Miracle Theatre Archives ~ The Next Steps

Posted on June 13, 2013 by Natalia Fernandez

Now that we know what is there, it is time to process the collection! Over the past months, the archives of the Miracle Theatre Group in Portland, OR have be massaged, fussed with, and inventoried. The sheer volume of materials that have accumulated over the thirty year history of the theater is staggering. It is, fortunately, very well organized. As an archival collection, it is rich with history, various forms of media and tons of ephemera.

As can be seen in the photograph, there is more to this collection than dusty old documents to put in acid free file folders.

The project is ready to continue to the next phase:  Arrangement and Description. We now have an idea of what materials are there, what needs to be weeded out, and a preliminary Series description to work from.

One last part of the inventory process will involve coming up with an estimate of what types and quantities of archival storage materials will be required for the processing. Due to the many different types of media in the collection, a variety of archival boxes will be required.

The VHS Video tape collections alone, again, remember we are talking 30 years, will require at least a dozen archival boxes.  Another concern involves the various forms of beautiful original artwork that has been accumulating. To preserve these pieces correctly, various sizes of oversize boxes will be utilized to store these items flat. Add to this mix a huge pile of cubic foot boxes to house paperwork. With proper records management procedures and a retention schedule for accounting records, we hope to reduce the volume by at least one third.

Changing of the Guard:

I will be relinquishing control of this project into the capable hands of Katrina O’Brien, a Graduate Student in Archival Sciences from San José State University. The next phase of the Miracle Theatre Project, sorting out this mess I’ve created, will be her capstone project for her Master’s Degree.

OMA Archivist Natalia Fernández, MTG Director José Gonzalez, and soon-to-be MTG intern Katrina O’Brien

A meeting of the minds was held, May 16th 2013, with Natalia Fernández, MTG Director José Gonzalez and the incoming and outgoing interns of this major project. It appears that the magnitude of the collection did not scare Katrina too much, so I consider this first contact a success.

The next phase of the project will involve the actual processing of the collection. This will be completed at the Miracle Theatre facility over the coming months. Decisions on what materials will be transferred to the Oregon Multicultural Archives in Corvallis will be made in consultation with José Gonzalez.  Some materials in the archive, such as the collection of scripts, will remain in Portland as they are accessed on a regular basis.  Old financial records, historically important production records and much of the ephemera will be housed at the OMA. This will insure the collection will be available to researchers and theatre historians.

I am confident the collection will be in good hands with Katrina. I will continue as a consultant to help her as required. The final phase of this project will include an exhibit of the collection and possibly a gala reception for the 30th Anniversary of the Miracle Theatre Group next spring.  Of course we will keep you all informed of the continued success of this project.

My next assignment will be equally challenging and exciting.  I will have the honor of working with another historic artist’s collection from Portland, OR. Stay tuned for an introduction to the Obo Addy Collection in a couple of weeks.

~ Mike Dicianna, Miracle Theatre Group Archives Project Intern

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OSU’s Native American Longhouse Eena Haws (Beaver House) Staff Oral History Interviews, Spring 2013

Posted on June 7, 2013 by Natalia Fernandez

“Eena Haws” means “Beaver House” (beaver image by Haida Nation artist Clarence Mills)

In a collaborative effort between the OSU Native American Longhouse Eena Haws (NAL), Natchee Barnd, an Assistant Professor of Ethnic Studies and Native American Studies as part of the School of Language, Culture, and Society, and the OMA, we now have 7 oral history interviews with NAL staff members!

All interviewees were asked to share their experiences working at the NAL, give their perspective regarding the significance of the new Longhouse, and offer their ideas for the future of the Longhouse.

Hali’a Parish, Office Assistant

Interview Transcript and Interview Audio

Brief Biography:
Hali’a was born September 15, 1992, in Honolulu, Hawaii. Her hometown is Kapolei, Hawaii on the island of O’ahu. At the time of the interview she was a junior studying Business.

