the DVD’s produced and

MONTANA NEWS cont.

duplicated. By the time our project is done theywill have saved at least $132,013.20 if notmore.”

The Montana Historical Society and theGenealogical Society of Utah are excited aboutthis project. We believe that it is a worthwhileendeavor that will provide both preservationand access to a wide variety of Montana’shistorically significant records. For moreinformation contact Karen Bjork at theMontana Historical Society (kbjork@mt.gov).

GRANT/SCHOLARSHIP OPPORTUNITIES

SHRAB Scholarships

The Montana State Historical Records Advisory Board (SHRAB) ispleased to announce the continued availability of scholarships ofup to $1,000 to paid and volunteer staff of Montana’s culturalheritage institutions to attend training, educational workshops, orcourses on topics related to the management and/or preservationof historical records. Funding may also be used to bringrecognized experts into an institution for consultation related tothe management, accessibility, or preservation of the historicalrecords in its care. The scholarships are made possible through agrant from the National Historical Publications and RecordsCommission (NHPRC).

An application for these funds is available at the SHRAB website:http://www.montanahistoricalsociety.org/research/library/rc_brdscoms.aspor by contacting Jodie Foley, Montana State Archivist, at jofoley@mt.gov or(406) 444-6779.

3

The list of grant opportunities with anOctober 1 deadline includes:

• Professional Development Grants(NEW): The Commission seeksproposals designed to improve thetraining and education of professionalsin the archival and historicalpublishing communities. http://www.archives.gov/nhprc/announcement/development.html

• Research in Historical Records IssuesGrants (NEW): The Commission seeksproposals from researchers toinvestigate how the public, includinggenealogists, historians, and otherscholars, gains access to and useshistorical records through on-sitearchival research, print editions, andonline collections. http://www.archives.gov/nhprc/announcement/research.html

• Strategies and Tools for Archives andHistorical Publishing Projects Grants(NEW): This grant category supportsprojects that develop new strategiesand tools that can improve thepreservation, public discovery, and/oruse of historical records. http://www.archives.gov/nhprc/announcement/strategies.html

• Archives Basic Projects Grants (NEW):The Commission seeks proposals forprojects that support backlogprocessing and collections cataloging,phased preservation, and/or collectionsdevelopment. http://www.archives.gov/nhprc/announcement/basic.html

• Archives Detailed Processing ProjectsGrants (NEW): This grant categorysupports detailed processing andpreservation of collections of nationalsignificance. These collections shouldalso have high research demand orsubstantial preservation challenges.http://www.archives.gov/nhprc/announcement/detailed.html

If you have questions on any of these grants,please contact NHPRC staff at http://www.archives.gov/nhprc/contact.html.

NHPRC Grant Opportunities

The National Historical Publications and Records Commission (NHPRC) recently posted ontheir website several new and revised grant opportunities of potential interest to listservmembers. The application deadline for all of these grants is October 1, 2007.

NEDCC Scholarship Opportunity

NEDCC’s Persistence of Memoryconference will be held in Seattle onNovember 28-29.

This conference about digitalpreservation is funded by an IMLS grant.NEDCC is offering a few scholarshipsfor diverse professionals, applicants fromunder-funded organizations, andapplicants that serve under-representedcommunities. There are 12 scholarshipscurrently available to cover theregistration fee. See www.nedcc.org formore info.

