Archive at the British Museum

THURSDAY, JULY 10th the LIS class visited the archive at the British Museum. The #1 thing I liked about this visit was how passionate the archivist is about her job, how concerned she is with doing what's best for the archival collections and her desire to make the collections as accessible as possible. 

The British Museum began with the passage of the British Museum Act in 1753. Initially located in the Montague House (which was hated by everyone at the museum), this was torn down and a new building was completed on the same site in the 1840s. Another site considered for the museum was the Buckingham House (now known as Buckingham Palace!). The museum has been in the "new" building ever since and once upon a time shared space with the organizations now known as the British Library and the Natural History Museum before they became separate entities. The reading room that once housed the library still exists in the museum and, until recently, it served as an exhibition space for the museum. Its future is now under debate as museum staff consider the best use for the space. 

(the round reading room, former home of the British Library)

Part of the museum's interesting history centers around WWII. During this time, the Germans were doing their best to loot valuable artifacts from museums across Europe. To protect against this, the museum had a number of security measures in place. While they couldn't remove everything from the museum lest they arouse suspicion, they found "reorganization" to be a useful tactic. They put less valuable or duplicate items on display in the public spaces while hiding the rare and more valuable items in the basement, a nearby post office and in Aldwych tube station. By doing so, the museum was able to minimize the losses to their collections during the war. 

Related to this, the museum still fields claims from other museums and individuals regarding items in the collection that may have ended up there through looting during WWII, indirectly. If these claims are discovered to be valid, the items are immediately returned to the proper owner as the museum cannot maintain anything acquired illegally. 

The archives of the British Museum are now located in the same basements once used to hide artifacts. These archives house the administrative records of the museum dating back to its founding, including committee minutes, officer reports, photos and architectural plans. The archivist is currently working on creating a catalog of all items so that one day soon these items will be searchable online. It's only been within the last five years that interest in the archive's collections has really grown. 

(a somewhat awkward photo of the shelving in the basement archive space at the museum)