twenty years later, mark the culmination of the movement towards modern archives in Maryland . Most of the activities directed towards records of the previous three centuries did not lead to officially established archives. The Maryland Historical Society provided a partial solution, but the varied motivations of this organization plus its constant struggles with its private nature and funding worked against the Society's being any more than a step along the way to the creation of official archives. The establishment of the Maryland Hall of Records in 1934 provided a real focus for the state's documentary heritage, although it caused some tension between the Maryland Historical Society and the Hall of Records that detracted from the formation of an archival community and archival leadership within the state. The Baltimore City Archives, following twenty years later, was a reminder that having both a historical society and state government archives were not necessarily enough to provide solutions to all the modern records problems within one state. While the Hall of Records comfortably assumed a strong leadership role, the municipal counterpart struggled for its direction and after a promising start and temporary rebirth fell by the wayside of dynamic archival programs. Nevertheless, both were products of a renewed and mature archival consciousness and the results of several centuries of efforts.
the last several decades of the nineteenth century had enormous importance for the development of American archives and for the formation of archives in Maryland . Ernst Posner, dean of American archival theoreticians, surmises that these early professionals, with their "scientific" theory emphasizing original historical sources, was the "tap-root" for the "systematic care of the archives of the United States ." 1Maryland was especially susceptible to historical professionalism, hosting one of the first historical seminars at the Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore . This university not only engaged historians in archives, it sent out individuals who worked in the newly established archival agencies and it brought new life into the uses of local archival sources. Until the advent of formal graduate archival programs in the 1960s and after, no higher education forum played a more important role than Hopkins .
Gilman, and his innovative ideas concerning graduate programs, not only established Hopkins as a pioneer in such education but implanted history as an integral part of it. 2Gilman hoped to found "an institute for the education of publicists, with history, political economy, & c, as leading subjects." 3He took to heart Henry Adams' admonition of 1877 that the school's "ultimate success may depend on getting History, Political Economy and Metaphysics well taught there." 4To insure this result, Gilman sought scholars with well-established and highly regarded reputations and for the instruction attempted to secure Henry Adams and then Hermann von Holst. The subject was, however, handled part-time by Austin Scott, an associate of George Bancroft, until 1881 when taken over by the virtually unknown Herbert Baxter Adams. 5
receiving his Ph.D. at the University of Berlin. 6Adams, a leading proponent of the "scientific" school, emphasized the use of original sources. One of Adams ' colleagues characterized his seminars as "laboratories where books are treated like mineralogical specimens, passed about from hand to hand, examined, and tested." 7Another graduate of the program described the seminar room itself as a "museum." "A favorite remark of Dr. Adams," the writer recalled, "is that the Johns Hopkins seminary library of historical and political science begins with relics of the stone age and ends with the newspapers." 8By 1896 the Seminar had access to over eighteen thousand books, fifty thousand pamphlets, and numerous manuscripts. 9
Adams notified President Gilman that he was sure "it will be a good thing for the University if we can ally with us the Historical Societies and quasi historians in all the seaboard States." This was necessary because he desired to "see each candidate for Ph.D. in History obtain some corporate recognition of his work, some local reputation which will help him on in his future career." 10Logically, Adams would not miss the opportunities presented by his own milieu. His own first publication was a treatise on Maryland history. 11And the studies of many of his students were to open broad new areas of inquiry into Maryland 's past. Bernard Christian Steiner, for example, composed nearly one hundred articles and books on Maryland history in a career of three decades. 12A significant portion of Adams ' prized project, the Johns Hopkins University Studies in Historical and Political Science , was devoted to Maryland history. 13
1881-1934. The problem with such an emphasis on historical sources was the paucity of archival institutions and reliable documentary editions. A national archives was a half-century away. State archives were a generation away and their development required the dedicated efforts of many of Adams 's own students. The best collections of records resided in the restricted and elitist historical societies, usually as unorganized masses, or with the few documentary editions of promoters like Peter Force and Jared Sparks. 14Adams soon realized that the future of successful historical research required the cultivation of relationships between academia and historical societies, a pioneer form of what became known in the 1970's as “public” or “applied” history.
"main principle of historical training at the Johns Hopkins University is to encourage independent thought and research" and that local history is an untouched field of study. His fundamental principle was a widely accepted axiom of the new scientific history, but the emphasis on local history was molded by his Baltimore experience. According to Adams, the study of the locality would foster a stronger connection between the university and its surrounding community, a fundamental goal of Gilman and Hopkins. For Adams , American local history was necessary to understand national history, stimulating a stronger interest in the past since "it takes hold upon the life of the community and quickens not only pride in the past but hope for the future." Local history was a "natural" place to begin an analysis of the past "because man is born into such associations and because an historical knowledge of them will always be the most valuable form of historical culture, for these subjects most concern our own life, our past, present, and future." Local history was a "living interest" rather than the dead past.
historians and the necessity to use local historical materials. Two years before he explained to President Gilman his desire "to see each candidate for Ph.D. in History obtain some corporate recognition of his work, some local reputation which will help him on in his future career." An ancillary benefit would be the improvement of Hopkins 's role in the Baltimore region and the South and the work of the various historical societies. 16In many ways, this was the essence of public history, emphasizing not just employment of historians outside of the academic environment but the active influence of historians on the public, in this case in the acquiring and building of archival and historical manuscripts collections. That Adams achieved this goal is visible both in the re-writing of Maryland history that occurred under his direction and in the wider resurgence of Southern historical scholarship. Adams emphasized this, preferring to see his students published in local journals, no matter how parochial, rather than the more prestigious national ones. In Maryland Adams pushed his students to the primary local institutions (like the Peabody Library and the Maryland Historical Society), archaeological excavations, and visits to historical sites, and he was instrumental in the publication of the state's records, most notably the Archives of Maryland. 17
Baxter Adams at the university. Between 1880 and 1900 twenty dissertations on Maryland were finished, far outdistancing the total on any other state. The Johns Hopkins University Studies in Historical and Political Science, started in 1883, had published twenty-six Maryland studies by the turn of the century including a number of the dissertations. Nearly every meeting of the Historical and Political Science Association from 1879 into the early twentieth century considered some aspect of the state's history - a 1673 Maryland land grant and its potential use and significance, the availability of Baltimore newspapers at the Maryland Historical Society, and even the research results of some prominent amateur local historians. 18The 1881 visit by English historian E.A. Freeman and his examination of the colonial and revolutionary records induced Adams to lobby for their publication. The outcome of this was a new course on the "Sources of American Colonial History," described as follows: “This will be a class course for practical training in the use of colonial laws, archives, and documentary history of the older states of the American Union. The class will meet in the library of the Maryland Historical Society; particular attention will be given to the State Papers of Maryland, which have lately been transferred from the Land Office at Annapolis ." 19The donation in 1891 of John Thomas Scharf's huge collection of records, primarily Maryland public records, further encouraged such courses, and, in the words of William Hand Browne, Hopkins was doing for the South's history "what Harvard and Yale have done for the New England States." 20
the scientific historians, the study of institutions and politics. Parishes, manors, libraries, churches, education and other institutional forms and all aspects of past political periods were thoroughly examined. Following Adams 's notions of the relevancy of the studies, many of his students produced works on recent events or traced themes of current interest. Typical was an essay on the early development of the municipal government of Baltimore completed not because of some antiquarian fascination but because the city had adopted its first new charter in a century. 21Had the average literate citizen read all of the Hopkins studies, the person would have gained a good understanding of the state's history and the origins of recent happenings. Was such information, however, not available in the publications of the amateurs and antiquarians?
with the greatest of the nineteenth century Maryland antiquarians, John Thomas Scharf. Scharf, a Baltimore journalist and businessman, wrote ten histories, four on Maryland , between 1874 and 1887; his most notable work was his 1879 three-volume History of Maryland . Although other general state histories were published, it was not until the 1970s and the completion of three such histories and numerous other county and scholarly monographs that Scharf became completely antiquated. Even at present, however, his history is often cited because of his inclusion of a vast amount of primary sources (some no longer available in their original form) and coverage of virtually every conceivable subject. The comprehensiveness of his work derived from his employment of researchers and successful solicitation of memoirs and anecdotes from individuals, families, and institutions and his welding of them into an encyclopedic, if at times incoherent, work. 22Although the Hopkins students used Scharf's work, their monographs were better histories, more thoroughly reasoned interpretations, if narrower in scope and less popular. Some comparisons with Scharf's History of Maryland will reveal something of the Hopkins renaissance in Maryland history.
