Oh! Bankruptcies and Depositions and Civil Cases. Oh my!

I’ve been dealing with soooo many law type things at NARA these past two weeks. Lots of dockets. Bankruptcies. Depositions. Civil cases from the district court at Chicago. So much legal-ness.

Last week we worked on bankruptcy cases. I went through bankruptcy dockets (giant books, well, kind of like glorified binders actually, containing bankruptcy cases) and looked for cases dealing with large steel manufacturing companies. Doug, my supervisor and the Director of Archival Operations at NARA Chicago, also asked me to keep track of farming cases (to my surprise, I found only two). In looking at the steel cases, my job was to aim at highlighting the variety of jobs in the steel/metals/manufacturing industry, specifically for Republic Steel Company, Youngstown Sheet and Tube, and Jones & Laughlin. These were all dockets from the district court at Cleveland, Ohio.

My lovely cart of dockets

So, tell me about Frank Holmes…

Okay so, I had a super fun find while refoldering and adding admiralty cases to the database a few weeks ago. Admiralty cases, remember, are those relating to the Great Lakes and are heard in federal court, specifically the Northern district of Ohio, Eastern division (Cleveland).

Anyway, the first case I opened on Tuesday morning after I got to work was number 3206, “In the Matter of the effects of Frank Holmes, deceased seaman, late a member of the crew, A. W. Osborne.” Evidently, Mr. Holmes drowned on July 30, 1934 (sad). His effects stayed with the case because his family (if he had one in the states) was never located. The master of the steamer, W. G. Coles, sent a statement and Holmes’ personal effects to Vance & Joys Company, a vessel agent for the Wilson Transit Company, on December 23, 1934. In his personal effects were several neat objects: A pocket watch, an envelope from the Seamen’s Church Institute of New York containing discharge slips from the various ships of which he was a crew member, a blue membership book to the International Seamen’s Union of America, and a leather US Army Honorable Discharge folder containing his discharge papers (duh) AND his certificate of naturalization (OMG)!

From Aztec shore to Arctic zone

Holdings maintenance is an important part of what we do here at the National Archives. Holdings maintenance essentially means prolonging the life of records by improving the “physical storage environment.” Refoldering all the admiralty records was a type of holdings maintenance: I replaced old, grungy, dirty folders with clean, archival folders that better protect the documents. Other types of holdings maintenance include replacing acidic storage materials, improving shelving practices, removing damaging fasteners, reproducing unstable materials, and, in general, keeping the area where archives are kept clean and dust free.

This week I worked with Coast Guard Logs for the cutters “Raritan” and “Neah Bay”. Daily forms and incident reports that the navigator and officers filled out are housed in the National Archives. I refoldered these forms (CG-4380 A, B, and C) separately and by year. Form A, the “Log-Remarks Sheet” is always a fun page on either Christmas or New Year’s. The person in charge of daily log forms on those days would usually write a little poem.

New Kids on the Block

The first week at an internship is like being the new kid at school. You meet everyone, can’t remember more than a handful of people’s names, try to commit to memory every tidbit of information you’re told, and everything is really exciting and shiny and new. At least that’s how it was when I was the new kid. And now it’s like that at NARA, which is fun!  Day one included all of the standard administrative to-dos: lots of paperwork, a mug shot for my ID badge, a tour of the facilities, introductions, and learning the basics of the different databases I’ll be using at the National Archives. Plus, we got to sit in on the weekly staff meeting. Jonathan, an undergraduate student at Vanderbilt, is also interning at NARA this summer. I usually work alone in the University Archives at Loyola, so I’m really enjoying the opportunity to complete tasks with another intern. Our work area comes complete with a Downton Abbey calendar.

Life is good.