Interview Information:
Date: May 21, 2013
Location: Oregon State University’s Native American Longhouse
Length: 00:24:04
Interviewer: Natchee Barnd
Transcriber: Hope Ervin-Murillo

Interview Description:
Parish discusses her experiences and personal growth working on campus in the Native American Longhouse; her thoughts on the importance of diversity development in OSU and the local community; the joys and challenges of learning the Native American culture; the success of NAL participation in events such as Heritage Month, Connect Week, the annual Salmon Bake and the Grand Opening of the new Native American Longhouse; the September retreat in Salem for cultural centers staff; the opening of the new longhouse and the sense of community within; her ideas for Native Hawaiian activities, collaboration with the P0lynesian Culture Club and Hui o Hawai’i, and outreach to the local population; her advice to future longhouse staff; and her experiences as a Native Hawaiian both in Hawaii and here at OSU.

Carmen López, Office Assistant

Interview Transcript and Interview Audio

Brief Biography:
Carmen was born November 2, 1991, in Portland, Oregon. Her hometown is The Dalles, Oregon. At the time of the interview she was a junior double majoring in Human Development & Family Sciences and Spanish.

Interview Information:
Date: May 22, 2013
Location: Oregon State University’s Native American Longhouse
Length: 00:22:30
Interviewer: Natalia Fernández
Transcribers: Johnathan Ngo & Anna Brecheisen

Interview Description:
López discusses her experience working as an office assistant at NAL and learning about Native cultures; the NAL booth on Earth Day; the Salmon Bake event; the importance of salmon and camas to the tribes of the Pacific Northwest and the need to better communicate the meaning of salmon, camas, and dream catchers to event attendees; her experiences as a non-Native member of the staff; her feelings on missing the old Quonset hut, her advice for future non-Native NAL staff and any staff working in cultural centers they don’t racially or ethnically identify with the center in which they work; the significance of the full name of the new Longhouse; her ideas about the NAL collaborating with the 4Cs; and the positive effect of OSU 0n her personal identity as Latina, Mexicana, and Chicana.

Daniel Cárdenas, GTA

Interview Transcript and Interview Audio

Brief Biography:
Daniel was born May 24, 1985, in Anaheim Hills, California. His hometown is a suburb of Sacramento, Fair Oaks, California. At the time of the interview he was a first year grad student studying College Student Services Administration.

Interview Information:
Date: May 23, 2013
Location: Oregon State University’s Native American Longhouse
Length: 00:55:02
Interviewer: Natalia Fernández
Transcriber: Hope Ervin-Murillo

Interview Description:
Cárdenas discusses the challenges, responsibilities, and growth he has experienced working as a graduate teaching assistance in the Longhouse; the events of Native Heritage Month; the planning and challenges of opening and moving into the new Longhouse, the annual Pow Wow thrown by NASA; relationships with other cultural centers staff, ideas for intercultural center collaboration; the Oregon One Percent for Art law and the art in the new Longhouse, including the art of artist Shirod Younker; the importance of honoring intersecting identities, the generosity of the local Native community; ideas about bringing in Native language speakers, visiting other longhouses and building ties with the nine tribes of Oregon, and OSU’s impact on his personal racial, ethnic, and spiritual identity.

Nadia Alradhi, Activities Coordinator    

Interview Transcript and Interview Audio

Brief Biography:
Nadia was born March 19, 1992, in Eugene, Oregon. Her hometown is Estacada, Oregon. At the time of the interview she was a senior with plans to graduate in the Fall of 2013 with a degree in Public Health.

Interview Information:
Date: May 23, 2013
Location: Oregon State University’s Native American Longhouse
Length: 00:38:38
Interviewer: Natalia Fernández
Transcriber: Natalia Fernández

Interview Description:
Alradhi, a member of the Karuk Tribe of Northern California, describes her experiences as Activities Coordinator at the Native American Longhouse (NAL) and Secretary of the Native American Student Association (NASA). She discusses planning NAL activities; bringing events to OSU dorms; the challenge of advertising the NAL as available for non-natives as well as natives; NASA Pow Wow planning and Jim Thorpe’s 5k Dash for Diabetes; the challenges of learning more about other native tribes; the Transforming Columbus Day event in collaboration with the 4Cs; interacting and collaborating with other cultural centers; the addition of “Eena Haws” to the Longhouse name; her hope to bring back the “Calling All Natives” outreach event; advice for future staff; the effect of racism on her grandfather; the Longhouse impact on her as a Native student; negative comments from non-natives; her suggestions to get more exposure for NAL; her experience as an informal advocate for natives, and her wish for NAL and NASA to collaborate more.

