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| Image appeared with original article |
Great
article which talks about the challenges of preservation and why at the
National Archives (UK) some items are deemed “unfit for production.”
On your visit to The
National Archives [UK], you get your reader’s ticket to order up the documents
you are interested in seeing but, after entering the document references
into Discovery, a document
comes up as ‘unfit for production’.
So, you wonder, what does that mean?
Items designated ‘unfit for production’ are in such
vulnerable physical condition that producing them would present a risk to the
document – unfit documents could
be extremely fragile, they could be blocked (all the pages stuck together in a
volume or a roll), or perhaps they could be damaged by mould. These are the
documents that, when you open the box, you immediately jump to put the top back
on and quickly hide it at the bottom of the pile, hoping that it will
miraculously disappear!
Read the full article.
Editor’s Note: Though the language
is different, most researchers have run across this at some point in their
research. For example, to preserve
original land grant records in NC, they are now only available to researchers
on microfilm and for marriage bonds you are requested to put in for a copy of
that document and if you must look at it, you will only be handed the one you
request and not be allowed to “trawl” through the folder or box from which it
came.
Have you run across documents either
“unfit” for production or which have been removed from circulation in an effort
to preserve them for future generations? Please share!
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