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Vol. 26:1 ISSN 0160-8460 March 1998
From the Editor
Our first 1998 issue begins with a short article on the Commission's new effort to keep itself up-to-date on the projects it sponsors. This undertaking will center around educational presentations at Commission meetings. David Chesnutt, Editor of the Henry Laurens Papers and Project Director of the Model Editions Partnership, inaugurated this effort at the Commission's February meeting.
After a brief notice regarding the President's proposed 1999 budget for NHPRC, we have our acting executive director's commentary on the recent upsurge in private support for preservation of the nation's documentary heritage. This welcome development proceeds in part from the nation's interest in the impending celebration of the millennium. We also welcome our newest Commissioner, Mary Maples Dunn, who succeeds Constance Schulz as the representative of the American Historical Association. Short articles on the establishment of guidelines for electronic records management on government web sites and on the completion of the Salmon P. Chase Papers project follow.
We then have a summary report on the Council of State Historical Records Coordinators' Historical Records Repository Survey, which tells us much about American records at the state and local level. Thom Shephard, project coordinator of the Universal Preservation Format initiative, then provides us with an explanation of this promising approach to electronic records preservation and use. Articles on records relating to copper mining on Michigan's Upper Peninsula and on the rich documentary heritage of a small Vermont town follow.
At its February meeting, the Commission recommended grants totaling $2,908,789 for regrant projects, records access projects, documentary editing projects, and documentary publication subventions. We note the receipt of new records products and documentary editions. Then it's off to the White House for an evening with President Clinton in company with editor Gary E. Moulton, who had a hand in the making of Ken Burns' recent documentary film on the Lewis and Clark expedition. The issue closes with a welcome for new staff member Cassandra Scott. And don't miss our back-page photograph of Spanish-American War reservists encamped on Chickamauga battlefield!
