Accessioning

Accessioning a new acquisition establishes institutional stewardship of the materials, and facilitates the eventual arrangement and description undertaken by the processing archivist.1 Collection Management manages the documentation for each new acquisition record in SPEC, and ensures the accuracy of the metadata associated with its record. These initial steps are integral to preserve the order and integrity of incoming materials, and serve as the preliminary step in making a new acquisition accessible to future researchers.

At the New York Public Library, this process occurs after a deed of gift or purchase agreement for a new acquisition has been signed by the donor/seller, curator, and NYPL administrators; shipping arrangements have been made by the Collection Manager, and the collection has been scheduled for delivery. Prior to the delivery date, collection documentation from the acquisition process is compiled by the curator. This documentation includes relevant correspondence, purchase agreements, deed of gift, site visit reports, collection photographs, invoices, and donor/seller inventories.

A SPEC acquisition record is created by the curator and refined during the acquisition process. This record includes an object inventory, expected extent, information on the types of materials expected, and indicates whether the acquisition is an addition to an existing collection. All compiled documentation is stored in an acquisition folder in Google Drive, which is linked to the acquisition record in SPEC.

When a new acquisition is received by the Library, Collection Management works to obtain physical, intellectual, and legal control of the incoming collection materials. Collection Management rehouses materials that are in damaged or in oversized boxes, inventories audio and moving items, separates electronic records, and shelves the new collection in the stacks. The LSC Collection Manager notifies Archival Processing unit management once a new acquisition is accessioned, and Archival Processing unit management links the SPEC acquisition record to a SPEC collection record, and creates an ArchivesSpace resource record. The Senior Manager, Archival Processing creates project records in the Arrangement and Description projects queue in SPEC for all new collections. Archival Processing unit management assigns each new acquisition to a processing archivist in the SPEC projects queue, and creates a new card in the Archival Processing Projects Trello.

For a detailed workflow of acquisitions and receiving, see Collection Management’s Intake and Accessioning Procedures and Resources Policies and Procedures page on the Preservation and Collections Processing internal site.

  1. In 2021 the Society of American Archivists published the first book dedicated solely to archival accessioning. Editor and contributor Audra Eagle Yun introduces this essential function stating, “The basic components of an archival accessioning workflow are intake, receipt, record of transfer, and creation of an accession record.” Tammi Kim et al., Archival Accessioning, ed. Audra Eagle Yun (Chicago: Society of American Archivists, 2021). ↩