St. Louis Media History Foundation - Preservation Assessment

FAIN: PG-280627-21

St. Louis Media History Foundation (Saint Louis, MO 63104-2924)
Kerry Manderbach (Project Director: January 2021 to May 2023)

A preservation assessment for a collection of 10,000 items including historic publications, radio and television broadcasts, photographs, and advertisements documenting media history in the St. Louis metropolitan area from the 1800s to the present, as well as training for staff that manages it. Highlights of the collection include 2,000 early radio broadcasts such as the earliest surviving St. Louis broadcast from 1928 and jazz and blues broadcasts on “race radio,” as well as 1,600 print ads of regional industries and manufacturers of shoes, stoves, medicines, and beer. The collection has been used for scholarly publications, local universities’ media history courses, and a forthcoming exhibit at the Missouri Historical Society.

A comprehensive preservation assessment of the Foundation's collections by a consultant from the Northeast Document Conservation Center (NEDCC) and a half-day workshop ("Fundamentals of AV Preservation") for staff and volunteers.