in Maryland , published in the first series of the Johns Hopkins University Studies in Historical and Political Science. 23Ingle presents a stark contrast to Scharf's idea of the colonial Anglican Church, published only four years previously. Scharf devoted only a few scattered pages to the establishment of the church in 1692 and its subsequent influence. Scharf hardly considered the institutional mechanism of the parish but consistently blurred it into the context of colonial politics: an established church was the reversal of religious toleration; Anglicans were part of the "aristocratic" class opposing political independence; an established church was the reversal of religious toleration; and the clergy was poor in quality, a natural result of official religion. 24Ingle, on the other hand, in six thousand words, described the operation of the parish institution, the support of the clergy, its educational contributions, relationship to the proprietary government, the technicalities of vestry elections, and care for the poor. Although Ingle also commented on the weaknesses of the system, he did not emphasize this. Ingle stressed the working of the system as a form of local government akin to a "school of liberty" for the American Revolution. Ingle's conclusions were not incompatible with those of Scharf. Whereas Ingle's essay emphasized the facts of the parish's mechanism, Scharf provided only the barest of facts with an abundance of interpretation.
by a chasm of time rather than only eighteen years; if anything, the two accounts show the widening gulf between the amateur and professional histories of the period. Scharf treated this and earlier periods of civil disorder as anomalies in Maryland 's early history. Leaders of such events, from William Claiborne in the 1620s to the end of the seventeenth century, were consistently seen by Scharf as ignorant troublemakers and power-grabbing schemers against an enlightened, if at times ineffectual, proprietary rule. Such rebellions can only be understood as isolated incidents; the 1689 revolution was caused by the failure of the proprietor to speedily acknowledge the ascension of William and Mary to the English crown and rumors of a popish plot to take over the colony. 25Sparks , however, presents thirty years of events and dissatisfaction with the Calverts as explaining the revolution. Sparks 's work is much closer to the arguments of subsequent histories, although he tends to see the Calvert family as worse than it was and the various mixtures of rebels uniformly as "patriots," precursors to the American Revolution. This latter work's conclusion is an obvious overreaction to the rose-tinted extremes of antiquarians like Scharf, especially since the author's conclusions are not borne out by his methodological excursion through the Maryland legislative records. 26
topics such as the development of the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal. 27 Ward and Scharf charted the canal from early predecessors in the eighteenth century through the labyrinth of charters, conventions, and state and corporate rivalries distinguishing this internal improvement project. But the two works also reflect the gap between professional and amateur history, even in these years when amateurs and professionals mingled more freely than now. In many ways Scharf gives an adequate outline of the canal's history. Ward's study, however, adds an entirely new dimension to the subject. The purpose of his monograph is to show the evolution of federal involvement in the development of internal improvement projects, a matter that prompted serious debates on the limits of the federal constitution. This book, unlike Scharf's treatment, reflects the importance of the canal on both local and national scenes. Scharf's writing on this subject seems to be little more than filler between the greater and more dramatic events of the War of 1812 and the Civil War.
historians suggest that the latter studies, although often concentrating on institutions at the expense of other subjects, still provided a fuller, more accurate view of Maryland 's past – at least one that could be better questioned because it was on archival sources. Even with dry, academic prose and predictable, if logical, organization, these new historians rewrote Maryland 's past. While writers like Scharf liberally sprinkled their pages with primary sources and little interpretation, the professionals presented evidence of a liberal use of the same records but with careful evaluation and a greater concern for the state's development in the context of regional and national events. The only connection between the amateur and professional historian was the subjects selected for study, not too surprising given their chronological overlap of work and the conscious efforts by the professionals to prove the worth of their training (this was, after all, long before professional history was firmly established in the academy).
twentieth century. The number of dissertations on this subject dropped dramatically from seventeen in the 1890s to four in the first decade of the twentieth century and to one in the succeeding decade; it was not until the 1970s that Hopkins and other university students and scholars rediscovered local history. 28The larger quantity of Maryland studies in the Johns Hopkins University Studies in Historical and Political Science lingered a bit longer but eventually showed a quick decline after 1910. The reason for this loss of interest was the premature death of Herbert Baxter Adams in early 1901. Maryland studies that appeared after this time are attributable to the dominance of the Hopkins History department by former Adams 's students, most notably John S. Bassett on Southern history and Jacob H. Hollander, an economist specializing on Baltimore. 29 Still, the Hopkins 's sudden and absolute departure from Maryland history from World War One until well after the Second World War seems almost inexplicable. At the turn of the century, with groups like the Maryland Society of Colonial Dames funding lectures on the subject, 30 the Johns Hopkins University was the center of Maryland historical research while the Maryland Historical Society supported it with its rich collection of sources. The subsequent neglect by the institution was so severe that the Scharf collection of papers, so celebrated in 1891 when obtained, were completely forgotten until 1932 when briefly "unearthed" by W. Stull Holt and forgotten again until after the Second World War. 31With the opening of the state archives in the mid-1930s, Holt envisioned the Hopkins as taking the "lead" in the study of the area's history 32 and, indeed, for a few years Hopkins professors served on committees of the Maryland Historical Society and taught a few courses on the subject in the evening school. 33But from 1950 until the late 1970s Hopkins offered Maryland courses only in the evening college, taught not by a member of the regular faculty but a local museum director more in the image of the nineteenth century antiquarian. 34
Johns Hopkins University can only be conjectured. The shifting winds of professional historiography, especially away from local history, were certainly partly responsible. The departure of Hopkin's graduates to other states deprived Maryland of a quantity of potential research; the single exception was Bernard Christian Steiner who, while Director of the Enoch Pratt Free Library, was the most prolific Maryland historian in the first half of the twentieth century. 35Nevertheless, the Hopkins students of 1880-1910 left a permanent legacy of excellent local history research that in some cases, as with Jacob H. Hollander's 1899 history of the Baltimore municipal government, 36 have remained substantial scholarly contributions. It has been only with the Maryland historical renaissance of the 1970s and after that as much scholarly activity on Maryland 's past has been seen since the heyday of Herbert Baxter Adams at the Johns Hopkins University . The existence of this most recent flurry of historical research in Maryland, and elsewhere, has been encouraged by the increased preservation of historical sources in archives and libraries, a greater popular interest in the local past as evident with the movements of historic preservation and genealogy, and the more recent employment and identity crisis of the historical profession leading to a re-rapprochement with the public's interest in the past. The role of the Maryland State Archives as a host for historians specializing in the early Chesapeake has been, for example, a prime example of the re-inventing of the old Adams academic seminars of a century before where scholars worked and debated their research surrounded by their documentary resources. The main difference is the much better acquisition and intellectual control over the archival records.
the greatest contribution of Hopkins ' may be his involvement in the movement for a state archives. When the prominent English historian Edward A. Freeman made a lecture tour in America in 1881 and visited Baltimore , Adams not only showed him Hopkins but also escorted him to the Maryland Historical Society for a glimpse of the Maryland state papers. Freeman was impressed with the documents and published a letter in the New York Nation and the Baltimore American urging that their "systematic publication would be a very great gain, and the State Legislature would surely not refuse its help, if the matter were pressed upon it by influential person and societies in the State.” 37Both Adams and one of his more famous students, John Franklin Jameson, considered this to be the genesis of the Archives of Maryland . 38Another one of his former students, B. J. Ramage, believed that the "revival of interest in local history at the South is contemporaneous with the professorial career of Dr. Adams . . ." as well as the awareness of the "importance of preserving ancient records and letters . . . ." 39
Jameson. Jameson's interest in records was stimulated by the seminars, and for several years he attempted to gain support for the editing and publication of the records of the Virginia Company, the idea having been planted in one of the seminars. 40A decade later, in 1895, Jameson headed the newly formed Historical Manuscripts Commission of the American Historical Association. The purpose of this Commission was to prepare "a calendar of original manuscripts and records of national interest relating to the colonial and later history of the United States ." 41For Jameson, its responsibility was of the greatest importance. To a colleague he prophesied, "that, if rightly managed, it can do a great deal for the future of historical work in this country." 42Jameson's assessment was modest. The Historical Manuscripts Commission gave birth a few years later to another AHA project, the Public Archives Commission, which laid (partially) the foundation for the establishment of the national archives.
