Oct. 3, 2008 — Explore the territory's history with a visit to the Territorial Archives, urged Territorial Coordinator for Archives Susan Lugo at a meeting Friday of the Rotary Club of St. John.
"We want to make the archives accessible," Lugo said.
About 20 people attended the meeting held at the Westin Resort and Villas Beach Café.
The Territorial Archives are housed at the Enid M. Baa Library on St. Thomas and the Florence Williams Library on St. Croix, both arms of the Planning and Natural Resources Department. They're a collection of everything from early records written in Danish, funeral booklets, yearbooks, local government documents, former Delegate Ron deLugo's congressional papers, and much more.
In 1967, the Legislature authorized the establishment of the Territorial Archives, but it wasn't until 20 years later that it provided funding. The National Archives loaned the territory an archivist in 1988, but Hurricane Hugo came along in 1989 and laid waste to the cataloguing already done at Florence Williams.
The archives program languished after the loaner archivist left in 1992, but Lugo is pushing to bring the Territorial Archives up to snuff.
Lugo is finalizing work on a grant application that will give the Territorial Archives $40,000 to plan how it will deal with all the territorial government's documents. If the grant happens, Territorial Archives will then be eligible for a $500,000 grant to implement the program.
Help is needed fast because old documents are crumbling. Lugo said that one very old book listing long-ago property transactions at the Recorder of Deeds Office has crumbled so much, it's no longer readable. Its remains are kept in a crate high up on shelf.
Her visit to Rotary was in conjunction with Archives Month, a national event celebrated for the first time this year in the Virgin Islands.
A series of events are planned, starting with a genealogy workshop from 9 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Saturday at Enid M. Baa Library.
The Friends of Elaine Sprauve Library will host a presentation by Lugo on the Territorial Archives. It will be held from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. Wednesday at Bethany Moravian Church Hall on St. John.
Other events are planned later in October on St. Thomas and St. Croix.
Lugo also unveiled a poster featuring the 17 women who served in the Legislature. The poster, which will be used as an educational tool, doesn't have names included with the pictures.
"They'll need to identify the image and when they served, plus answer questions about what happened when they served," Lugo said.
The winning class gets a tour of the Territorial Archives, Lugo said.
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