Beaufort County Library Records Finding Aid

In honor of National Library Week, we just posted a Finding Aid to the Beaufort County Library Records under our stewardship here in the Beaufort District Collection. Since Amanda Forbes came on staff in late June 2017, she has concentrated on organizing the archives portion of the Beaufort District Collection. She  finished an inventory begun by Ashley Sylva and has begun compiling Finding Aids to our holdings. The Beaufort County Library Records, 1862 - 2018 Finding Aid will begin a series of Finding Aid posts in our BDC Wordpress Blog until such time as we can add Finding Aids into the SCLENDS consortium catalog. 

 

We have more than 150 Finding Aids yet to post to cover all the archival collections of records and papers that we steward so this is definitely a work in progress. 

Q: What's a "Finding Aid?" 

 

A: A finding aid, in the context of archival science, is a document containing detailed information about a specific collection of papers or records within an archive. A finding aid is a tool that facilitates discovery of information within a collection of records. This single document places the materials in context by consolidating information about the collection, such as acquisition and processing; provenance, including administrative history or biographical note; scope of the collection, including size, subjects, media; organization and arrangement; and an inventory of the series and the folders.

 

This description of records gives the repository physical and intellectual control over the materials and assists users to gain access to and understand the materials. Finding aids are used by researchers to determine whether information within a collection is relevant to their research. 

 

Read the Beaufort County Library Records on our Wordpress blog. Researchers can access the records described in the Finding Aid during the Beaufort District Collections customary hours of operation.