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Re: Archive Project progress

Minutes from the latest meeting have been published today and can be found here

http://a7ca.org/newsarchive/archive-project-meeting-9th-october-2016/

thanks

Hugh

Location: Cambridge

Re: Archive Project progress

Our project has seemingly been well received in the Archives world generally (from feedback I have had) and a rather nice acknowledgement of that was the invitation to write a small piece for Hampshire County Council's on-line magazine where we are 'Archive of the month' this month.

https://www.hants.gov.uk/news/yourhampshire/archive

Location: Cambridge

Re: Archive Project progress

A year ago today, we held our first meeting of the Archive Project Team and I thought it was worth looking back over the year and thinking about what we have achieved in that time frame..

If we cast our mind back to a year ago, the collection was suffering from the after effects of the infamous ‘burst pipe’ event and, although we were incredibly lucky to have got off as lightly as we did, the collection had been turned upside down and spread round the TSSC buildings. Those items that were water damaged were away for restoration but the whole collection needed re-sorting and putting back into a sensible order.

With the start of the Project coinciding with that, it enabled a larger group of people efforts to be brought to bear on the task and now the collection has been successfully re-ordered and is in a better state of conservation in general. We have also taken the opportunity to go through the collection in greater detail, weeding out inappropriate items that over the years had inevitably found a home there and also identifying Archive materials that weren’t directly related to the Austin 7 and should be found new homes.

If we think of what we have achieved directly related to the Digital project, we have made remarkable progress. The items that caused greatest angst were the Index Cards and those, along with the Handbooks and Parts Lists have been digitised. We have a complete set of photos of all our Trophies and related materials and we have built a web site and published all those images. We have already started on a project to make the Index Cards easier to research on line and all of that work has been done to a high quality and professional standard. The Team should be rightly proud of what they have created.

Our efforts are also reflected in the fact that a number of other organizations have talked with us about our approach as they embark on Projects of their own. I like to think we have really become a leading light in this area…

We should not forget that very soon, we will also be adding Show Brochures and Paint cards to our digital collection. Overall, that really does reflect an extraordinary level of progress in 12 months, starting from nothing.

I think we should give the team a huge pat on the back for their efforts over the past year and consider what they have achieved. They all have my sincere thanks for the effort they have put into the Project..

Hugh

Location: Cambridge

Re: Archive Project progress

It's amazing what has been achieved by so few for so many. We are deeply in debt to them all. THANK YOU.

Location: Piddle Valley

Re: Archive Project progress

Fantastic progress, and a great asset for the whole Austin 7 movement! Well done team!

Re: Archive Project progress

The minutes of our latest meeting can be found in the usual place

http://a7ca.org/austin-seven/archives/archive-project/

but keep an eye out for our next big news item in the next few days..

Hugh

Location: Cambridge

Re: Archive Project progress

Good progress.

However the link for "Technical Drawings" says that the work is yet to be done.
In the meantime before the recent investment there was a DropBox folder with a range of useful drawings. Is it still accessible?

Charles

Re: Archive Project progress

Charles - yes. If at A7CA.org you follow the links

Austin Seven>Archives>Historic Images>Technical Drawings

you will find them all there. We are already discussing the potential for moving these images in a more 'orderly' fashion to the Archive pages. However, the images may not be of the standard that we are aiming for in the Project, so when we have transferred them, we will go through them one by one and replace them with better quality images where needed. That is something on the plan for early next year once we have completed the current round of work..

hth..

Hugh

Location: Cambridge

Re: Archive Project progress

They are still in the same place you saw them last Charles, see: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/jb4e0eg95m3r8c3/ClW_7ot5rh#/

There are plans to consider redoing these however and if that happens those will be uploaded to the new Archive site.

Re: Archive Project progress

Thanks chaps.
Will bookmark that until higher resolution stuff is created

C

Re: Archive Project progress

We have some great news this morning. Just in time for Christmas, we have just released 'live' our next tranche of digitised materials from the Archive. This covers detailed information on Austin paint colours, our collection of show brochures, an interview with Bob Wyatt (in itself, a wonderful thing) and the beginning of our dedicated Stanley Edge collection.

These can all be found at the usual place of http://archive.a7ca.org/

We hope that you find this latest batch of work interesting, entertaining and informative.

We plan to add more material from the Archive in 2017 but are always looking for items the Archive doesn't hold - either by loan or donation. SO if you have anything that you think might be useful, please do get in touch..

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year from all the Project Team..

Location: Cambridge

Re: Archive Project progress

The minutes of our latest meeting can be found in the usual place

http://a7ca.org/newsarchive/archive-project-meeting-26th-january-2017/

but keep an eye out for another addition to our 'oral histories' in the next day or so..

Hugh

Location: Cambridge