Reference Service to Researchers in Archives.

Abstract

A review of the 280 citations in the chapter on reference service in Frank Evans' guide to archival literature, for example, reveals that the largest number (sixty-seven) deal with literary property, while the second largest group (fifty-nine) discusses problems of access and confidentiality.1 There are thirty-six citations concerning estrays, thefts, and the replevin of alienated archival materials topics that are at best remotely related to the subject of reference service to researchers and thirty citations dealing with the technical examination of suspect documents.2 About half of the forty-three citations describing reference service in American and foreign public archives, and about half of the twenty citations on users' views of archival reference service, were written before 1960, with about half of these written before 1950. Most of the thirteen citations on interviewing researchers are dated and none deal specifically with problems and techniques of interviewing researchers working with nonprinted textual records. None of the listed monographs or articles analyze the distinguishing characteristics of archival reference s rvice in terms of the issues raised in recent library literature on reference service and the reference process. In another work, Evans himself complained in particular about the lack of attention given to reference problems associated with public or institutional records, noting that manuscript curators rather than archivists have made the most substantive contributions to the literature on archival reference service.3 Perhaps this neglect of such an important topic stems from a significant distinction between archives and the manuscript collections maintained in research libraries and historical socie ies. Unlike manuscript collections, archives do not exist exclusively, or even primarily, for research.4 An archives functions as an admin-

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