It’s Time to Archive All Your Documents Digitally

Searching for information

By Digital Archivist Alyssa Voss With the digital age making content and media more prevalent, the physical world of information and research has evolved in similar ways. While traditional document archiving will always be the established standard, there is no denying that digital document archiving is more necessary than ever. This new process has developed […]

ROT and Prioritizing Materials for Digitization

books covered in cobwebs

By Digital Archivist Alyssa Voss When planning to digitize a collection, it’s important to suppress the urge to jump right in and scan everything. Not all items are created equal; some may be more fragile or rare, while others may have greater historical or cultural significance. Prioritizing the materials in your collection can help you […]

The Dow Foundation Archives: Cultivating Historical Context

Willard Dow image

By Digitization Team Lead Andrea Glazer Archivists are often eager to illustrate the one-of-a-kind perspective their collection presents. Artifacts like postcards, candid photos, and personal correspondence offer a way to tell previously untold stories about our origins. However, historical archives not only provide a peek into the past, but they also offer new context around […]

Finding Harmony in the Past

Betty at Golden Gate Bridge

By Junior Digital Archivist Alyssa Voss Imagine discovering boxes of your loved one’s manuscripts and documents you never knew about until after they passed. Going through a late loved one’s belongings can be a daunting and emotional task. It stirs up memories and feelings long forgotten. Finding items you never knew about, like boxes filled […]

Crashing Through the Surface

What is a surface

By Junior Digital Archivist Alyssa Voss At Anderson Archival, the term surface has a slightly different meaning than it does in most industries. The word surface is typically defined as “the outer layer of something.” While that remains true, in the archival community, it also refers specifically to the number of surfaces requiring a scan […]

Why Outsource? Digitizing In-House vs. Outsourcing

Struggling to digitize your collection in house?

By Team Lead Andrea Glazer It can be tempting to see the photocopier in the corner of your office and imagine digitizing your collection over time, if only to avoid the costs associated with finding a vendor to handle it. However, in-house digitization is rarely that simple. Digital preservation is no longer the future of […]

Discover the Magic of Large-Format Document Digitization and Enhance Your Collection

Blueprints need to be captured on a large-format scanner

By Junior Digital Archivist Alyssa Voss Ever wondered how to digitize those larger-than-life documents in your collection? Whether it’s oversized newspapers, record books, or even maps and blueprints, we’ve got you covered! At Anderson Archival, we’re here to guide you through the process and ensure that your valuable items are preserved with the utmost care, […]

Hit by Flooding? Here Are 3 Things You Can Do Now

Hit by flooding

by Marcia Spicer Plus: two ways you can prepare for the future to conclude National Preparedness Month  The summer of 2022 has been a season of unexpected flooding for many areas, including our own here in St. Louis, Missouri. Many of our friends and neighbors experienced damage and loss—placing this particular natural disaster at the […]

Preventing the Worst-Case Scenario

national preparedness month

by Marcia Spicer Ask any archivist, collector, or researcher who works with historical materials what their worst nightmare is, and you’ll probably get a few variations of the same answer. Total loss and destruction of a collection, history, language, people… you can’t get much worse.  Yes, recovery techniques have dramatically improved over the last 100 […]