ACTive ALIA

proACTive

Number 241: February 2004

[Commemorating Warren Horton | ACT Heritage Library: uncover hidden treasure | PANDORA - Australia's Web Archive | PEARLS | Wanted!]

Commemorating Warren Horton

Warren Horton will be commemorated at an event at the National Library of Australia at 5 pm on Friday 26th March. ALIA ACT members are asked to send the editor of proACTive stories remembering Warren for the next issue.

Warren Horton, the former Director-General of the National Library of Australia died on 25 November 2003 after a long illness. Director-General from 29 July 1985 until 27 July 1999, Warren Horton began his library career at the State Library of New South Wales in 1957, working in the Information Service sections of the General Reference Library and the Mitchell Library. He was Deputy of the State Library of NSW from 1975 to 1981, and State Librarian of Victoria between 1981 and 1985. Warren Horton had been a member of the Australian library community for 42 years at the time of his retirement.

Warren Horton was President of the Library Association of Australia (now ALIA) in 1984, holding numerous offices and serving on key committees and reviews. He was a member, and for three years President, of the Australian Libraries and Information Council (ALIC) from its inception in 1981 until its amalgamation into the Australian Council of Libraries and Information Services (ACLIS) in 1988. He was a member of the Australian National Commission for UNESCO from 1993 to 1996, became Chair of the Public Lending Rights Committee in 1991, and was Treasurer of IFLA from 1993 until 1997, as well as being active in the Conference of Directors of National Libraries (CDNL).

The IFLA Gold Medal was conferred on Warren Horton in 1997 for his leadership and contribution to international librarianship. He won the Australian Library and Information Association's HCL Anderson Award in 1988. He was appointed a member of the Order of Australia in 1992, held an Honorary Doctor of Letters in La Trobe University, and was awarded the National Book Council Gold medal in 1996. Most recently, in 1999 he was awarded an honorary IFLA Fellowship for his work as a 'true internationalist', campaigning 'to bring into the global arena libraries and library associations most likely to benefit from the international network'.

ACT Heritage Library: uncover hidden treasure

(and volunteer to help!)

The Heritage Library was established in the 1970s and opened in 1995. It has been in its current home in the Woden Public Library for two years, where it collects, preserves and provides access to material about the ACT and the region. It is open 10:00am - 5:00pm Monday to Friday and on the first Saturday of each month 10:00am-2:00pm. The collection includes books, photographs, periodicals, government publications, brochures and ephemera, as well as many personal and organisational records.

There are many hidden gems. For example, did you know that the first newspaper produced in Canberra was the Federal Capital Pioneer in December 1925? The ACT Heritage Library holds some very early issues with fascinating insights into early Canberra. Or did you know that the Licence League held a referendum on whether to introduce prohibition to the Federal Capital in 1928? We hold an unused voting paper explaining the process.

Or would you like to see Walter Burley Griffin's personal copy of a book on the native flora of the Federal Capital Territory? And, according to a 1927 railway timetable, the journey time between Sydney and Canberra has scarcely improved, except now you don't stop in Goulburn for breakfast.

One of the strengths of the collection is its ephemera, particularly the wealth of material relating to local performing arts bodies, including the Canberra Theatre Trust, the Canberra Philharmonic Society and Canberra Repertory Society. The program of the gala performance opening of the Canberra Theatre is only one of a vast collection that helps document Canberra's theatrical heritage from the 1920s right up to last week.

The photograph collection comprises around 30 000 images, of which about 6000 have been digitised onto the online ImagesACT database http://www.basis.act.gov.au/DUSLibrary/ImagesACT.nsf. Photographs from the Department of the Capital Territory from the 1950s until the early 1980s document a period of enormous growth for Canberra.

The extensive collection of maps of the territory has been recently listed and described by a Library volunteer, providing another perspective.

The Library relies heavily on volunteers. This year Woden Library will be refurbished, bringing the ACT Heritage Library repository up to appropriate standards. The manuscript collection has to be rehoused before the move so it can reappear looking spruce and easier to use. Resources are short, so we are hoping to undertake this rehousing with volunteer help.

If any PEARLS members or other willing parties out there might enjoy being part of a team for a few weeks in late January or February please contact Judith Brooker judy.brooker@act.gov.au. This is your chance to contribute to the preservation of Canberra's local history.