reports for 32 states, two cities, and the Philippines. 43Maryland 's Commission was established in 1904. Since the commencement of the publication of the Archives of Maryland , the State government had shown little regard for the preservation of historic records other than the modest funding of that project or the repair and organization of records to facilitate current usage. 44Even the State's formal recognition of a Public Records Commission involved only a minor commitment: the members of the Commission were volunteers and the State provided only one thousand dollars a year for two years. 45The results of the survey, however, were certainly the most significant analysis of the State's records in a generation.
records in the Land Commissioner's Office, Superior Court of Baltimore, Court of Common Pleas, Baltimore City Hall, and twenty-two counties, resulting in a "detailed" report of two thousand "large Pages." 46The thoroughness of this work was certainly the chief consequence of the fine blend of Commission members and researchers. The members of the Commission included a leading amateur historian and civic leader (Hester Dorsey Richardson), a professional historian and librarian (Bernard C. Steiner), and a member of the legislature (Samuel K. Dennis). 47Utilizing such individuals, the Commission compiled lists of records needing rebinding and recopying, described inadequate and adequate storage conditions, noted records known to be missing, and even analyzed habits of usage – all well in advance of the state historical records assessment projects of the 1980s and 1990s which also brought together historians, archivists, public officials, and other civic-minded figures to ascertain the condition of the states' records. Typical of their descriptions is that for the Court House in Queen Anne's County:
Such sentiments would also be found in the later reports, just as they had been evident in the eighteenth century records surveys of government offices.
astounding, but continued the tradition of earlier reports from David Ridgley and Brantz Mayer. The Commission initially noted the incompleteness of its work. It had not been able to study the records in one county, many of the offices of the Baltimore Court House, the Court of Common Pleas, the offices of the Secretary of State, Comptroller, Treasurer, and Court of Appeals, State House, State Library, and some of those in Baltimore City Hall. More importantly, it demanded "prompt action on the part of the Assembly, for delay in the work of rescue and preservation will prove fatal in many instances." 49Such recommendations echoed earlier reports and predicted what latter records reports would also reveal and actions urged. Urgency of attention was always recommended, and nearly always ignored.
twentieth century, there was the legacy of the Maryland Historical Society, and the increasing attention to and use of historical records by an array of scholars. The mandate for the work of the Commission had been the analysis of public records "required by law to be preserved, filed or recorded in any office of the State, or of any county or municipality, or of any officer or employee of the State, or of any county or municipality." 50Thus, the Legislature acknowledged from the start their legal responsibility. Apparently, the Legislature interpreted its funding of the Commission as fulfillment of this responsibility. Mrs. Richardson did mention in her summation to the American Historical Association that a bill to establish a central archives had been drafted, 51 but this actually would not occur for three more decades and Maryland would be among the last of the southern states to organize a public archives (although well in advance of other states in other regions). 52Not only was a plan to find a "safe and secure building in Annapolis" for the records defeated in the legislature, 53 the only result was the authority of the Commissioner of the Land Office to select "records at this time [1908] most in need of preservation and restoration." Preservation and restoration generally meant only transcription and rebinding. 54
archives. All along the East Coast public archival agencies were being created, mainly stimulated by the professional historians of the American Historical Association. 55Certainly in Maryland such professional research was highly visible and significant, with theses and dissertations being completed at ever-increasing rates (see Table One), most of these coming from area schools. 56Possibly, the fact that the Maryland Historical Society had been custodian of selected early records discouraged such a development. A number of the western states also used existing historical societies for this purpose. 57
Source: Richard R. Duncan and Dorothy M. Brown, comps., Master's Theses and Doctoral Dissertations on Maryland History (Baltimore: Maryland Historical Society, 1970).
Maryland Historical Society and the Land Office were "reluctant to relinquish their rights as archival agents for the State." 58A professor from Hopkins appealed in 1919 not to the state but to the Maryland Historical Society "for an aggressive search of the State for historical material." 59It was obvious that the State's involvement in archives was inevitable, however, as the Society was on shaky financial grounds and other than the publication of the Archives and the Maryland Historical Magazine had nothing to contribute to resolve the tenacious problem. 60What it finally required was a massive public campaign in historical awareness, the celebration of Maryland 's three hundredth anniversary, that made the funding of a State archives politically acceptable, even sensible.
state. The celebration brought together amateur historians, professionals, patriotic groups, and the general populace. Among its many activities the Maryland Tercentenary Commission erected markers and monuments, reconstructed buildings, sponsored plays and festivals, and produced souvenirs; its most lasting and important contribution, however, was the creation of the Hall of Records in Annapolis. 61
arranged and preserved," 62 fulfilling a centuries' old interest for such an institution. Commissioner Carroll T. Bond, a Maryland Judge and legal historian, 63 lamented the loss of some private collections of Maryland documents to the Library of Congress and the lack of facilities for the proper storage and exhibition of museum artifacts. He suggested the name "Hall of Maryland History." Bond also was concerned that the use of this material be restricted to "a very few" and not "handed out as printed books are handed out in a library" and that an expert in preservation be obtained. 64Richard Duvall responded to Bond's request by informing him, despite his criticism of the institution, that the Maryland Historical Society was striving to collect private papers and artifacts and was more than willing to fulfill such responsibilities. Duvall also informed Bond they were simply not ready to consider such matters. 65The legalization of the Commission later in 1929 with the mandate that it "report to the General Assembly of Maryland of 1931 any recommendations as to what provision should be made for said Tercentenary anniversary n 1933 and 1934," reopened such debates. 66By the end of 1929 the Commission had definitely accepted the idea of a public archives as an integral segment of its plans. 67Some of the immediate questions revolved about the location of the building. In late 1928 many favored a site directly in the State House Circle , but by the following year an offer from St. John's College was the preeminent option and discussions generated about this until its formal and final approval at the very end of 1932. 68
debates generated by the efforts to define the scope of the public archival program. In 1930 Governor Ritchie requested Judge Bond to head a special committee to investigate the amount and type of records and the size and design of the building needed to accommodate them. 69Bond's scrutiny of the records, recalling all those special commissions and their records surveys of the eighteenth century, uncovered a serious fissure among the proponents of the public archives. He found evidence that the Maryland Historical society was "fearful" that it would lose control of its public records and that the Commissioner of the Land Office was also jealous of its collections under his jurisdiction. 70It soon became obvious that the Land Commissioner was the greatest obstacle. In 1928 the Commission noted that the "provision made for keeping [the records] in the Land Office at Annapolis is entirely inadequate, either for the preservation of the records, or for their convenient handling by the increasing number of persons wishing to study them." 71The vidence is certainly supportive of Morris Radoff's position that the Land Office and the historical society were sources of friction in the formation of a state government archives. Over the next years this conviction was compromised. In mid-1930 Duvall confided that "it has never been in my contemplation that these records would be taken out of the nominal custody of the Commissioner of the Land Office, but that if the Hall is erected, and the records removed there, they will be under the care of a deputy.”" 72Contributing to the dilemma was Ritchie's concern for the gubernatorial election at the end of 1930 and his fear of pushing an unpopular project. Daniel R. Randall, cognizant of such fears, could only note his exasperation with the whole affair and his private announcement that if it failed he would "seek seclusion in the lowest depths of the ship of State and wave my greetings to the Tercentenary Commission from the most nethersome porthole!" 73
February 1931 Judge Bond presented his report, proposing the storage of five thousand bound volumes and unbound materials in a building with two floors and a basement each 60 by 60 feet and 15 feet high; the total cost was approximated to be a quarter of a million dollars. Shortly thereafter the Legislature approved $200,000 for the location and construction of such a building, to be supervised by the Board of Public Works. 74Immediately after (and even during its consideration) the passage of this legislation, criticism was loudly raised concerning its contents. Judge Bond wanted "provisions" for an able "custodian or curator" and restrictions regarding the usage of the records in order to place an archival program on firm footing. 75Judge Bond was cautioned by Mr. Duvall that to opt at the present for an excessive number of regulations would only threaten the entire scheme. 76Internally the Commission continued to discuss such aspects of the archives as its architectural style and restoration and storage techniques. 77By the middle of 1931, however, the direct supervision of the building's construction was taken over by the Board of Public Works and the tasks of the Tercentenary Commission relegated more to the planning of the celebrations. 78Duvall's argument that the "Commission, composed of a body of impartial citizens having no other desire than to see a worthy consummation of the whole matter, would be better able [to secure] competent and desirable architects . . ." fell on deaf ears. 79
site on St. John's campus, constructing the building, and formally opening the Hall of Records for operations in early 1935. 80Just prior to its formal opening, the Hall of Records Commission was established to govern the operation of the archival program. The law also provided for the position of Archivists; outlined its responsibility as the collecting, preservation, and cataloguing of "old court records, official documents, records, reports, old newspapers, church records, private papers and other historical data . . . in order to encourage historical investigation and research in the history of the state:" and enabled the turnover of records by "every State, county, city, town or other public officials in the state . . . in his discretion" to the Hall of Records. 81
1935. Most of its problems consisted of the agency's implementing its mandate to collect records, creating hostility in every direction, especially from the Maryland Historical Society and the Land Office, both of which held large amounts of archival materials. 82But the Hall of Records made quick and steady progress. At first it worked alongside of the Historical Records Survey of 1936-1942, capitalizing on its findings and the expertise of its staff, most notably that of Morris L. Radoff who transferred from the project in 1939 to become State Archivist after the death of the first State Archivist. 83Most of its earliest collection came from the Maryland Historical Society, which transported large batches of historical records in 1936, 1938-40, 1945, 1947, and 1953. 84 Other early accessions included the records of the Maryland Court of Appeals and the land records of Baltimore and Anne Arundel counties. 85The process was similar to what occurred with the establishment of every other state government archives before and after, as well as with the National Archives, a process going on at the same time.
