Tag Archives: National Archives

1934: Building a brick & mortar archive

The logo I’ve always used for the site is an image of the National Archives Building.  Amazingly, Congress did not approve such a building until 1926.  The architect was John Russell Pope, who also designed the Jefferson Memorial and the National Gallery of Art.  Ground was broken in 1931 and the building was mostly completed by 1935.  According to the online history:

By the time President Herbert Hoover laid the cornerstone of the building in February 1933, significant problems had arisen. Because the massive structure was to be constructed above an underground stream, 8,575 piles had been driven into the unstable soil, before pouring a huge concrete bowl as a foundation. Another difficulty arose over the choice of building materials. Both limestone and granite were authorized as acceptable, but construction began during the darkest days of the Great Depression, and suppliers of each material lobbied fiercely to have the government use their stone. Ultimately, as in the other Federal Triangle buildings, limestone was used for the exterior superstructure and granite for the base.

Here’s construction images:

September 30, 1932

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GAO report and pending bill on federal e-mail retention

The GAO has released a report entitled Federal Records: National Archives and Selected Agencies Need to Strengthen E-Mail Management. The report found that “[w]ithout periodic evaluations of recordkeeping practices or other controls to ensure that staff are trained and carry out their responsibilities, agencies have little assurance that e-mail records are properly identified, stored, and […]

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Archiving Independence Day

The National Archives and Records Administration maintains a great site called Charters of Freedom that maintains high-quality scans of key documents such as the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.  It also includes the Declaration of Independence. By the way, the picture in the sidebar is the National Archives building being built way-back when. Happy […]

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