General Preservation Assessment for Local History Collection in the Mary Riley Styles Public Library

FAIN: PG-263489-19

City of Falls Church (Falls Church, VA 22046-3301)
Marshall William Webster (Project Director: April 2018 to September 2019)

A general preservation assessment for over 2,000 books, 1,200 maps, 20,000 film negative and print slides, 8,000 photographic prints, 130 linear feet of clipping and pamphlet files, and nearly 600 audiovisual items related to the history of Falls Church, Virginia.  The collection includes maps of original land grants and street and building development from the 1790s through the present; Civil War letters and diaries; over 50 original stereoscopic daguerreotypes depicting daily life at Camp Alger during the Spanish American War; several thousand photographic negatives documenting the area’s culture and transformation in the mid-20^th century; over 100 oral histories from the 1970s and 1980s; and city directories, genealogical folders, and records from local organizations.

The Mary Riley Styles Public Library’s Local History Room features collections documenting the rich history of the City of Falls Church, Virginia, from revolutionary times through the Civil War and Spanish American War up to the present day. An NEH Preservation Assistance Grant would help to preserve the life of these diverse collections and make them accessible to researchers and the general public. The Local History Room collections include area maps from the 18th century, thousands of photographic negatives depicting life in Falls Church from the late 40’s to the early 60’s, and oral history sound recordings of prominent citizens, including state senator John A.K. Donovan and relatives of civil rights activist E.B. Henderson. These collections are significant to the humanities because they vividly depict the life of a small but significant town as it experienced all of the major events in the history of the United States.