head for thirty-five years until 1974. Radoff steered the archives to a number of innovations and was honored for his work being elected as President of the Society of American Archivists in 1955 and accepting the bestowal of the Distinguished Service Award by the SAA for the Hall of Records in 1965. As one critic points out, the record of Radoff's career runs in "three concurrent stories,"--gathering the records, designing finding aids, and developing a practical archival "philosophy." 86A few examples of this remarkable career will suffice.
able to resolve or circumvent these difficulties. The State Archivist squarely faced the legal problems of a peculiar Maryland statute that defined all land and county records as non-current. Starting in the early 1940s a program of microfilming these records was initiated. Radoff also energetically lobbied and received in 1945 an act that required all such original records prior to 1788 to be transferred to the archives. 87He also continued his efforts at records management, culminating in a vast program (expansive for the time, an era when records management was just beginning to spread throughout government and business) established in 1953. 88Dr. Radoff also succeeded in acquiring gubernatorial records and set a precedent, although there still exists no official compulsory policy, 89 and also brought about the merging, in 1966, of the Land Office and state archives. 90
Radoff, whose treatise on calendaring is considered definitive, believed in this elaborate and time-consuming method since it aided historical research; in his opinion one of the reasons for the demise of the method was "the increasing interest shown by archivists in the use of materials in their custody for administrative rather than for historical purposes." 91Today, of course, we have witnessed a substantial shift to encompass administrative and other non- historical approaches to the use of archival documentation. 92Although he supervised the production of a number of noteworthy calendars, 93 they represented only a small proportion of the overall volume of records on hand at the archives. The entries were often subjective, required far too much staff-time, and were only ideally suited to the older records. Clearly, many of these kinds of problems were the result of such work being carried out long before the days of archival descriptive standards, and the modern Maryland State Archives now cheerfully uses many of these standards in providing access to its holdings. 94
Baltimore City Courthouse in 1835 forced the City's officials to grapple seriously with the care of its historical and administrative records for the first time. The completion of a separate record office in 1839 was a major, but incomplete, accomplishment, providing for the care of only select records and mistakenly viewed as the ultimate answer to archival administration. The awakening of interest in the city's past, commencing in the 1870s, brought these inadequacies under closer scrutiny. The creation of the City Library in 1874 and its gradual evolution to a full-fledged archival program by the late 1920s, largely due to the superb work of Wilbur F. Coyle between 1903 and 1920, was the awakening's most important result. Along with the establishment of the Maryland Historical Society and Maryland Hall of Records, the creation of a Baltimore City Archives was another major landmark in the development of the state's archival legacy. This municipal records program was a pioneer local government records program, although it never fully matured to meet its potential.
sketched a view of a single hotel and church, two taverns , a barbershop, a theater, a tobacco warehouse, financial firm, brewery, and private dwellings for some two hundred residents. 95Slightly over a decade later, the town was a bustling seaport and by the end of the eighteenth century the principal city of the state. 96The growth of this city was nothing less than phenomenal and its economic expansion inevitably wrought a transformation of its political significance. In the late 1760s the town became the seat of Baltimore County and within a few years a courthouse was constructed. 97The most important change came a generation later, in 1797, when Baltimore was incorporated.
city's early recordkeeping was far from sophisticated. Until the 1830s efforts to preserve it's own records were paltry. In 1791 the clerk of the city's Commissioners was directed to "procure a Mahogany Chest to contain the records and the Platts of the Town with two keys to the lock ." 98Similar acts came in the early decades of the nineteenth century. In 1817 a "fire proof Closet" for selected records was constructed in the Mayor's office and a decade later an ordinance instructed the city Register and various clerks not to allow the removal of records from their offices. 99Such legislation mimicked, of course, what had gone before with the colonial and state government records, although there is little evidence of direct influence. Such efforts seemed merely commonsensical for providing better protection for the records. We even today see local officials also mimic these efforts by producing vaults or by seeking off-site storage in secure commercial records center facilities. Storage of records is, of course, only one aspect of the management of local government records.
documents of the incorporation of the city revealed some concern for the records. 100In fact, the new City 's second ordinance directed the appointment of "persons to take into possession and safe keeping the Records, Papers, Proceedings, Monies and accounts of the corporation of the City of Baltimore ." 101Their concerns seemed genuine when in the first decade of the nineteenth century the old courthouse was replaced because it was determined to be "in a state of ruinous decay, and the public records therein deposited considerably endangered." 102Like their colonial forebears, the Baltimoreans established their best records guidelines in the face of catastrophe. Just as the near destruction of the statehouse in Annapolis prompted the initial comprehensive records legislation, the burning of the Baltimore City Courthouse in 1835 generated the best record care of the ante-bellum period.
the conflagration and their own remissness of the past half-century. Immediately after the event they presented a direct appeal to the Maryland legislature for the design and speedy construction of a fireproof record office. The petition read in part:
under the chairmanship of Solomon Etting, appointed to supervise the design and construction of the Courthouse and Record Office first met on March 25, 1835 . At that meeting it was decided to canvass the opinions and expertise of the various clerks. 104By the end of that spring Robert Cary Long, a prominent architect of the city, had been asked to submit proposals for buildings of several sizes; in July 1835 he was officially appointed architect of the project. 105
alternative plans, ranging in cost from forty thousand dollars to nearly forty-eight thousand dollars, 106but by the end of 1835, many questions had been raised concerning the suitability of Long's work. Several carpenters examined the projected arched ceiling of the second floor and stated emphatically "that the extent of the arching required . . . will render the building unsafe, and likely to fall." 107After considerable remedying of such defects, a plan was approved and in April 1836 the Commission decided to "prosecute the building with vigour." 108The laying of the cornerstone on June 29, 1836 reflected the progress being made. 109
building, done in the “Egyptian Style” according to the Commissioners, 111 was a large, graceful three-storied building of 54 by 68 feet situated next to the new courthouse on St. Paul and Lexington Streets. The main provision of the Record Office was for those records of the Orphans and Baltimore County Courts, with large vaults and cases and other storage space. 112Only a few months later, however, architect Long was cautioning the Commission about the future inadequacies of the structure (reflecting an honored tradition of society building records facilities deemed quickly to be short of storage space). Long also prophesied that "in view of future papers and taking into consideration the rapid increase and multiplication of records, attendant on a corresponding increase in the growth of a city, there can be no doubt than in less than fifty years hence," the current record office would be heavily burdened. 113Records professionals for generations before and since then have experienced similar challenges that new storage facilities are quickly filled. The City's investment of nearly seventy-five thousand dollars 114 for the building reflected a concern for the preservation of the records they were creating. Until after the Civil War, however, its construction represented the main manifestation of concern. In the 1840s the extent of new records legislation involved the recopying of some worn volumes, the sale of "all the waste and useless papers about the City Hall," and the hiring of watchmen to safeguard the Record Office. 115The problem of the limited record care was ably expressed by John B. Seiden-Stricker, President of the Second Branch of the City Council, in 1853. Mr. Seiden-Stricker labeled the City Hall a "Miserable shanty" and further noted that the "accumulation of documents, now largely increased every year, are altogether unsafe, for so poorly constructed are the walls of the building that they offer but a trifling means of protection against fire." 116Fire seemed always to be the main concern when it came to records, along with general neglect in storage and organization. Given the better records facilities of the modern era, a concern with natural calamities like fire has diminished (replaced by a stronger consciousness of disaster preparedness and issues about electronic recordkeeping).