Judith Brooker

PANDORA - Australia's Web Archive

'But why the name Pandora?' the editor asked. He then told me the myth of Pandora letting all the evils of the world out of her box, and concluded: 'So Pandora wasn't really a nice person at all!'

Fortunately PANDORA - Australia's Web Archive - has nothing to do with Greek mythology! It is an acronym for "Preserving and Accessing Networked DOcumentary Resources of Australia" and it preserves Australian online resources and exists in perpetuity to benefit current and future researchers. It is quite a different story.

This year PANDORA is eight years old. It was conceived in 1996 by the National Library of Australia when the Library saw that it had a responsibility and role in preserving long-term access to the increasingly significant amount of Australian information being made available on the Internet. After much hard labour in the new online world, the actual birth of the PANDORA Archive occurred in mid-1997 when our first archived titles (websites and online publications) were made publicly available via the Internet.

The rate of growth was slow in the beginning but by the end of December 2003 PANDORA had successfully archived 5000 titles and 10 000 archived instances. (An archived instance is a single snapshot or copy of a title that has been added to the archive. Many of the titles are copied into the archive more than once to capture changing content. Each new copy of a title is referred to as an 'archived instance'.)

Not only has PANDORA grown, PANDORA partners have also grown in number. The first partner agency to join was the State Library of Victoria in 1998. By 2003 all mainland state libraries, the Northern Territory Library and Information Service, ScreenSound Australia and the Australian War Memorial had joined the PANDORA partnership. The Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies will also come on board this year. This will make AIATSIS the 10th PANDORA partner.

Apart from thanking our partners for their collaboration, thanks also goes to the PANDORA Digital Archiving System (PANDAS), developed by the National Library. It has greatly improved efficiency in our archiving work over the past two years, and is now attracting quite a bit of interest from those other collecting institutions around the world that are setting up web archives.

But new technology continues to pose challenges for us, especially websites that are dynamically generated, eg. databases. The National Library of Australia realised that it cannot face the challenges on its own. In July 2003, it became the member of the International Internet Preservation Consortium (IIPC) to collaborate with other international institutions responsible for web archiving to share development costs, ideas and experiences. In developing a solution to archive databases, the Library is currently conducting research work as a co-operative effort with the Bibliotheque Nationale de France and is contributing results to the Deep Web Archiving Working Group of the IIPC.

PANDORA - Australia's Web Archive - is growing and faces new challenges in its growth. As an Australian, I am excited and proud of it. It is an archive of world renown that is documenting Australian culture and heritage as it is represented on the Internet for researchers now and in the future.

For more information about the PANDORA Archive, please visit our PANDORA homepage
http://pandora.nla.gov.au/index.html

Amy Bartlett

PEARLS

PEARLS (Previously Employed Australian Retired Librarians) enjoyed an afternoon tea last 1 October at ALIA House to meet librarians from the Retired Members Guild in the UK. Thanks to Yvette and staff of ALIA for a very pleasant function.

Our final gathering for 2003 was held at BOOKPLATE on 13 October with most members of PEARLS present. Two more retired librarians joined us and although new to PEARLS were not strangers to the others in the group, Joan and Margaret first met at school. Consequently there was much reminiscing about library experiences shared by many of them. Margaret Saville who recently moved to Sydney sent her regards to friends in Canberra.

Other topics of conversation ranged from learning new languages to the problems of long flights and the apparent disregard that airlines have for their passengers when flights are delayed. There were comments about internet, e-mail and computer problems being experienced by a few of our members. Computers are great - when they work!

It was decided to continue meeting at BOOKPLATE in 2004 to indulge in their delicious coffee and cake.

Dates in 2004 are 9 February, 19 April, 21 June, 9 August and 11 October. Two new convenors will be looking after PEARLS meetings in 2004, they are Beth, ph 02 6247 7843 or at bstone@webone.com.au and Maxine, ph 02 6257 4342.

Many retired librarians have enjoyed catching up with colleagues during 2003 and hopefully we will continue meeting each other for coffee, cake and conversation during 2004.

Eileen Mills

Wanted!

A convenor, a secretary and a treasurer for ACTive ALIA.

This is your chance to do something really vital for your professional association in the Canberra region.

Please send expressions of interest to Sherrey Quinn sherrey.quinn@alianet.alia.org.au.