Mariah Huhndorf, Activities Coordinator      

Interview Transcript and Interview Audio

Brief Biography:
Mariah was born November 13, 1991, in Anchorage, Alaska. Her hometown is Kenai, Alaska. At the time of the interview she was a junior studying General Science: Pre-Physician Assistant.

Interview Information:
Date: May 30, 2013
Location: Oregon State University’s Native American Longhouse
Length: 00:27:46
Interviewer: Natchee Barnd
Transcriber: Desiree Gorham

Interview Description:
Mariah, a native Alaskan with an Athabaskan mother and Yupik father, describes her experiences at Oregon State University, both as a student and as an Activities Coordinator at the Native American Longhouse. She discusses Longhouse events, such as the Alaska Winter Games, which she coordinated; the challenges and solutions that NAL staff have experienced with communication; her suggestions that staff learn more about events hosted at the NAL by other groups and work to make it clear that the NAL welcomes all visitors, native or not; what the new Longhouse means to her; how OSU and the NAL have affected her own identity as a native Alaskan; the importance of sharing stories and the “culture shock” she felt coming to Corvallis, with a population of about 54,700, from her hometown of Kenai, Alaska, with a population of about 7,000.

Matt Williams, Internal Coordinator     

Interview Transcript and Interview Audio

Brief Biography:
Matt was born January 05, 1992, in Roseburg, Oregon. His hometown is Winston, Oregon. At the time of the interview he was a junior studying Exercise and Sport Science.

Interview Information:
Date: May 30, 2013
Location: Oregon State University’s Native American Longhouse
Length: 00:40:47
Interviewer: Natchee Barnd
Transcriber: Hope Ervin-Murillo

Interview Description:
Matt Williams, a Native American with Oglala Sioux, Cherokee and Osage heritage, discusses his experiences as a student, a Native American, and a staff member at the Native American Longhouse (NAL). His discussions include his responsibilities, experiences, and personal growth as an NAL office assistant, activities coordinator and internal coordinator; the importance of teaching about native traditions; the Indigenous Feast at the end of Heritage Month; the Jackson family from Warm Springs Reservation; the challenges of managing time as a working student; NAL collaborations with various OSU departments and his desire for relationships with more departments; Dr. Robert Thompson’s talk about Native American and African American relations during the Civil War; his suggestions for future events and visits to native high schoolers; advice to future coordinators; the challenges of letting non-natives know they can use the NAL; his father’s adoption away from the Pine Ridge Reservation where he was born and subsequent separation from his culture; the N7 program and importance of basketball on many native reservations; stereotypes about Native Americans, and his experience of being mixed native and having a white mother.

Tyler Hogan, External Coordinator                 

Interview Transcript and Interview Audio

Brief Biography:
Tyler was born July 9, 1989, in Belleview, Washington. His hometown is Junction City, Oregon. At the time of the interview he was a senior studying Political Science.

Interview Information:
Date: June 3, 2013
Location: Oregon State University’s Native American Longhouse
Length: 00:36:09
Interviewer: Natalia Fernández
Transcriber: Anna Brecheisen & Johnathan Ngo

Interview Description:
Tyler, a member of the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma, talks about his responsibilities and growth as an External Coordinator at the Native American Longhouse (NAL), where he was previously a volunteer, as well as his experiences as a Native American student at OSU. His discussions include the importance of the Salmon Bake event; the NAL’s relationships with nearby tribes and his desire to have more tribal outreach; Heritage Month events, including the Two-Spirit event and tribal resource kit; the difficulty of getting out a unified message when the NAL staff are from so many different cultures; the gathering of student input during the planning stages of the new Longhouse; what the new Longhouse means to him; his advice to future coordinators; how resilient, passionate, and empowered Native Americans are, especially when given the opportunity; the three functions of the Longhouse; the Longhouse as a “home away from home” for native students; the effect of the Longhouse on OSU and the local community; the Longhouse’s contribution to personal identity development of staff and visitors; negative comments and stereotypes about Native Americans, and the N7 program’s positive effect on cultural competency.

