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Much has been going on at your Archives in Murfreesboro. Archival materials have been purchased with the $$ Area 64 has provided . The inventory process is still under way. More people are getting involved. Herb H. has agreed to inventory all audio tapes and organize them so that access will be much easier. This will be a rather large undertaking and is greatly needed. Sadly Area 64 Archives must give up the case's and archives that were donated by someone in Chattanooga. The area was re-organized to accommodate the glass display case's. These case's will stay in the Archives building until after the 9th National Archives Workshop. At that point we are in need of a couple of glass display case's to re-place these. Displays such as this make our Precious Memories more visible and better protected from all elements. Its much better to protect our Precious Memories and be able to see them, rather than be stuffed away in a bottom file cabinet somewhere. So keep your eyes open and lets replace these glass display case's with even nicer ones. That's the way God works you know. He never closes a door lest he open another. One of the objectives here is to protect and preserve our Precious Memories not today nor tomorrow, but 20 or even 50 years down the road. Its odd that we learn to live one day at a time in our wonderful program yet we are faced with the considerations of preserving our past for future AA's. It may seem impossible but there could be files in our Archives now that will not be accessed for twenty years. If this be the case we are charged with protecting and preserving each individual piece of paper, book, photo, to the very best of our ability. The climate control is very important in the long term preservation. Another objective is to address the Humidity control in Area 64 Archives. A start will be simply to monitor the building, not each case which will come as time goes on and the money tree begins to yield more. A Hygrometer for the building will run about $90.00. The display case style hygrometer runs about $73.00 each. These are compact but very accurate humidity indicators. Another objective is in progress already. We are attempting to make the front room accessible to anyone. Non AA's. Thus we are charged with personal anonymity. Anonymity doesn't stop at the Grave. Lest suppose that Jane Doe visits the Area 64 Archives. She is a non AA. In she comes and strolls around and sees a picture of a past delegate. Oh My God she cries. That's my Grand Dad. I cannot believe that , there has to be a mistake. My Grandpa couldn't of been a drunk. The point is that we are responsible to maintain personal anonymity in our Repository accessible to the general public, not just at the level of press radio & films. So what we are doing is taking all photos and individual's that are identifiable and moving them towards the back room that should be accessed only by AA members. The possibility of maybe a hanging curtain that breaks the rooms along with a sign AA's only beyond this point. There are many items in our repository that do not need to be handled or touched, these things also will remain in the back portion of the building. One of the guidelines of the Area 64 Archives is the fact that once a item is donated that it remains the property of Area 64 Archives. That we do not accept items on loan. The UNIQUE situation above concerning the case's raised a lot of possibilities. There was a lot of work that transpired in the process of picking up the case's, protecting them and the archives that came along with them for the 100 mile trip back to Murfreesboro. Then came the problem of making room for them in the building. Complete re organizing of the entire building was necessary to accommodate these case's. What's a few hours and several peoples help? When's the last time you broke out the old Windex and tried to clean one of these show cases? Ah! Lets not forget that there were a couple hundred individual items that came along with the case's. It is impossible to itemize each photo, paper, hat, meeting schedule. With 100% focus on placing everything in a work in progress pile, these items are placed in the most available appropriate places. Times goes on and then comes the bad news. We have to give up the whole lot. Are you beginning to see the picture? The newly cleaned case's now full of archives form many files in our repository, not yet inventoried entirely, are in question. Do we allow one piece of our Precious Memories to be mistakenly sent away? This tells me that the decision the committee made concerning no items on loan is a very wise decision. Although this unique situation is a great learning tool, it is also very disheartening to those that participated in the scene printed above. What's the use we might think. All items donated to Area 64 Archives in the future should be given only with this in mind, and a signed form releasing the items to Area 64 for Conservation & Preservation to be always a part of Area 64 Archives Repository. This story is not pointing fingers at anyone or anything. Simply an experience that possibly be avoided in the future if we will learn from our mistakes. We have taken all measures possible to be able to present the case's and all the archives back to the Chattanooga folks. Because each item was not able to be inventoried and the archives were mixed to some extent, there is no human possible way to be sure. Another problem is the short term memory loss and this thing called time. Even with our very best intentions we still are subject to calamities. A cup of coffee is a must in Archives work, but is it worth that Precious Memory? As I know that a spilled cup of coffee on these precious documents is irreversable my intentions was not to destroy but to preserve. We ask that you consider this when you visit your Precious Memories. There is a sign posted just for me that says "No Food Or Drinks, This Means You" just inside the door. It is very hard to do the right thing because it is the right thing when no one else is looking. I suppose that this is the beginning of understanding the principals of Alcoholics Anonymous. Although I know that there are un-principled people in every organization, I believe that our Higher Power (Step 3) will continue to do for us what we could never do for our selves. Please continue to support Area 64 Archives and be sure and Thank all those Trusted Servants that continue to make this thing happen.
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