Like Paul I have many memories of Ken at Lancashire Record Office (I wasn't the staFf member who slept in the afternoons, though Lord knows I feel like it these days).

In fact, Ken was my first boss, and I shall always remember his kindness and support to a young rookie. Not the most hands on of archivists, he had to be banned from the searchroom as he had no knowledge of the collections nor where to look for them, as he cheerfully acknowledged. However, he was a superb negotiator and advocate for the service at chief officer level, and in the bleak early Thatcher period fought off significant cuts and indeed grew the resource most years. 

I remember one time it was reported to the office that some early 19 cent plans had begun to turn up at a dump in Lancaster. The source was a long established firm of surveyors which, as it turned out, had been involved in producing tithe maps for that area. The plans were associated with the survey, and the firm was having a clearout. Ken immediately took me up to Lancaster, marched us into the firm's offices and demanded that they stop what they were doing immediately. They did, with alacrity, and I spent the next few days retrieving hundreds of wonderful 19thC plans of all sizes back to the office. Of course, he had absolutely no legal authority to make the demand, but I'll never forget the horrified look of the lady on the desk, who appeared to be under the impression that we were court officials or people from the HSE conducting a dawn raid. I guess this shows perhaps his greatest skill, being a passionate advocate and communicator when the occasion demanded.

He also had a wicked sense of humour and was a wonderful gossip, but that's another story. It's difficult to believe that he's gone.



David Hay

Head of Heritage

BT Group plc

020 7440 4227

07850 444920

www.bt.com/archives

www.connected-earth.com



-----Original Message-----

From: Archivists, conservators and records managers. <[log in to unmask]>

To: [log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]>

Sent: Thu Jun 12 15:58:19 2008

Subject: Ken Hall



I was sorry to hear the news.



 



I have a great memory of Ken when he was County Archivist at Lancashire.



 



For those of you who do not know it, the Record Office at Preston had tall and heavy internal doors. For those who did not know him, Ken was not tall or heavy.



 



I shared an office with a member of staff who was fond of a good snooze in the afternoons. Ken used to make frantic efforts to get the doors open quickly enough to catch the culprit asleep. It got to the point where he would run full steam ahead at the door with his shoulder to get it open quickly. To no avail. The guilty party would always be upright at his desk (though often looking startled).



 



Eventually Ken solved the problem by getting a larger member of staff to throw the door open and sprinting in behind with a sort of military precision. 



 



RESULT!



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