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Braceros Photos in a New Salem Art Exhibit

Posted on May 23, 2013 by Natalia Fernandez

“Creating Abundance” Art Exhibition in Salem

Six photos from the Braceros in Photograph Collection are featured as part of a new art exhibition in Salem! 

The exhibit is Creating Abundance and ”features work by Phil Decker, Judy Phipps, Deanna White, Joel Zak, Roberto Oran, Steve Scardina, Andrzej Maciejewski and Dorothea Lange, as well our historic photographs of Oregon’s Bracero Program. Each artist approaches the subject of food in Oregon from a different angle, resulting in a multi-faceted exhibition designed to elicit questions and conversations.”

~ Salem Art Association Website, Exhibitions

Here are some photos of the Braceros images: 

The Alcove Gallery Featuring the Braceros Photos

Photos from within the Alcove Gallery: 

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Exhibit Information:

Location: Bush Barn Art House, Salem Art Association
                 600 Mis­sion St. SE, Salem, Ore­gon 97302

Dates: Now – the end of June 2013

Bush Barn Art Center

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Where are Those Materials? Creating a Digital Collection

Posted on May 17, 2013 by Natalia Fernandez

A reflection of my current project: The creation of an online exhibit for the Bobbie Nunn and Robert Ford Collection

I can’t say I remember a time when there was no internet. I was born right around the time that the World Wide Web was invented and implemented, which has officially made me a kid of the Information Age. While growing up, I have had the luxury of curing my boredom by “surfing the web” and having Google answer any question I have within .45 seconds (I just typed  Why OSU? into the Google search bar and it kindly rewarded me with “7,190,000 results 0.37 seconds”). The technological advances during the Information Age have led to an increase in both information sharing and information storage, which has created an interesting situation for me this term at the Oregon Multicultural Archives.

During the fall term, the OMA acquired a collection of materials consisting of newspapers, photo albums, letters, books, and magazines pertaining to the Nunn Family, a prominent African American family in Portland. The plan for the collection was to process it, create a finding aid, scan all of the materials, design an online exhibit, and then give it back to the donor. Therefore, after everything is complete, the OMA would be left with a collection that was solely digital. Returning a physical collection as per the donor’s wishes and instead, having a collection that is solely digital may seem uncharacteristic of an archive, however, having the ability to scan materials and share them on the Web is an amazing opportunity that provides extensive access to the collection. And, as with any digital collection, it means that people who are conducting research across the country can use our digital resources even if they can’t make the trip here.

Making history more accessible to a wider audience has always been a mission of mine, but this term I began questioning my project of creating a digital collection. How do I choose what gets digitized? Should I digitize everything? What if I chose not to digitize something and it could have been helpful to someone’s research? I quickly realized that having a collection that will only be digital takes more thought and planning than I ever realized. Even though we have developed a wonderful relationship with the donor, the OMA will not have the collection once we return it. Not having access to the collection means that the material I choose to digitize or do not choose to digitize will be important. The materials that are in the collection will dictate who will be interested in the collection, who will use the collection and how the materials will be used. Last week, after a considerable amount of thought, I came to the conclusion that just as I would have weeded (archives jargon for “removed”) certain materials from a physical collection, I should let the story within the collection guide me to decide what materials should be digitized. Sometimes it is difficult for me to remove materials from a collection, but I think that if I keep in mind the story that the collection is trying to tell, I will be able to create a digital collection that represents the entirety of the physical collection.

And so, over the course of these next few weeks, I will continue working on the creation of the online exhibit and will of course post again soon!

