Preservation Assessment of the Television News Film and Video Archive

FAIN: PA-51572-06

Historical Society of Central Florida (Orlando, FL 32801-2401)
Wanda Edwards (Project Director: May 2005 to April 2007)

A preservation assessment of a collection of 2 million feet of local television news coverage donated to the society by WDBO-TV that dates from 1954 through the 1970s that documents the recent history of central Florida.

The Historical Society of Central Florida has among its collections a large archive of television broadcast film. This proposal supports the hiring of a professional conservator with the appropriate qualifications to provide the Historical Society with an assessment of the conservation needs of the collection. In addition the Historical Society will request advice from the conservator on storage and preservation of the current film collection (including a list of required supplies and equipment purchases), recommendations for the appropriate migration of the collection to a more stable and user friendly media such as digital media, and recommendations for creating a cataloguing system for the newly migrated collection.