xenophobia reflected in the state law passed in early 1833 that commenced the systematic compilation of Baltimore passenger ship lists in 1833. The legislation was directed at the large number of foreign paupers supposedly being sent by foreign almshouses and governments. By the provisions of this act a vessel's captain had a day to provide the name, age, and occupation of every foreigner or face a twenty dollar fine for every omission and forty-eight hours to pay $1.50 for each German or Irish immigrant over five years old or be levied a one hundred dollar fine for every omission. There was no question that the law was intended to curtail the rate of immigration, with the act containing the statement that the dispatch of foreign paupers was "evil" and that this "should be remedied or alleviated as far as practicable." 117It was public knowledge that this law was the culmination of several years of efforts to restrict immigration altogether.
report of Baltimore's Health Officer, who since 1797 had the authority to inspect all vessels for evidence of disease, 118 noted an increase in the number of foreign poor: "I have been grieved to see so many persons amongst the number brought here as passengers, so destitute of the means of support, as well as a number laboring under disabilities both corporal as well as mental ." The Health Officer continued, "to the introduction of such without restraint we may safely attribute in some measure the overwhelming state of our Alms House and the multiplied calls on our charities." 119A week after receiving this report, the Mayor suggested that ship captains should be fined for "landing paupers, idiots, and person otherwise unable to gain a support by their own exertions." 120This remained the theme for the next several years concerning immigration with rumors of entire foreign almshouse houses being sent to Baltimore and the efforts of the trustees of Baltimore's almshouse to end immigration because of the cost of supporting the new settlers; the problem was serious enough that the Health Officer devoted his entire report of 1830 to the question of the foreigners complaining of the possibility of introduction of serious diseases and of many cases of "unruly conduct." 121
immediate catalyst for the 1833 legislation. In this report he described, in anything but a calm manner, the immigrants as a "depraved population" being " poured in upon us." The Health Officer recommended that masters bringing in passengers should have to report every one "who may have been convicted of any misdemeanor or crime" and that they be returned to the port of embarkation. His report also discussed cholera being brought in, helping to renew serious attention on the passengers. 122
read of statistics of immigration quadrupling in five years and of a tremendous new burden on the Baltimore public charity. In jingoistic terms the Committee complained of an increase in the poor rates, a "swarm of foreign beggars ... who infest our streets," "the very refuse population of foreign cities," and of those "who in consequence of their infirmities or vices are unable or unwilling to contribute to their own maintenance." 123Several days later the Mayor was requested to write to the Mayors of New York and Philadelphia to propose jointly approaching Congress for restrictive laws; this approach was taken since it was believed that the municipal government had no authority to levy a tax upon foreign immigrants. 124Eventually the state provided the desired mechanism with the 1833 law.
forced immigration of paupers unable or willing to support themselves. All of these explanations were largely pretenses covering anti-immigrant sentiments and expressing the fear of a society in great flux. Contagious diseases had always been a factor in local policies since the late eighteenth century, but the last serous epidemic had been many years ago; there was no major health problem directly attributed to the increased immigration nearly all through the first half of the nineteenth century and certainly not before 1833. 125The matter of foreign countries sending entire poor houses to the United States was never substantiated even in the years when it was most frequently discussed. The effect on the almshouse, however, is somewhat more complex and seems to have had some validity.
ill, elder, physical handicapped, and the mentally deficient or insane. 126Although extant annual reports of the almshouse are sparse, there was nearly a full run of statistics from late 1822 through early 1828 showing approximate geographical origin of the inmates, although only in one case listing specific country of origin. In those years inmates from outside Baltimore City and County and including other Marylanders and foreigners never exceeded more than two percent although they exhibited a slow but steady increase from 6.8 percent in the earliest year. 127As late as 1828 foreigners were not enough of a problem to be more carefully numerated although the trustees of the institution would still mark that pauperism has increased in the past year partly due to the "number of strangers which the public works in our neighborhood have invited among us.” 128In later years the percentage of foreigners increased to an average of half the inmates, 129 but during the late 1820s when the protests started the concerns seem greatly exaggerated.
such care was the fact that the 1830s were a period of great change for Baltimore and its citizens. Over the past half- century Baltimore had steadily grown from a small town to a thriving metropolis; starting with the 1830s the transformation became even more dramatic. Two historians have characterized the situation. According to Jean Baker, between 1830 and 1850 the city grew from "a manageable community ... to a vast impersonal urban center .…" Gary Browne states that the 1830s brought an “accelerating pace of foreign immigration, industrialization, institutionalization, and other forces of modernization that imposed a new, more utilitarian value system upon society, under physical appearance of the city." 130One of the prevalent aspects of the change to contemporaries was foreign immigration. From 1790 to 1820 about a quarter-of-a-million immigrants arrived in the United states, a slowed pace that contributed to the establishment and growth of American nationalism, a nationalism later transformed to anti-immigrant nativism with a vast increase of Europeans; from 1820 to the end of the 1850s nearly five million immigrants arrived, with three million in the decade of 1845-1854. Across the United states, but especially in the Eastern seaboard ports, fears of the foreigners because of their Catholicism, the potential of cheap labor, and the possibilities of rapid increases in poverty and crime led to the creation of restrictive laws like Maryland's of 1833 and led by Massachusetts and New York in the 1820s 131
number of foreigners arriving at Baltimore continued to grow until the disruption of the Civil War and resumed growth immediately after 1865; by the 1850s, even by the approximate statistics maintained by the municipal government, immigration was five times greater than it had been in the late 1820s, the years of intense debate leading to the restrictive legislation. 132That things were not working well is clearly portrayed in the official municipal reports after 1833. In the end of that year the Health Officer was concerned because the $1.50 tax was less than that charged in Philadelphia , New York , and Boston and that the law would, therefore, actually attract more immigrants to the city. 133Reports of the foreigners being "of the very lowest class of the population of Europe," 134 with shiploads of convicts and paupers 135 and of "Emigrants of bad character," 136 finally led to the suggestion by the Mayor in early 1838 that foreigners be sent back to Europe. 137In the same year, demonstrating that Baltimore was not involved in anything unusual, Congress conducted its first investigation on immigration and considered briefly restricting vagrants and paupers. 138
over the legislation seemed to accentuate the positive - helping ill and unemployed immigrants cope with their new environment. In 1834 the German Society petitioned the City Council requesting that a portion the immigrant tax be given to it to assist newly arrived Germans. One of the City Council committees favorably considered the petition since the $1.50 could not be considered revenue but rather "as a police regulation to restrain the importation of foreign paupers and to prevent them as far as possible from becoming a burden upon the City." The City Council referred the matter to the State Legislature believing it had no authority to revise the state law and the result was a supplement, passed March 12, 1834, authorizing the Major and City Council to give two-fifths of all income received from the passengers to the German and Hibernian Societies for the assistance to German and Irish immigrants who composed the vast majority of the foreigners. 140Although it is not possible to evaluate the direct impact these funds had upon the immigrant communities, the law provided ample funds to both Societies, totaling nearly one hundred and fifty thousand dollars. 141
Trustees for the Poor of Baltimore City and County after 1842. In that year a state law was enacted placing the remainder of funds arising from the immigrants' tax at the disposal of the trustees "for the purpose of supporting the foreign paupers." 142What led to this development is not certain except that the pressure upon the almshouse created by the foreigners had been in the fore of the debates for nearly two decades. In early 1842 a committee of the City Council examined the health care of the immigrants and while finding the legislation sufficient concluded that "no provision has been made to shelter or protect such unfortunate beings as may arrive here in a State of disease and for whose comfort and relief it is essential they should be immediately removed from the poisoned hold of the vessel." 143Such discussions may have prompted the funds to be directed to the Almshouse for immigrant health care along with the construction of a hospital on the south side of the Patapsco River. 144Between 1842 and 1875 $208,970 was given to the trustees, a figure representing a substantial portion of their overall budget. 145
1849 and the state passing a law to avoid this ruling, 146 the Supreme Court ruled that any system of charging foreign immigrants was a regulation of foreign commerce and therefore unconstitutional, leading to the first federal legislation restricting immigration and marking the end of the free period of immigration and its regulation by the states.