~ Until next time, Hannah Mahoney (OMA student worker)

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The OMA at NWA 2013

Posted on May 9, 2013 by Natalia Fernandez

AABC and NWA Conference 2013

The OMA was busy at this year’s AABC/NWA conference! Earlier this month the Archives Association of British Columbia (AABC) and the Northwest Archivists (NWA) held a joint conference in Vancouver, British Columbia, and the OMA participated in three sessions:

Session 1: Roundtable: “Prescripts and Postscripts: Connecting Theatre Companies and Archives in the Pacific Northwest” ~ In this session the OMA shared information regarding the Miracle Theatre Project; intern Mike Dicianna presented. Helice Koffler of the University of Washington was the session moderator and she discussed the American Theatre Archives Project as well as the Seattle Theatre Archives guide. Other presenters included theatre researchers, Renée Bucciarelli, City Stage New West, and Ken McIntosh, co-author of Burning Up the Infield.

Session 2: Panel: “The Oregon Tribal Archives Institute: Providing a Professional Development and Networking Opportunity for Oregon’s Tribal Communities” ~ The OMA has blogged quite a bit about this project and for the first time was able to share it on a  regional level! The OMA presented on its role within the project the other presenters included  David Lewis, Confederated Tribes of the Grand Ronde Community of Oregon; Jennifer O’Neal, University of Oregon; and Larry Landis, Oregon State University. More information is located on the OTAI Project Website

Session 3: Roundtable:  NWA’s Native American Collections Roundtable ~ The NWA-NAC roundtable was first conceived at the 2012 NWA Conference during the session, “The Protocols for Native American Archival Materials.” NWA-NAC Roundtable members, including the OMA, shared the history and progress made to create the roundtable; discussed the bylaws; and brainstormed topics for the NWA-NAC blog and future projects. The Roundtable Moderator was Mariecris Gatlabayan, University of Alaska Anchorage. Be sure to check out the NWA-NACR website for more information.

Conference Highlight:

Kim Christen, Associate Professor in the Department of Critical Culture, Gender and Race Studies and Director of Digital Projects at the Plateau Center for American Indian Studies at Washington State University, gave a great keynote address “Relationships not Records: Connecting Communities and Collections.” Christen’s ongoing work explores the intersections of cultural heritage, traditional knowledge, intellectual property rights, the ethics of openness, and the use of digital technologies in and by indigenous communities globally.

Click here for the Full Conference Program (PDF)

Next up for the OMA during conference season is two upcoming presetnations at the Association of Tribal Archvies, Libraries, and Museums, in New Mexico this June! 

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“The Fall of ’41: Students of Japanese Descent at Oregon State College”

Posted on May 1, 2013 by Natalia Fernandez

In celebration of Asian Pacific Islander Heritage Month, the Oregon Multicultural Archives presents the display “The Fall of ’41: Students of Japanese Descent at Oregon State College”.

Beginning with an overview of the Japanese immigration to Oregon, the display largely chronicles the campus reaction, both the students and the administration, in the months  after the attack on Pearl Harbor, and concludes decades later with the honorary degrees awarded to the Japanese students in 2008.

If you are interested in learning more, all of the documents and photographs within the OMA collections pertaining to the events have been digitized and are available online, see the blog post: OSU’s Japanese American Students During WWII

The Flickr collection of the display showcases the photographs of many of the students enrolled at OSC during 1941-1942.

 Display Information:

Dates: May-June 2013
Location: OSU Valley Library, 5th Floor across from the main elevators
Exhibit Curation and Design: Hannah Mahoney, OSU Special Collections and Archives Research Center Student Worker

Special Thanks: The exhibit includes photographs from the Oregon Nikkei Legacy Center (ONLC) in Portland, Oregon. We were lucky to have the opportunity to work with the ONLC on this exhibit to gain a better understanding of the Japanese American population in Oregon.

Want to learn more? Contact Oregon Multicultural Librarian Natalia Fernández at natalia.fernandez@oregonstate.edu

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Minorities in the Barometer, the 1960s

Posted on April 16, 2013 by Natalia Fernandez

Microfilm Boxes Containing the 1960′s Barometer

Last year the OMA began a project to search through The Daily Barometer (day-by-day) to find as many minority issues/multicultural related articles as possible, scan them, and make them available online. We started with the 1970s and just completed the 1960s!

