Letter in IT about NAI understaffing

pinkypinky

http://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/letters/understaffing-in-the-national-archives-1.2411896

I'm amazed to hear someone managed to get into the National Archives on a weekend, and suspect this may have the reason for the understaffing! Tempted to write a riposte.

Hermy

I have yet to visit the National Archives.
Does it present much of a challenge to the uninitiated?
Or is there usually a helping hand to guide the novice?

pinkypinky

Depends what you want to do?

I find for most ordinary genealogy purposes, I don't need to go into the NAI these days. The census, will calendars, tithe applotment books and prison records are all online. The most recent thing I got from there was the actual administration paperwork of my great-great grandfather's estate.

Hermy

pinkypinky wrote: »

Depends what you want to do?

A good question but I'm not sure to be honest.

I'd like to see paperwork for wills and administrations.
I'm also hopeful that there might be estate papers for Foxhall, Co. Longford.
Or would that be the National Library?

pinkypinky

Wills and administration paperwork, if it survived 1922, will be in the NAI. The testamentary card index around the walls of the Reading Room will tell you if there's something more than is in the calendar.

Well, there are estate papers in both places, but more in the NLI. Check the catalogue online for both though because Foxhall might be in neither. Worth checking the Longford County Archive for that too.

pedroeibar1

Bossman of NAI has a response in today's IT, basically an advert for its services. Curious that it comes on a day when the Board of the National Library are publicly bemoaning the lack of funding and the increasing dangers to their collection from fire and damp!

Sir, – Further to Jordan Markey’s letter (November 2nd), the National Archives makes its collections available to the public for inspection for personal interest, education or discovery, to demonstrate accountability, and to safeguard the rights of citizens. Our collections are used by a wide variety of researchers, including academics from a range of disciplines, genealogists, legal researchers, local historians and policymakers.

The National Archives, like its sister national cultural institutions, endeavours to deliver a high-quality public service within its available resources. We are open to the public from 9.15am to 5pm, Monday to Friday.

Readers will be pleased to know that a dedicated duty archivist office in the reading room will be in place this month and provide readers with direct access to an archivist for queries and advice.

We place a limit of one item with a reader at any time to minimise potential damage or misplacing of archives. In some cases archives must be recalled from offsite storage which can cause delays in production. However, we offer an advance ordering service to reduce waiting times.

The National Archives also provides valuable services to government departments in assisting them to prepare and transfer records that are 30 years old for preservation and inspection. This annual practise supports the democratic principles of transparency and accountability and is a core function of the National Archives. We are currently in the planning phase for this year’s transfer and release, and the National Archives will be publishing a selection of digitised versions of records from 1985 in the new year on the nationalarchives.ie website.

The National Archives has for many years utilised digitisation as a means of both preserving and increasing accessibility to its holdings, and has prioritised collections where we can make a complete series available. These include the flagship 1901 and 1911 census website and other collections such as the first World War soldiers’ wills and the very popular Dublin Metropolitan Police “Movement of Extremists” files from 1915 to 1916 that are released on a weekly basis and will conclude in April 2016. We also actively collaborate on initiatives such as the RTÉ-hosted Century Ireland website and the Letters of 1916 project .

We are also aware that within our holdings are foundational series from the Civil War and the establishment of the Irish State, and are actively working on means to digitise and make these available in the coming years. – Yours, etc,

JOHN McDONOUGH,
Director,
National Archives,
Bishop Street, Dublin 8.

pinkypinky

I wrote to them too: my letter was funnier but they didn't publish it.

P. Breathnach

pinkypinky wrote: »

I wrote to them too: my letter was funnier but they didn't publish it.

I'm sure that the mod team would permit you to publish it here.