4

Montana SHRAB Workshop

In conjunction with the Montana History Conference, October 18-20, inHelena, a pre-conference workshop will be sponsored by the MontanaSHRAB. The half day workshop entitled Archival Basics for theAccidental Archivist will be held October 18, 8:30-12:00. This workshopis aimed at beginning archivists, volunteers, or librarians who findthemselves in the position of “archivist” without any formal training inthe profession. Proper archival procedures provide safe and affectivecollection management, thus extending the life of the materials. Theworkshop will introduce the fundamentals of archival appraisal,acquisition, and access, as well as common preservation problems and theuse of proper storage materials. Attendees are encouraged to bringquestions from their own institutions and/or experiences. For moreinformation see the Montana Historical Society webpage athttp://www.montanahistoricalsociety.org/education/default.asp

National Conference of Tribal Archives,Libraries, and Museums

Guardians of Language, Memory and Lifeways: Tribal Archives,Libraries, and Museums, is a national conference seeking to build anetwork of support for tribal cultural institutions and programs. Thisunique event brings together people who share the common goal of tribalcultural preservation. The 2007 conference builds on two previousconferences that were held in Arizona during 2003 and 2005. Thisproject is funded by a National Leadership Grant from the Institute ofMuseum and Library Services, a federal agency serving the public bystrengthening museums and libraries. Additional support is provided bythe Arizona State Library and the Arizona State Museum. For moreinformation contact Susan Feller, Conference Director, 405-522-3259.

To register, go online to www.tribalconference.org. A preliminaryconference program is available at http://www.tribalconference.org/pdf/PreliminaryProgram.pdf.

WORKSHOPS/TRAINING OPPORTUNITIES

5

Society of American Archivists Offers Online Courses

Two online and on-demand course are now available from SAA:

Electronic Records: Preservation Options of PDF. This seminar addresses:

� The use of PDF/A as a preservation format

� The limitations of PDF

� The ISO PDF/A standard

� Processes for converting electronic documents to PDF

� Quality control procedures and general preservation managementfor PDFs

Thinking Digital…A practical session to help you get started! This sessionenables you to adapt your current knowledge and skills to the demands ofa digital environment. You’ll explore the choices that have to be made in thedevelopment of digital projects and workflows!

Discussion includes:

� Quality choices

� Cataloging/metadata choices

� Management choices

� Storage choices

� Delivery choices

� Digital records

For registration information see SAA website: http://www.archivists.org.

OUR HIGHLIGHTED COLLECTION:

FROM THE STACKS…

Our contributor for this piece is PeggyGow, Archivist Grant Kohrs National Park.Once the headquarters of a 10 million acrecattle empire, Grant-Kohrs Ranch NationalHistoric Site is a working cattle ranch thatpreserves these symbols and commemoratesthe role of cattlemen in American history.

The personal papers from the lateConrad K. Warren I pertain to hisranching operation of some sixty

years. He was the grandson of Conrad Kohrs,one of the original owners and for whom theranch is named. Conrad K. Warren took overthe operation of the ranch in 1932 and raisedBelgian horses and purebred Hereford cattle.His personal papers reflect ranching and miningactivities. The papers range from 1862 to 1993with the bulk of the papers ranging from 1932when he took over management of the ranchand until the dispersion of his purebredHereford herd in the fall of 1958.

Conrad Kohrs Warren was born in Helena,Montana on August 16, 1907 to Otey YancyWarren and Katharine Kohrs Warren. Hisfather died a few months after his birth. As ayoung boy, he was influenced by hisgrandparents, Conrad and Augusta Kohrs andhis Uncle Johnnie Bielenberg. He was rearedand educated in Helen, Montana, graduating

Guide toConrad K. Warren

Personal Papers

Conrad K. WarrenNational Park Service Website

6

from Helena High School in 1926. After highschool he worked on a Wyoming ranch for ashort period of time before going to theUniversity of Virginia in Charlottsville for acouple of years. But he yearned to return toMontana and his grandparent’s ranch. In 1930he began working for the Conrad KohrsCompany Ranch and then in 1932 he took overas manager of the ranch. In 1940 he purchasedthe ranch from the Conrad Kohrs Company,which was a trust set up by his grandfather andrun by the Union Bank in Helena.

Conrad Warren married Nellie BradfordFlinn in 1934. They raised two children,Patricia Nell and Conrad Kohrs Warren II.