extant at the Baltimore City Archives cover only the period 1833-1866, although the manuscript summary volume continues until 1875 with indication of payment to the ethnic societies and the almshouse and no federal regulation restricting the municipal maintenance of these lists until that year. From January 1, 1820 every collector of customs was required to maintain lists and the microfilm version of passenger lists for 1820-1891 produced by the National archives shows that after 1866 extant lists came from the Customs Office no the municipal government. 148Either these lists were inadvertently destroyed, which seems unlikely to have happened without some notice, or the City continued to charge the head taxes based upon the Customs records. The only state or local legislation regarding immigration in this period is a state law appointing a Commissioner of Immigration or "inviting capital and labor into" the state "by means of immigration" and making it illegal for any agency, owner, or solicitor to visit vessels before inspection by the Commissioner. 149It is possible that this may have led to the end of the City-created lists, which were superfluous with the Federal government maintaining the same record. 150
municipal recordkeeping was, as stated in the 1835 petition for the Record Office, a restriction of the concept of record care to merely "security and safety." There was no thought of the needs for systematic collection, cataloguing, publication, or real awareness of the historical significance of the documents. The careful maintenance of the passenger ship records only developed because of the hysteria tending to surround the arrival of undesirable foreigners in the city. Interest in more systematic and broader recordkeeping would come, however, in the gradual evolution of the Baltimore City Library, created in 1874, to an urban archival program by the late 1920s. The impetus for this was an awakening of interest in the city's history, comparable to the awakening in Maryland history a half-century earlier.
dated the beginning of American urban history with the 1930s and, most notably, the work of Arthur M. Schlesinger, Sr. 151This viewpoint has persisted despite the hundreds of city histories composed and published before then. 152The foundation of this perspective is a solid argument, in that these earlier works often lacked a quality of any kind; Richard Wade simply stated that they were "marred by excessive description, inadequate analysis, and a fist- family basis." 153There can be little doubt that these works signal an awakening of some degree of the validity of the past to the present environment of the writers. The case of Baltimore demonstrates that these early writers-- whether antiquarians, boosters, or hack writers-paved the way for the later modern urbanists and that, today, they are the evidence of shifting notions of public memory. It is quite legitimate to suggest that without them, the records and source materials would have been either lost or widely scattered and inaccessible.
ignored Baltimore's past. From the production of the first state history in 1811 until 1871 the only historical studies consisted of Thomas Waters Griffith's brief sketch of 1824 and a collection of letters and other documents related to Baltimore's participation in the American Revolution. 154By the 1870s, however, a complete transformation had occurred; in that decade a number of lengthy volumes appeared. In 1871 two Maryland journalists brought to fruition a project of two years, Baltimore: Past and Present, which included a fine historical overview by the aged Brantz Mayer. The preface announced that this book was completed to rectify the neglect of the city's history and to offer "to the public the first compendious account of Baltimore, and of prominent Baltimoreans ever yet published. 155
widespread manifestation of urban boosterism. The histories of Kansas City published between 1850 and 1930 exhibited "a dominant tradition, drawing its force from conceptions of what the city was supposed to be and what it was supposed to become"; 156 a similar tradition was also present in Baltimore 's histories. Griffith 's early history had originally been conceived as a guidebook to the city; despite his failure to produce such a volume, other guides poured from local presses from the 1830s until well into the twentieth century. 157The City was rapidly expanding in all directions and natives were eager to highlight the greatness of its past as a beacon to its present and future greatness in order to attract new businesses. 158George W. Howard's The Monumental City, first published in 1873, announced that this "little vessel" was intended to "bring to our port the treasures which our merchants and business men so richly deserve." 159Over half of the book was filled with advertisements and handsome illustrations, and its appearance in three further editions by 1883 attested to its important role in the city's development.
Scharf. Scharf employed numerous local historians and antiquarians to help him compile his voluminous chronicles. Although Scharf did much outside the realm of Maryland history, the appearance of his Chronicles of Baltimore in 1874 and History of Baltimore City and County in 1881 represented the most significant of Baltimore's nineteenth century histories. 160The Chronicles was the first detailed history of the city and Scharf himself called it an "encyclopedia" of facts and figures. 161It also exhibited to date the greatest utilization of source materials. He confessed to the "ransacking" of the "house of history" for "every possible and available source" and also alluded to the added importance of his book as insurance of the preservation of "historical materials." 162Scharf's work showed the popularity of urban history in the last decades of the nineteenth century, as his books stayed in print and he employed many freelance writers and researchers. In his History of Baltimore City and County he boasted of sending out over twenty-five hundred letters to person possessing valuable historical information. 163
1880. The Baltimore Morning Herald of August 1879 carried an article by Scharf reminding citizens that the one hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the founding of the city had just passed and lamenting the lack of any notice of it. 164Soon Daniel Coit Gilman of the Johns Hopkins University and the Maryland Historical Society became involved, proposing a major celebration. From the outset the celebration was destined to be in the booster tradition. Mayor Ferdinand C. Latrobe stated in his encouragement of the project, that “The wonderful progress made in the wealth, commerce and general prosperity of the city within the past few years is an evidence of what the future has in store for it, and the honorable record of Baltimore's history and that of her people is deserving of being told not only to the present generation, but rescued from its hiding and pigeon holes and put in some lasting shape, to be preserved for those who are to come after us.” 165Despite some early problems such as a lack of funds and the strange reluctance of the Maryland Historical Society to become more than a minor participant, 166 the festival that finally occurred in October 1880 involved every inhabitant of the city. 167The official history of the event--itself a testimony to the awakened awareness of the city's origins--described the week of celebration in the following manner: “Old relics of every sort were hunted out and furbished up; old letters re-read; old histories thumbed anew, and finally the quaint spectacle was witnessed of a business community of 330,000 souls totally absorbed in the study of decorative art.” 168
understatement. One need only compare the 1880 festival with the modest parade in honor of Baltimore 's centennial in 1829 to see that something had changed. 169The sesquicentennial mood also spawned a movement toward the production of special commemorative histories. Between 1880 and the first decade of the twentieth century, historical treatises of Baltimore's religious groups, service professions, and ethnic communities appeared. 170These urban citizens continued to festoon their city with reminders of their illustrious past. In the immediate decades after the celebration, numerous monuments were erected to local heroes such as John Eager Howard, Francis Scott Key, George Peabody, Samuel Smith, and Edgar Allen Poe, enabling Baltimore to live up to its earlier designation as the "Monumental City." 171Typical of the city's concerns was its adorning of the new courthouse between 1902 and 1920 with murals commemorating the settling of Maryland, the burning of the Peggy Steward , the 1649 act of religious toleration, Washington resigning his commission in Annapolis in 1783, and the surrender of Cornwall is at Yorktown; also along these lines was the city's long battle to preserve Fort McHenry as a national monument. 172The city even had the energy to stage equally extravagant celebrations in 1914 in honor of the centennial of the Star-Spangled Banner and in 1929 for its bicentennial. 173
excavation. After Scharf's twin studies of 1874 and 1881 numerous city biographies appeared, but none that matched the caliber of these. The title of one 1928 opus-- Baltimore: A Not Too Serious History -- and the author's confession that her "chief aid and support" was John Thomas Scharf who "has written the best and biggest book on Baltimore ...." 174 summarizes most succinctly the scholarly contributions of the previous half-century. The result was the awakening of the sensitivity of Baltimore 's inhabitants to its past. Baltimore was and is to this day the cultural capital of the state. One inhabitant wrote in 1893 that " Baltimore . ... is a city of schools, libraries, lecture courses, university advantages, and all that can conspire to the cultivation of intellect. 175It was only a matter of time before this fascination with the past in this milieu was translated to something far more substantial. One example was the establishment of the historical seminar at the Johns Hopkins University , which directed a number of professionally trained historians to the records of the city. 176 More important was the establishment of the City Library, which sponsored the first efforts to preserve, arrange, describe, and facilitate research into the city's historical archives.
major cities in the United States had established effective archival programs. Philadelphia , Atlanta , and Houston are three that have attempted to do so and, interestingly, all are post-World War Two developments. 177Baltimore, strangely enough in the light of the progress made in this direction over a half-century ago, is not to be included among that select list.
