You didn't say if any donor relations issues were involved. Is your
repository this author's official archives? Are you wooing the author for a
donation?
 
If not, then I don't see an archival issue here. From your description, the
photocopies seem to comprise only a clippings or reprints file; that is, the
kind of file many librarians stopped creating or maintaining after the
advent of ILL. Putting the articles in a box doesn't make them archival, or
magically transform them into a collection. It just makes them a bunch of
articles in a box.
 
If the articles are available through ILL, then you're needlessly
duplicating information. Throw the articles away.
 
If it's important to document this author's work (and if your repository is
not the author's official archives, then why would it be important for you
to do that?), then a bibliography or citation file would suffice (per Kim
and Kelly's advice), and throw the articles away.
 
If its important to document this author's work but compiling a bibliography
would take too much effort (as Dean suggested), then file the title pages
and throw the rest of the articles away.
 
The fact that someone gives you something doesn't mean you have to keep it.
The fact that something's subject may relate to your archives' collection
policy doesn't make it archival. Throwing things away can be hard, but
knowing what to toss and having the strength to toss it is fully as
important a part of archival work as knowing what to keep.
 
Lee
 



---- 
Leon C. Miller, Manuscripts Librarian 
Special Collections, Jones Hall 
Tulane University Libraries 
New Orleans, Louisiana 70118 
ph: 504-865-5685, fx: 504-865-5761, [log in to unmask] 
http://specialcollections.tulane.edu <http://specialcollections.tulane.edu/>


-----Original Message-----
From: Archives & Archivists [mailto:[log in to unmask]]On Behalf
Of Taylor, Tomaro
Sent: Wednesday, March 29, 2006 9:52 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Another question about photocopies...


We have an interesting situation in our special collections department.  A
"collection" of photocopies of a particular author's writings (primarily
journal articles) has been created and maintained for a number of years 


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