{"id":6029,"date":"2015-03-30T07:11:09","date_gmt":"2015-03-30T13:11:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lastbestnews.com\/site\/?p=6029"},"modified":"2015-03-31T10:07:32","modified_gmt":"2015-03-31T16:07:32","slug":"butte-public-archives-a-little-gem-of-montana","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/2015\/03\/butte-public-archives-a-little-gem-of-montana\/","title":{"rendered":"Butte public archives &#8216;a little gem of Montana&#8217;"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\t\t\t<div id=\"slides-6029\" class=\"navis-slideshow\">\n\t\t\t<p class=\"slide-nav\">\n\n\t\t\t<a href=\"#\" class=\"prev\"><\/a>\n\t\t\t<a href=\"#\" class=\"next\"><\/a>\n\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n\n\t\t\t<div class=\"slides_container\"><div id=\"6029-slide1\"><a href=\"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-content\/uploads\/Archives-Exterior-1-of-1.jpg\" target=\"_blank\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-content\/uploads\/Archives-Exterior-1-of-1-771x514.jpg\" \/><\/a><h6>Ed Kemmick\/Last Best News <a href=\"#\" class=\"slide-permalink\">permalink<\/a><\/h6><p>The Butte-Silver Bow Public Archives moved into the old Fire Station No. 1, left, in 1981. The addition at right was opened to the public in 2010.<\/p><\/div><div id=\"6029-slide2\"><a href=\"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-content\/uploads\/Archives-Kim-1-of-1.jpg\" target=\"_blank\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-content\/uploads\/Archives-Kim-1-of-1-771x509.jpg\" \/><\/a><h6>Ed Kemmick\/Last Best News <a href=\"#\" class=\"slide-permalink\">permalink<\/a><\/h6><p>Kim Kohn, the archives technician and scheduler,  talks about the collection of old newspapers at the archives.<\/p><\/div><div id=\"6029-slide3\" data-src=\"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-content\/uploads\/archivesvault-1-of-1-771x514.jpg*771*514\" data-href=\"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-content\/uploads\/archivesvault-1-of-1.jpg\" \/><h6>Ed Kemmick\/Last Best News <a href=\"#\" class=\"slide-permalink\">permalink<\/a><\/h6><p>Government records and historical documents are stored in temperature-controlled archival vaults.<\/p><\/div><div id=\"6029-slide4\" data-src=\"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-content\/uploads\/archives-wideshot-1-of-1-771x514.jpg*771*514\" data-href=\"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-content\/uploads\/archives-wideshot-1-of-1.jpg\" \/><h6>Ed Kemmick\/Last Best News <a href=\"#\" class=\"slide-permalink\">permalink<\/a><\/h6><p>The main room in the old section of the archives.<\/p><\/div><div id=\"6029-slide5\"><a href=\"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-content\/uploads\/Archives-cost-sheets-1-of-1.jpg\" target=\"_blank\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-content\/uploads\/Archives-cost-sheets-1-of-1-771x454.jpg\" \/><\/a><h6>Ed Kemmick\/Last Best News <a href=\"#\" class=\"slide-permalink\">permalink<\/a><\/h6><p>The archives also contain many documents pertaining to the operation of the old Anaconda Copper Mining Co.<\/p><\/div><\/div><\/div><script>jQuery( document ).ready( function() { loadSlideshow( 6029, 'https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/2015\/03\/butte-public-archives-a-little-gem-of-montana\/', 5 ) } );<\/script>\n<p>BUTTE\u2014Six years ago, when she was still teaching English and history for Billings Catholic Schools, Stella Burke organized a two-day field trip to Butte for about 80 seventh-graders.<\/p>\n<p>There, among other activities, her pupils went into an underground mine and visited the mansion of Copper King William Clark. But the highlight of the trip, she said, was spending time in the Butte-Silver Bow Public Archives.<!--more--><\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe archives really kind of brought everything together for us,\u201d Burke said. \u201cIt really helps kids understand how important Butte was, not just to the state but to the whole country.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Burke has been selling real estate for the past two years, but BCS seventh-graders are still making that annual trip, with the next one planned for May.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe people at the archives were so great,\u201d Burke said. \u201cThey\u2019d give us a little introduction and then just let the kids dig in.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Letting people dig into the history of Butte is what they\u2019ve been doing at the archives since it was established by the Butte-Silver Bow Commission in 1981 as a repository for non-current government records. It was also charged with collecting and preserving historical documents, photographs and manuscripts dealing with the history of Butte-Silver Bow (so named because of its combined city-county government).<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_6030\"  class=\"wp-caption module image alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 336px;\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"addboard wp-image-6030 size-full\" src=\"http:\/\/lastbestnews.com\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/Archives-Ellen-1-of-1.jpg\" alt=\"Crain\" width=\"336\" height=\"235\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-media-credit\">Ed Kemmick\/Last Best News<\/p><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Ellen Crain has been the director of the Butte-Silver Bow Public Archives for 25 years.<\/p><\/div>\n<p>The archives are located in a fire hall built in 1900 at 17 W. Quartz St. in Uptown Butte. In 2007, Butte-Silver Bow voters approved a $7.5 million bond issue to renovate and expand the archives, a project that included the construction of archival-quality vaults. The new addition was opened to the public in 2010.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt doubled our size,\u201d said Ellen Crain, who has been the director there since 1990. \u201cIt was a hugely successful public project because it was on time and under budget.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The archives house 500 collections of photographs, a library of books that drew on the archives\u2019 holdings, hundreds of bound volumes of Butte newspapers, coroners inquests, naturalization papers, maps, blueprints, labor records, records of the Anaconda Co. and countless genealogical materials.