Admittedly, the office was primarily for administrative and legislative reference, but the Librarian was also to "take under his charge and keeping all the books and documents of every description, and the archives, records, papers and proceedings of the corporation. . . ." 178The importance of this latter responsibility was certainly underscored by the recent bloom of interest in the city's history, gaining the attention of even the urban bureaucrats. Mayor Joshua Vansant, at the formal dedication of Baltimore's new "fireproof" City Hall in 1875 belabored the point with a politician's flair: “The erection of this new and splendid structure, which we this day dedicate, and the collection and depositing therein of the musty records of the city which had been passed from a garret to garret of the various buildings which the corporation of Baltimore had from time to time occupied, and much of which was covered in piles of dirt and rubbish because there was no proper depository of them, nor any one whose especial duty it was to protect them, has enabled the excellent Librarian of the city to collect many records that are, at least, interesting as matters of history.” 179 Despite this auspicious start and excellent new quarters, the City Librarian was overwhelmed with his administrative tasks. He was simply overworked. It was not until 1876 that he was granted an assistant, whose main responsibilities involved bookkeeping and not archival projects. 180Moreover, the Librarian spent much of his time on special assignments such as an inventory of municipal property. 181For both 1876 and 1877 the Librarian simply described the records as "a confused mass" and noted his futile efforts to cope with the situation. 182
that the increased indexing and arrangement of the records caused a concomitant increased usage of the records by the "various departments of the City Government and citizens generally." 183The annual reports of subsequent years echo the same attitude and conditions. In 1879 the usage increased even more to the point that the Librarian suggested the levying of a fee: "If the information is valuable to a person, there can be no objection to paying a fee; and it will furthermore prevent many who, form idle curiosity, consume time." The only thought that kept the meager staff functioning at all was the hope that their work might cause "these valuable historic records . . . [to] be rescued from oblivion, and in some substantial form be preserved among the archives of the city." 184Samuel S. Smith, the Librarian in 1882 aptly depicted the daily routine of his office: “During office hours, almost all the time of myself and assistant is taken up with the active duties pertaining to the library, filling orders for stationery, etc., searching for papers and documents that are called for from time to time, and giving information to city officers and the general public whenever required to do so. While not thus actively engaged, our spare time is devoted to arranging, indexing and carefully filing away, in chronological order, all papers and documents in my charge, so that they may be quickly and easily referred to at any time.” 185By 1889 over five thousand person annually visited the Library and the Librarian succinctly and pointedly sated that its "growing business . . . makes it out of the question to properly arrange and store away many valuable documents . . ." 186
1878 and 1879 small sums were allocated for repairs to certain record groups, but no funds were earmarked for the use of the Librarian! 187Several years later Librarian Smith received more than enough money for stationery but still not one cent for the most basic record repair--rebinding. 188Finally, he resorted to a different tactic, that of requesting appropriations for specific repairs and purchase of valuable documents. The first such request came in 1883 when he asked for $1000 to buy a collection of maps because of their significance "in the many questions so constantly arising concerning old boundaries, names, drainage, etc., to say nothing of the question of good taste, in preserving these successive foot-prints of our city's march along the path of progress, civilization and wealth. It is equally true that not a city in the country is so inadequately provided with such records as the city of Baltimore." 189The Librarian's appeals to both the documents' political value and to civic pride were propitious, for he was able to purchase the collection and, thereafter, had little difficulty in acquiring needed, albeit modest, funding. 190
George C. Wedderburn's tenure. Wedderburn, a journalist and businessman, had had a bit of pertinent experience as Assistant Doorkeeper and Superintendent of the Document Room of the United States House of Representatives from 1880 to 1882. 191No sooner had Wedderburn assumed this position than he opened fire at his predecessor, especially complaining of the lack of administrative control of the records. He angrily noted that "there has never been otherwise a catalogue, record or index of any of the . . . books and papers in the custody of this department . . ." He began to rectify this at once and requested two additional assistants to better enable him to accomplish this task. 192Improvements quickly became noticeable in the Librarian's Office. The City approved the then huge some of $3850 for record repair after the report of Wedderburn that "many old and valuable original historical documents . . . are going to wreck . . ." 193During 1891 he as able to "preserve" nearly five hundred municipal maps by "mounting them upon muslin, nearly every one of which were in a dirty and dilapidated condition, while many were in several pieces and unfit for reference." 194
of its historical records. In 1892, in summing up the previous year's work, he requested the division of responsibility between the more mundane administrative burdens such as printing and stationery supply and the care of the archives. "The archives and records are public property," he bluntly declared, "and I most respectfully ask that their condition be looked into, or else that a special committee upon the library be appointed." 195In succeeding years he further requested the publishing of the "early records" 196 and the establishment of a fund for the purchase of books and manuscripts of importance to the city's history. 197Probably due to Wedderburn's influence, the new City Courthouse had the largest single allotment of space set aside for records storage. 198Wedderburn's final report of 1895 carefully summarized his efforts of the previous six years in the direction of better record care and, once again, firmly requested that some substantial action be taken by the municipal government; it was obvious by this time that he believed little had been accomplished. 199
1890, or even 1874. The new Librarian was shocked to discover the absence of a catalogue, and the requisite utilization of reading "over a number of lists or by relying on the memory." 200For the next seven years he devoted himself to establishing such a catalogue for as many of the records as possible. 201With the exception of his desire to see a small room set aside as a museum of "historical records, relics and documents," the wider vision of a full archival program, such as Wedderburn had pushed for, was lost. The summation of his philosophy of the City Library's function shows his emphasis on the purely administrative, with historical record care in a somewhat secondary role: “The importance of the City Library is . . . greatly underestimated. It comes in contact with all the City Departments, perhaps more than any other. It is the medium of communication for official publications between this city and other cities of the world, and can, therefore, if properly conducted, be the means of supplying valuable information, not only to city officials, but to the people generally. Then, too, when it is remembered that the Librarian is the custodian of all the official papers, books and documents from the time the city was incorporated, as well as many of the records of Old Baltimore Town, some of them dating back as far as 1729, the importance of the office will be more fully appreciated.” 202
Wilbur F. Coyle, assumed the post. In his first report he announced his intentions to fight for "better preservation of the archives, documents, etc., of the city" and proceeded to paint a vivid rendition of the Library's condition. "The `carnival of confusion' is being added to and aggravated yearly," Coyle mused, "and the problem just how to attack the dirty heap is becoming more vexed." 203But Coyle did not hesitate for long in just how to assail the dilemma. He began with the purchase of filing boxes--sixty-five hundred in 1905 alone--steel cabinets, historical reference works, and the systematic ransacking of all the offices of the government for historical treasures. 204And treasures he discovered. In 1908, in a closet "designed as a repository of overcoats and hats," he found papers of George Washington, John Adams, and James Madison. 205
repository. Coyle confessed to assuming his position with the "conviction that Baltimore knew little of itself" and the determination to correct this. In 1909 he summed up his philosophy: “The City Library is unique. It is a historical library of Baltimore for Baltimoreans; of Maryland for Marylanders, and it should never be anything else. This dominating feature should not be eliminated, curtailed or subordinated in the interest of any other, but the City Librarian should be encouraged, and the requirements of his position demand that this be his most important work.”
history. It represents the ` Baltimore of yesterday,' not the Baltimore of today; just a glimpse through the spectacles of the past." 206Of course Coyle's aim encompassed more than history. He called the Library "a storehouse of information concerning the City and State . . . [and added that] the City Library is not limited to matters purely historical, but includes data on financial, commercial, industrial, social and economic conditions . . ." But, he further reflected, the basis of his peculiar labor "necessitates a Knowledge of history [and] an appreciation of the value of records." 207
published an article in the Municipal Journal entitled "Preservation of Historical data and Official Records of the City a Function of City Library," and outlined its importance to understanding the city's past. In it he congratulated himself on his own success in providing "greater space than heretofore that is being devoted to Baltimore in school histories and geographies" and his steady supply of facts and illustrations to publishers. 208Even more significant was his overseeing the editing of four volumes of early city records between 1905 and 1909. Their purpose was to preserve the records and to make them far more accessible to the increasing research demands. 209Even today these volumes remain the only systematic effort at the publication of Baltimore's government archives.
