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Lisa helping Victoria into her cabbage dress: Definitely not an ordinary day in the archives #ArchiveSelfie

There’s no such thing as an ordinary day in the archives…every day is different, and that’s part of the reason why I love working in archives.   Today, for example, I’ve been on duty at The Hive.  Talking to people about their research needs and helping them to find what they’re looking for (or not!) is a great way to spend the day.   We hear all kinds of stories this way, from the very emotional to the light hearted – and it’s very easy to see how archives and research impact on people’s lives.  A startling ‘YES!’ from researcher momentarily disturbed the quiet of the searchroom, but was a sign of a new discovery and generated much excitement all around.  A few weeks ago we helped an author to locate information on roman Worcester for her upcoming novel.  She said that she had been looking for weeks for information to help put her characters in context, and the answer was in our local studies and archaeology reference library the whole time – just waiting to be discovered.  We were thrilled to help her discover this and, after immersing herself for hours in the world of Roman Worcester, she left with a new plotline and a smile! Conversely we also helped someone to locate her mother’s grave in local churchyard, and she left planning an emotional first visit.

Work outside of assisting customers with research is equally diverse including developing funding applications, writing documents, cataloguing, website development and a wide variety of other projects – including an #ArchiveSelfie. Actually, probably the strangest activity recently was to help our service manager, Victoria, with her cabbage dress for her #ArchiveSelfie Some days, inevitably, are spent in meetings … and the best ones are definitely the ones where new ideas are discussed and projects develop.

There’s so much going on in archives at the moment, and it would be disappointing if every day were the same!