The Public Archives of Canada, 1948–1968

Abstract

When W. Kaye Lamb arrived in Ottawa late in 1948 to take up his appointment as Dominion Archivist, the Public Archives of Canada had been operating under strict financial restraints for almost two decades.During the Depression of the 1930s and the Second World War, the period of growth over which Arthur Doughty had presided gave way to one in which it was difficult even to maintain the status quo.Very few new professional appointments were made after 1930 and clerical appointments were scarcely numerous enough to fill vacancies as they occurred.The volume of accessions declined; the range of Archives' activities was curtailed; and the number of scholars engaged in research diminished.Not surprisingly, two decades of restraint had a deadening effect on the attitude and morale of the Archives' staff.Though a few fondly recalled the golden age of Doughty when great things had been possible, the general attitude was one of resigned acceptance.But a new age of development and progress was about to dawn.

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