efficient operation; this resignation ultimately led to the creation of a separate City Archives. An article in a local newspaper just before this retirement lavished praises on Coyle's tenure, noting his energetic style and ability to establish standards in the office. 210Although his annual reports gave the impression that all was well, the new Librarian, John A. Slowik, was not up to the mettle of his predecessor. 211In 1926 a controversy erupted over the need for this office, the argument being that the position had been since its creation a "fat piece of political pie," normally given to political cronies. The single exception had been Coyle's excellent service of seventeen years, which "made the office more than respectable" and gave it "a field of growing usefulness." 212As a result, the following year the Bureau of Archives was created, relegating the City Library (which was finally abolished in 1932) to a secondary administrative position within the Department of Legislative Reference, which had been originally organized in 1907.
greater importance of the Librarian's archival responsibilities. The 1927 transformation pulled the purchasing and maintenance of stationery and printing into a separate division, allowing the restoration of the Library to its "main purpose for which it was originally established . . . to keep under the control of this department books, documents, pictures, plats, maps . . . pertaining to Baltimore from its inception." The Bureau of Archives had as its "objective," the preservation of the City's Records. 213An archives expert was brought in for a preliminary study to establish an effective program 214 and Baltimore, seemingly, had entered the modern period. The Emergence of a Modern Municipal Records Program, 1927-1983.
Archives disintegrated into a morass through mishandling and lack of direction, until by the 1970s it was an archives in name only. The process of decline was by no means even or rapid. In the late 1930s the regular staff of the archives was assisted by as many as six workers of the Historical Records Survey of the Works Progress Administration. 215The result of this work was about twelve hundred detailed worksheets completed by 1942, when the HRS ended. 216These worksheets, presenting the efforts of at least twenty different catalogers, clearly picture a vast, disorganized mass of records. There were over two hundred boxes of cancelled checks for only one decade (1917- 26), indicating that these records had not been weeded or examined for historical and administrative values. Until the 1940s, then, there were few new attempts to manage the records of Baltimore 's municipal government. These early efforts were restricted to historical records, although there never were local criteria for determination of the term historical . The HRS surveyed records and indexed by name and subject numerous so-called historical documents but neglected the questions of storage, provenance, inventories and administrative histories, and a general guide. For three decades, however, the HRS efforts constituted Baltimore 's municipal archives.
horriblepanorama of "dirt-covered, water-soaked, tattered" records strewn about the basement and attic of city hall, itself a structure badly needing maintenance. This article prompted replies by officials of Maryland Historical Society, the State archives, and various citizens' groups. Interestingly, the state archives offered to care for these records in Annapolis but never pursued the matter further. 217With the exception of the selective preservation of the records of Annapolis -- Maryland 's first major urban center and state capital--the State archives provided few guidelines for the care of municipal records.
established a committee consisting of the city comptroller, president of the city council, director of public works, city solicitor, and director of legislative reference to review all records and to formulate a "plan for putting order and system in the keeping of records. 218Under the leadership of Dr. Horace Flack, director of legislative reference, the records committee sent out a questionnaire to all departments soliciting the recommendations for retention periods and ascertaining what records were in existence. This committee, however, never proceeded beyond seeking useless records for destruction, mainly cancelled checks and outdated bonds. Flack spent much of his time contesting the notion that the cost of an independent survey was justified (one consulting firm, Records Engineering, Inc., suggested $42,000). He believed that an ordinance of 1941 enabling the destruction of records older than five years with the approval of the city solicitor and himself was satisfactory, that municipal officials were the most qualified to make judgments regarding the value of records, and that a thorough weeding of the municipal records would so reduce their volume as to provide easy storage. 219Flack, over-zealously endeavoring to save money and obviously trying to protect his authority for the maintenance of records given him in the earlier ordinance, headed a committee that faded gradually into inactivity and had no real results. A confusion of destruction with management was the only legacy of this committee.
towards microphotography. The City Treasurer wrote a letter to the Mayor in late 1950 suggesting the appointment of a "Committee for Safeguarding City Records" in order "to determine the city records should be microfilmed or placed in safekeeping as a matter of precaution in the event of war." 220At this time no committee was organized but funds were shifted from civil defense for the purpose of purchasing a camera, storage equipment, supplies, and hiring staff for the filming of essential operating records. This program was initially under the direction of Flack who continued to block the formation of a new committee and survey efforts. 221
from city hall to a temporary storage area several miles away. This idea attracted the attention of several members of the City Council who argued for a centrally located records center with a specialized staff. When the matter of funding such a move of records came before the Board of Estimates, it reactivated a records committee. This committee was not under Horace Flack but J. Neail McCardell, the City Comptroller, a change because of Flack's earlier failure regarding the records survey and solution to the records problem. McCardell immediately contacted Records Engineering, Inc. and urged that such private consultants be hired to conduct a survey. Local newspapers immediately picked up the story and encouraged matters to continue to proceed thusly. In the meantime the microphotography unit was shifted from legislative reference and placed under the city auditor, Horace C. Beck, Jr. Beck soon called for a separate, permanently established micro-photography unit with full-time staff, a regular budget, and its placement under the City Comptroller, not legislative reference, since "experience has shown that this has not been completely satisfactory." Sentiment now dictated that an outside consultant be employed in order to gain proposals quickly for the records work. 222
Safeguarding City Records to engage Records Engineering, Inc. to do a government-wide survey at a cost of $55,000 and in four phases to ensure the municipal government's satisfaction with the firm's work. The objective of the survey was to determine "economical and efficient methods and procedures in the management and retirement of current and noncurrent records involved in the conduct of the business of the city." Records Engineering would identify records, propose retention schedules, develop procedures for an ongoing records program, determine records suitable for microfilming, and suggest a scheme for the establishment and maintenance of a records center. 223The first phase was completed by the end of August 1953, and the pleased city officials funded the remainder of the study. 224In March 1954, the entire survey was completed, reports issued, and the debate over its findings begun.
records of twenty-nine agencies holding about forty thousand linear feet of records, but its prime recommendation for the establishment of the position of records management officer and the Records Disposal Committee was adopted with few modifications. However, several aspects of the survey were extremely poor and continued to plague the creation of an effective program for the municipal government's historical records. It was quite obvious from the tone of the reports and the actual recommendations of retention schedules that the consulting firm was emphasizing the notion of an effective management program as that which would destroy as many records as quickly as possible. Over eighty percent of nearly six hundred recommended schedules called for the retention of records for five years or less; only thirty-four schedules, or less than six percent, called for permanent retention and only two of these because of historical significance 225Records Engineering, Inc. made no specific proposals for an archival program except that the Records Management Office would be under the City Comptroller, and historical records, only vaguely defined, would continue to be sent to the Department of Legislative Reference which had already been declared as being not appropriate for their preservation. The reduction for records and the proportionate reduction of records storage cost were reiterated and was the theme of the reports. Furthermore, Records Engineering, Inc. seemed little aware of or interested in the records identified by the HRS.
Records Management Division somewhat modified the neglect of historical records. The recommendation that the records management agency be placed under the City Comptroller was not heeded; instead, the function was placed under the Department of Legislative Reference, giving a single agency responsibility for both the current and historical documents. This development was predictable with the retirement of Flack a year before and the cooperation and leadership to his successor, Dr. Carl Everstine, since early 1953. 226More important was the intervention of Wilbur H. Hunter, Jr., director of the municipal museum, who proposed first to his own trustees and then, with their approval, the city council an amendment to the pending legislation that historical records could be loaned to the museum and the director of the museum would be a member of a records disposal committee. Hunter, since his involvement with the museum, had seen it as an official repository for such records and urged that it, not legislative reference, be the "proper permanent depository for those historical records which have no further immediate connection with the official activities of the various city department." With the exception of this last item, the legislation incorporated Hunter's suggestions.
program was within grasp. Providing explicit details on the nature of records and their creation, maintenance, and disposition and having a procedure (albeit, a weak one) for the care of historical records, the success of such a records program was dependent upon proper financial support by the municipal government and the hiring of an individual capable in current records management and sensitive to the potential historical importance of all records. It was in both of these areas that th |