Every year come December, West Sussex Record Office closes its doors to the public for an annual period of stocktaking, cleaning, and cataloguing. This year, we began closed fortnight with a deep clean of our public searchroom! Staff pitched in to dust shelves and clean books to make sure our library collection and resource material was in good shape for researchers to use once we open up again next week.
We were also able to make a trip to Winchester, to visit our counterparts over at Hampshire Archive and Local Studies at Hampshire Record Office to have a tour around and discuss how our respective services are run. We had a fascinating look behind the scenes, and were able to share our experiences of running a busy local Record Office. The staff were brilliant, and everybody came away with new ideas and interesting questions about how we can share our ideas to benefit the delivery of archive services.
Traditionally, the second week of closed fortnight is dedicated to cataloguing. This year we were able to sort, describe, package and store accessions both new and old. Highlights included the completion of the Bognor Bowls Club collection, a fascinating farm account book recording life on the land in Selsey in the 1830’s, and the Worthing Operatic Society. Searchroom Assistant Ian was working on railway plans for West Sussex, and Collections Manager Jenny tackled a recent deposit from a Chichester building firm. All of these records will soon be available to search via our online catalogue.
The Record Office will reopen as usual on Tuesday 19th December.
Christmas/New Year closures
– Saturday 23 December to Tuesday 26 December 2017 inclusive, reopening on Wednesday 27 December
– Saturday 30 December 2017, reopening on Tuesday 2 January 2018
West Sussex Record Office 