Conrad Warren was active in severalorganizations including the Montana HerefordAssociation, American Hereford Association,the Montana Stockgrowers Association,American Association of Belgian Draft Horses,Montana Livestock Commission and SanitaryBoard, Republican Presidential Task Force, and

several local county boards. He served as thepresident of the Montana StockgrowersAssociation from 1950 to 1952. He wasinducted into the National Cowboy Hall ofFame in 1989.

In 1972 after several years of negotiatingwith the National Park Service, Grant-KohrsRanch National Historic Site was created. Theoriginal purchase was about 200 acres and alater purchase in 1988 brought the total acreageto over 1500 acres.

The bulk of the papers consist of financialrecords, ranching records, pedigrees, legalrecords, published and unpublishedmanuscripts, correspondence, photographs, andrecords relating to the establishment of Grant-Kohrs Ranch National Historic Site. There aretwenty-two series of records. For anappointment to use the papers, contact thecurator at Grant-Kohrs Ranch NHS at (406)846-2070 X243. Our hours of operation arefrom 8:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. Monday throughFriday.

Grant-Kohrs Ranch National Park Service Website

7

The following is adapted by Donna McCrea from Tom Hyry’s article “More for Less in Archives”published in the Spring 2007 issue of Annotation, the newsletter of the NHPRC.

Considerations forProcessing Collectionsand Managing Backlog

ARCHIVAL MUSING…

Mark A. Greene and Dennis Meissner’srecent article, “More Product, Less Process:Revamping Traditional Archival Processing,”challenges long-held assumptions andtraditions about collection processing andoffers suggestions for dealing with backlogs ofunprocessed records. They state that we mustcome to different conceptions of the words“processing” and “backlog” by allowing ourstandards to evolve.

Our goal should be to get a reasonableamount of work done on all of ourcollections, so that we no longer think ofthem as in a backlog. We need to move inthis direction because the pressures causingour backlogs are not going away; if anythingthey will increase. As professionals, we arenow being asked to do more than we everhave, staff resources are getting stretchedever thinner, and budgets rarely increaseaccordingly. Moreover, technologicaldevelopments are causing our collections tobecome larger and more complicated, ofteninvolving many more record formats thanbefore. In order to meet these challenges, wemust work smarter and also makecompromises in our traditional sense of craftby adapting our processing methodsaccordingly.

New methods of processing should rest onthe following principles:

• Every collection in a repository deserves somelevel of description. Following thatassumption, it is more important to have atleast a minimal level of processing anddescription done on all of a repository’sholdings than it is to have highly detailedwork done on only a few collections,leaving the others unprocessed and thushidden from researchers.

• All collections are not created equal. In aperfect world, we would process all of ourholdings to an ideal level. In the realworld, we must make hard decisions aboutwhich collections to process more fully andwhich can get by with less. These decisionsshould be closely linked with collectiondevelopment policies, repository missionstatements, and other appraisal tools andmethodologies. While our most importantand difficult collections still need detailedprocessing, the reality is that for most of usthese collections likely make up only asmall part of our total holdings.

• Different parts of a collection need not beprocessed to the same level. Even collectionswith extremely high research value often

8

include series within them that do notneed detailed arrangement, descriptionand preservation.

• We process materials so that researchers canuse them. Our decisions about processingshould be driven by how much work mustbe done before a collection can be used, aswell as our impression of how much usethe collection will actually receive. Timeand resources are too valuable to bemisspent.

• Collections are not truly available toresearchers unless they are described online. Atthe least, a collection-level record shouldbe created for each collection and placed inat least one venue that allows onlinediscovery. In Montana such resourcesmay include the Montana Shared Catalog,the Northwest Digital Archives finding aidsdatabase, the National Union Catalog ofManuscript Collections, and/or the websiteof your own institution.

