Appraisal of Photograhic Collections

The chapter on the appraisal of photographic collections makes me
think about how small the local history room is where I work and how
wonderful it would be to accrue some more photographs documenting the
history of the city. Just in the past two weeks I have had three reference
questions that included requests for images we do not have. One was for
an image of a local restaurant/club that burnt down in the 80s. Another
was for an image of an ice storage shed from when people used to
harvest ice off ponds in the area. The third was for photos of
street views from the 1950s of certain parts of the city. I am sure
plenty photos of this kind exist somewhere. It has become frustrating
that we are so ill equipped to give our patrons qualified referrals. It
is understandable that so many people expect the City Library to be
the place to house such materials of historical value.

Reading Ritzenthaler and O'connors' chapter on photographic appraisal
made clear some options for what I could do to improve our
photographic collection. To start, we have a collection policy that
could probably use some updating. Contacting other institutions such
as surrounding colleges, local newspapers, heritage and historical
centers to get a better idea of the collections they possess would be
helpful for referring patrons to repositories that have what they are
looking for. It will also help us to know what collections are
available so we don't take on the duties of preserving a set of
photographs that are merely a duplicate of a near by collection.
Making connections with these institutions may also put us in contact
with potential donors, which would be a step in the right direction to
acquiring more photographs. Making people aware that we are looking
for this material by communicating the criteria that meets the mission
of the library, while also being realistic about the resources we
possess to process and preserve a larger photographic collection is
likely the most important part of getting the collections we want and
are qualified to take care of.

Assessing value, use and risks require skills and experience. As discussed in the reading, photographic collections are often the most heavily used materials in an archive. It is no doubt that this would be the case at the library where I work, as indicated by the constant request for this material by current patrons. I would
not be so concerned with acquiring collections of monetary value as a
public library obviously does no have the means to pay for an expensive collection. Collections that require considerable research or significant processing time is also out of the questions due to staff and monetary constraints on the public institution. What is most important would be acquiring photographs with research value for both current and potential users of the collections. The chapter includes some useful suggestions on how to go about assessing user needs. Keeping track of the requests made will help make well informed acquisition decisions in the future.