Hello All,
I am a geologist with NSW Government's department of Mineral Resources, in
Sydney Australia.
The department is to be moved to Maitland which is a long way further north
in the same state.
As you would be well aware, moves are a time of greatest danger to the
heritage of organisations.
Item are lost, or thrown out, and knowledge too can be lost to a significant
degree, especially when large staff turnover accompanies a long distance
relocation.
In similar relocations that I know, about only 5-25% of staff survive in
their positions across the move, and organisations are usually restocked
with newcomers.
Our heritage items could include maps, books, specimens, photographs, glass
slides, old laboratory and museum equipment, etc.
Formerly the department had a large Chemical Laboratory for doing analyses
of coal, ore, waters etc.; and a Geological & Mining Museum concerned with
keeping and displaying ores, rocks, minerals and fossils.
The analytical chemical work has all been privatised out of the realm of
government now, and the NSW Treasury saw fit to pull the pin on the
geological and mining museum, and to no longer fund it - whence it soon
closed down.
Broadly speaking this is part of a general devaluing of geology and other
sciences which can be seen to have been happening in Australian society over
a protracted periond. It is presumably a worldwide phenomenon. Not only
government deptarments are affected but also most of the universities. Some
of these have ceased to any longer want rock or fossil collections that they
had built up for a hundred years or more .. They offer them to government
but what are government servants to do with them when we often don't even
know with great certainty if we (officially) want all our own stuff any more(?).
Also, because most of the older staff might be lost in the coming relocation
it is obviously a vital time to think about means of capturing and
preserving the history of the Department - Should a history be written? By
whom - an amateur afficionado type who is keen and who knows the place well,
or by a professional who doesn't know it well but who has proven him/herself
with some good historical books publications already? I'd particularly like
your opinion on that question.
Or what about individual stories - are they worth preserving? Should staff
be just requested to write them, as part of their terms of employment, or
should they be offered extra money to do so?
I would be grateful if you could point out to me, esp. by URLs, other
organisation (or named individuals) faced with any similar sort of situation.
As we will be having pack up to move the department, and perhaps throwing
things out willy nilly, do you know of any guidelines that would assist them
in making decisions on what are heritage items; or what is worth keeping and
what to toss?
The risk is that items of historical significance either to the Department
or the State will be lost if inadequate precautions and planning are not
undertaken now, well in advance of the actual move.
Besides the physical items of historical or heritage significance, we also
wish to capture/preserve the historical knowledge that may be lost as key
staff leave. The actual relocation takes place in late 2004.
Please send information or suggestions to me directly and off list.
Thank you very much,
John Byrnes,
Geologist
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* John G. Byrnes , Geologist , [log in to unmask] *
* NSW Department of Mineral Resources, MEA Section *
* PO Box 536 ST LEONARDS NSW 2065, AUSTRALIA *
* Ph: +61 2 9901 8789 FAX: +61 2 9901 8783 *
* http://www.minerals.nsw.gov.au *
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