• We should make our preliminary inventoriesavailable to researchers. Ideally we wouldmake these inventories available throughthe same mechanisms (online catalogs,finding aids and/or websites) that we useto make our processed collectionsavailable. In doing this, we may need tosacrifice some of our pride in craft, but weincrease discoverability and ultimate use ofour materials. From a user perspective,imperfect information is better than noneat all.

• We should allow researchers access to ourunprocessed and under-processed collections,unless there is a very compelling reason not to.Such reasons include collections withmaterials that are restricted, either bydonor agreements or by law, collectionsthat have very severe preservationproblems, or collections with majorpotential for theft. While there areexceptions, our default should be to makecollections available whether they havebeen fully processed or not.

9

RecommendedReadings:

Greene, Mark A. andDennis Meissner,“More Product, LessProcess: RevampingTraditional ArchivalProcessing,” American Archivist 68 (Fall/Winter 2005)

Hyry, Tom. “More for Less in Archives.”Annotation 33.2 (Spring 2007)

Johnson, Greg. “Quality or Quantity: CanArchivists Apply Minimal Processing toElectronic Records?” MA Thesis fromUniversity of North Carolina-Chapel Hill.Accessed online http://hdl.handle.net/1901/413 on July 12, 2007.

Jones, Barbara. “Hidden Collections,Scholarly Barriers: Creating Access toUnprocessed Special Collections Materialsin America’s Research Libraries.” RBM: AJournal of Rare Books, Manuscripts, andCultural Heritage 5:2 (Fall 2004)

McCrea, Donna, “Getting More for Less:Testing a New Processing Model at TheUniversity of Montana” American Archivist69 (Autumn/Winter 2006)

Weideman, Christine. “Accessioning asProcessing.” American Archivist 69(Autumn/Winter 2006)

README

WEBSITES, BLOGS ANDWIKIS...OH MY!

10

The Montana Historical Society recently launched a new resource, theMontana History wiki (see http://montanahistorywiki.pbwiki.com/) The wiki is designed to assistresearchers in finding the best resource for their projects or topics. Thesite includes materials for the casual user or the seasoned researcher—quick Montana Facts toextensive subject guides. The site is still under construction so users are encouraged to sendcomments or suggestions for content to mhslibrary@mt.gov

PUBLICATIONS AVAILABLE

Copies of the Montana SHRABs manual, Preferred Practices for Historical Repositories arestill available, free of charge. This publication is a checklist and self-assessment manualand provides information on a wide variety of management and preservation topicsrelated to archives and museums. Copies are available from Jodie Foley at (406) 444-7482 or jofoley@mt.gov. Additional copies of the SHRABs other publications, includingSo You Have a Box of PapersÉ and the quarterly newsletter are also available.

NEW RESOURCES

•Photographs: Archival Care and Management. Mary Lynn Ritzenthaler,Diane L Vogt-O’Connor, with Helena Zinkham, Brett Carnell, Kit A Peterson

An essential tool for custodians of photographs in archives, libraries, historical societies, andsimilar repositories who manage photographic materials. This authoritative guide providespragmatic techniques for each aspect of managing collections of images—from appraisal andaccessioning through arrangement, description, and research use.

• Understanding Archives And Manuscripts (Archival Fundamentals Series II)James M O’Toole, Richard J Cox

“This thoroughly updated version of the 1990 edition is not only the best short introduction toarchives for students, new archivists, and anyone interested in archiving, but also provides theexperienced archivist an invaluable summary analysis of the field’s burgeoning literature andincreasingly complex issues.”

Jodi Allison-Bunnell, Missoula

Faith Bad Bear, Crow Agency

Jodie Foley, Helena

Peggy Gow, Deer Lodge

Donna McCrea, Missoula

Sami Pierson, Libby

Kim Allen Scott, Bozeman

Published Quarterly

Jodie Foley, Editor

Board Members

11

Cowboys Grant-Kohrs RanchNational Park Service Website

Grants-Kohrs RanchNational Park Service Website

Montana Historical SocietyPO Box 201201Helena, MT 59620-1201