West Palm Beach Public Library Florida Room and Archives Preservation Assessment

FAIN: PG-51138-11

West Palm Beach Public Library (West Palm Beach, FL 33401-5511)
Janice Collins (Project Director: May 2010 to October 2012)

A preservation assessment, staff training, and storage supplies for the library's Florida Room, which houses the Florida Collection and Archives. The repository includes books dating to the late 1800s pertaining to the area's citrus industry, hurricanes, architecture, and shipwrecks; historical maps and atlases illustrating the rapid population and environmental changes that took place in the early to mid-1900s; and city directories, school yearbooks, regional novels, and personal scrapbooks documenting the area's cultural, educational, and commercial development.

The West Palm Beach Public Library seeks to provide proper care and long-range plans for its Florida Collection and Archives, a collection of items gathered over time with historical significance to Florida and Palm Beach County. Through proper care and environmental control, our humanities collection will be maintained for future generations and access to the collection will be improved. Currently, the collection is well-used by the public for research, educational purposes, and library displays and exhibits. Once proper care and long-range plans are determined, the library will seek to improve access to the collection through possible digitization and archival description projects. These initiatives will increase accessibility to Florida's documentary past and strengthen the importance of humanities research and the study of human thoughts and behavior.