Minorities in the Barometer Online Collection

The Daily Barometer, OSU’s student newspaper is a fantastic source of information regarding special events and campus controversies as well as a great way to get a sense of the general atmosphere on campus from the student perspective. The archives has copies of the Barometer dating back to the early 1900s both in print, in large bound editions, as well as on microfilm, which can be viewed via specialized equipment.

This project will continue, decade by decade, and we will be sure to post about it when we make another decade worth of articles available!

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Oral History Interview Regarding Colegio César Chávez

Posted on April 9, 2013 by Natalia Fernandez

Colegio César Chávez advertisement, Silverton-Appeal Tribune–Mt. Angel, Sept. 1980 (Andrew Parodi on left)

Several years ago Andrew Parodi and Karen Olivo shared a part of their lives with the OMA through their donation of a collection of materials pertaining to the Colegio César Chávez.

As the first and only independent Chicano-oriented and managed four-year college to emerge in the nation, Colegio César Chávez occupies an unparalleled place in Chicano history. Andrew and Karen were a part of that history; they lived at the Colegio from 1980-1982. Arthur Olivo, Karen’s husband was a student at the Colegio as well as the campus groundskeeper. For more information about the collection, be sure to view the collection’s finding aid: Colegio César Chávez Collection 

Last year, Andrew and Karen again shared their lives with the OMA, this time through an oral history interview. In the interview, Olivo and Parodi begin by chronicling Karen’s early life and her time spent living in Alaska. They continue by discussing how Karen met Arthur Olivo, her future husband, while attending De Anza Community College; Arthur’s work at Center for Employment Training in central California; and how Arthur and Karen began their relationship. The bulk of the interview begins when they explain Arthur’s decision to move to Oregon. During this part of the interview they detail their time working and living at Colegio César Chávez in Mount Angel, Oregon. They discuss the physical grounds of the college; the people they interacted with while they were there; events at the college; ethnic discrimination they endured; and the politics behind the closing of the college. Throughout the interview the two discuss aspects of Mexican culture and the family structure of the culture. They conclude by explaining the end of Arthur’s life and how having him in their life impacted them.

Interview Information

Title: Andrew Parodi and Karen Olivo – Oral History Interview
Date: July 23, 2012
Location: Corvallis, Oregon
Length: 02:26:43
Interviewees: Andrew Parodi and Karen Olivo
Interviewer: Natalia Fernández
Transcriber: Hannah Mahoney

Interviewee Brief Biographies

Andrew Parodi (b.1975) was born in Mountain View, California. He is the son of Karen Olivo and the stepson of Arthur Olivo. He lived at Colegio César Chávez with Karen and Arthur from 1980 – 1982. He attended Western Oregon University.

Karen Olivo (b. 1939) is the widow of Colegio César Chávez student and groundskeeper, Arthur Olivo. Born in Chicago, at age 6 her family moved to Anchorage, Alaska to Yakutat where she lived with the Tlinget indigenous people. In 1977 while living in Sunnyvale, California and attending De Anza Community College, she met Arthur Olivo. Arthur was a teacher for the Center for Employment Training. When he was offered a job in Tigard, Oregon in 1979, Karen and her youngest son Andrew moved from Sunnyvale, California to Oregon with Arthur. In the Fall of 1980 Arthur enrolled at Colegio César Chávez and was also the college’s groundskeeper. Karen, Arthur and Andrew lived on the property of Colegio César Chávez until they were asked to vacate in 1982.  Karen has lived in Gervais, Oregon, since 1983. She has volunteered for nearly a decade with the Foster Grandparents organization as a “Grandparent” at the Western Oregon University Day Care Center and the Jensen Arctic Museum.

Interview Transcript and Interview Audio

video platform video management video solutionsvideo player

For more information about the Colegio’s history, read the book Sonny Montes and Mexican American Activism by  Glenn Anthony May

 Also, check out two digitized items from the Colegio César Chávez collection:
Colegio Catalog, 1978-1979
Colegio Newspaper Advertisement, 1980

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Thoughts on Theatre Archives Organization

Posted on March 11, 2013 by Natalia Fernandez

Unorganized File Box

After spending some quality time with the Miracle Theatre Group’s archives, I have already developed some ideas on how to arrange this substantial collection.  After thirty years of accumulation, the miracle of the Miracle Theatre archives is their completeness and organization. Theatre folk are not normally known for their organizational skills, artistic, left brain types seldom are. However, these boxes and binders of theatre history actually lend themselves to an organized structure or “arrangement”, in archivists’ terms.