<\/p>\n<p>Last year, the archives purchased the C. Owen Smithers Photograph Collection for $122,000. The collection of 15,000 negatives provides an exhaustive documentation of Butte during much of its rich history.<\/p>\n<p>Crain said the archives serve as many as 5,000 people a year, including people who \u201ctravel from all over the world to research family members.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Kim Kohn, the archives technician and scheduler, said she helped a man from Ireland last week, who came in with his son, a resident of New York. The Irishman wanted to learn what he could about the death of his great-uncle. It didn\u2019t take him long to find the coroner\u2019s report that detailed his ancestor\u2019s death in a Butte mine.<\/p>\n<p><div class=\"well\"><div class=\"dfad dfad_pos_1 dfad_first\" id=\"_ad_652\"><a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/goo.gl\/mjhWkW\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/lastbestnews.com\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/201703_capeair_variable.jpg\" alt=\"CapreAir_Variable\" width=\"510\" height=\"180\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-18069\" \/><\/a><\/div><\/div>Crain said people doing family research make up about 40 percent of visitors to the archives. The others are researching subjects other than family history and include scholars, writers and moviemakers. Another 1,000 people a month access the archives\u2019 online collections, and the staff regularly fields inquiries by phone or email.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s a very busy little spot,\u201d Crain said,<\/p>\n<p>The busyness is one of its attractions. Dennis Swibold, a professor at the University of Montana School of Journalism, spent a lot of time in the archives in preparation for writing \u201cCopper Chorus: Mining, Politics, and the Montana Press, 1889-1959,\u201d published in 2006.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI really liked just being there and overhearing conversations and watching people doing research,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>He recalled two old sisters who found a newspaper photograph of their mother as a teenage beauty queen, and of visitors who were trying to find out how their uncle died as a toddler in early Butte. They discovered that he\u2019d pulled a tub of scalding-hot water off a stovetop.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_6031\"  class=\"wp-caption module image alignright\" style=\"max-width: 336px;\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"addboard wp-image-6031 size-full\" src=\"http:\/\/lastbestnews.com\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/Archives-Vault-ledgers-1-of-1.jpg\" alt=\"Vault\" width=\"336\" height=\"480\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-media-credit\">Ed Kemmick\/Last Best News<\/p><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">The archival vaults contain hundreds of ornately bound governmental documents dating back to the earliest days of Butte.<\/p><\/div>\n<p>Best of all, he met an old-timer who remembered as a boy having seen William Clark. That made the past come alive for Swibold as he wrote \u201cCopper Chorus,\u201d in which Clark was a major figure.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere was a picture in my head I could write to,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>Many visitors to the archives have lost themselves in the extensive collection of bound newspapers, including the Butte Miner, Butte Intermountain, Butte Daily Post, Anaconda Standard, Montana Standard and the New Northwest.<\/p>\n<p>There are also microfilm records of the Butte Bulletin, the Independent and the Walkerville News, going back to the 1870s. They also have scattered copies of Croatian, Finlander and Serbian newspapers.<\/p>\n<p>In the new archival vaults, kept at a paper-friendly 62 degrees and 30 percent humidity, there are tens of thousands of government records, including one of Kohn\u2019s favorites: the complete daily diaries of Maybelle Hogan, county school superintendent from 1931 to 1970. The meticulous, typed diaries were bound in black leather.<\/p>\n<p>Crain said the archives take in about 300 collections a year, ranging from a single sheet of paper to 150 boxes of materials. Everything that comes in is sorted and processed by a staff of seven, aided by 40 to 50 volunteers.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019ve only been in here 4\u00bd years,\u201d Kohn said, gesturing around the new vaults, \u201cand we\u2019re already saying, \u2018Oh, my gosh, we\u2019re running out of room.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Swibold said an important feature of the archives is Crain\u2019s deep experience and eagerness to help.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cShe has been so important to so many people who have used it,\u201d he said. \u201cShe knows her stuff and she\u2019s so welcoming.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Burke, the former schoolteacher, said her pupils enjoyed the archives so much because \u201cthe staff was so good to us.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s just a little gem of Montana,\u201d she said. \u201cI wish everybody could get there and appreciate it.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>BUTTE\u2014Six years ago, when she was still teaching English and history for Billings Catholic Schools, Stella Burke organized a two-day field trip to Butte for about 80 seventh-graders. There, among other activities, her pupils went into an underground mine and visited the mansion of Copper King William Clark. But the highlight of the trip, she [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6032,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,16],"tags":[2282,2280,2284,575,2278,2279,2281,2283],"class_list":["post-6029","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-diversions","category-montana","tag-copper-chorus","tag-billings-catholic-schools","tag-butte-silver-bow-public-archives","tag-dennis-swibold","tag-ellen-crain","tag-kim-kohn","tag-stella-burke","tag-william-clark","prominence-top-story"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6029","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6029"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6029\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6032"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6029"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6029"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6029"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}