Local history enthusiasts are being encouraged to book a visit to ‘Explore Your Archive’ as Aberdeen City & Aberdeenshire Archives has re-opened for in-person research visits at the Town House on Broad Street.
The Archives have been closed to the public for almost a year to allow the team to carry out a major collection move from Old Aberdeen House to the Town House.
Preparations began in November 2023 with a huge stocktake of the collection, when staff and a group of 20 volunteers recorded details of every item in every storeroom.
One of the most formidable tasks was labelling over 7,000 individual boxes.
The preparations also included checking that delicate items would be suitable for transportation, and wrapping and protecting a wide variety of materials, including glass slides from Second World War Red Cross hospitals, maps, oversized volumes and ledgers, and thousands of architectural plans.
Over 9,000 individual items, including archive boxes, bankers boxes, crates, wrapped volumes and plans, were transferred across over 20 days of heavy lifting, multiple trolley loads and several flights of stairs – all fuelled by 136 packs of biscuits! Volunteers logged 1,549 hours helping with the move.
The largest tasks for volunteers was an appraisal of 120 files of Aberdeen School Board correspondence sent from teachers and Aberdeen residents in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Volunteers reviewed and listed the bundles of letters, reducing the collection from seven storage shelves to two, using professional criteria to weed out items of little historic value. Detailed information on these letters is now recorded in the Archives catalogue and the material is available to researchers.
Phil Astley and Councillor Martin Greig in the Charter Room at Aberdeen City Aberdeenshire Archives
A new storeroom at the Town House is now home to several core collections, such as the school admission registers and logbooks, building warrants, council minutes for Aberdeenshire and the Port of Aberdeen records (Aberdeen Harbour Board). A selection of photographic images from this collection showing the technological changes that have taken place on the quayside over the past 100 years will be going on display at the Art Gallery from Saturday 7 June.
https://www.aberdeencity.gov.uk/AAGM/whats-aberdeen-art-galleries-and-museums/archive-aberdeen-harbour
Councillor Martin Greig, Aberdeen City Council culture spokesman, said: “The Archives are a valuable resource for all kinds of research. It’s a tremendous source of pride for us in Aberdeen that we care for the oldest and most complete collection of burgh records in Scotland, dating back to 1398.
"They are recognised by UNESCO as being of outstanding historical importance to the United Kingdom. It’s very exciting that the Archives team has set up a new storeroom at the Town House where the public can access these remarkable collections, which really are a the gateway to the written history of the north-east of Scotland.”
A new Access Guide to the Archives at the Town House is available on the plan your visit pages of the Archives, Gallery & Museums website (aagm.co.uk). A new Visual Guide has also been published with details of what to expect on a visit to the Archives at the Town House.
Phil Astley, team leader – Aberdeen City & Aberdeenshire Archives, will be giving a free lunchtime talk on the Port of Aberdeen archives – ‘A Haven for History’ on Wednesday 7 May at 12.45pm
https://www.aberdeencity.gov.uk/AAGM/whats-aberdeen-art-galleries-and-museums/lunchtime-talk-haven-history-port-aberdeen-archives