Archival collections are broken up into series and sub-series, think…”outline”.  The Miracle Theatre records generally fall into three main categories:

Accounting, Promotional, and Production Materials

      Series I:  Theater Operations and Finances

  Series II:  Productions (Theatrical Seasons)

            Series III:  Promotional Materials

Within these groupings are natural sub-series. Boxes of financial records and three-ring binders containing ledgers, grant applications and old receipts/bills. Records of the daily operations of a theatre group can be just as important to a researcher as play scripts or promotional photographs. This inventory of the Miracle Theatre Group has also shown that keeping absolutely everything is not the best practice.  Thirteen year old phone bills are well past the records retention date and should be purged from the boxes. A reduction of probably 1/3 of the original volume of accounting records will be achieved by using best practices of Records Management.

Records Management Examples

The Miracle Theatre has a long history of productions, community workshops and outreach. This involvement is well represented in the collection with various forms of media.   Posters, programs, photographs (of all types) and other ephemera have been gathered over the years and placed in storage. These items are of historical importance to the theater as well as the Latino/a community.  Sub-series within these topics will be arranged based on the Miracle Theatre’s yearly seasons. Playbills, tickets, and programs are currently stored in Zip-lock bags by season. Additionally, there are files of production materials such as budgets, lighting plans, costume designs, and artwork for these plays that still need to be inventoried.

This project began as an initial inventory of the Miracle Theatre Archives.  It has evolved into a lesson in arrangement and description, even before this process has officially started.

~ Mike Dicianna, Miracle Theatre Group Archives Project Intern

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American Theatre Archive Project Presentation at Miracle Theatre

Posted on March 5, 2013 by Natalia Fernandez

Helice Koffler, Rachel Kinsman Steck, and Jeff Katz of the Northwest Region of ATAP

On Thursday, February 28th, the OMA’s Miracle Theatre Project participated in a meeting of local Portland, Oregon arts groups featuring the American Theatre Archive Project (ATAP).  Helice Koffler, Rachel Kinsman Steck, and Jeff Katz of the Northwest Region of ATAP gave presentations about the importance of preserving theatre history.  Every theatre group has some type of archive, either organized or accumulated.  It is of historical importance for these groups to get a handle on their volumes of records, ephemera, and production materials.

Examples of Various Forms of Media Found in a Theatre Archives

To illustrate just how theatre archives can be managed, I put together a display of Miracle Theatre materials.  I arranged some of the theatre’s archival holdings along with the proper archival storage and organizational materials.  Different forms of media, such as video, CD/DVD, photographs, and floppy discs were used to highlight the need to preserve productions for the future.  Good records management practices were also stressed.  A records retention schedule for items like financial records can thin out the bulk of many stockpiles of theatre papers.  A sign with “Do we really need to keep thirteen year old phone bills?” helped to drive home this concept.  The representatives of the Portland theatre community learned that setting up an archival program has many benefits.

ATAP Meeting Group

ATAP’s Helice Koffler presentation included information about the national program and its history, as well as efforts underway in the Pacific Northwest.  Jeff Katz introduced the ideas that not only are physical archives important to establish, but gathering oral histories of important theatre founders is equally imperative.  Rachel Steck showed how theatres can have an online archive, possibly including videos, interviews or photographs.  OMA Archivist Natalia Fernández spoke of the relationship we are developing with José Gonzalez and the Miracle Theatre Group.  She emphasized that organizations such as the OMA can provide expertise, collection storage, and arrangement assistance.

I felt that the ATAP meeting was very successful.  The OMA Miracle Theatre Project was well represented and proved to be a model that other theatrical groups can emulate.  The theatre groups in attendance learned the importance of comprehensive archive programs to preserve the history of the arts in Portland, Oregon.

~ Mike Dicianna, Miracle Theatre Group Archives Project Intern 

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