Members will be aware that the Federation Archive was passed to Durham University, where it is now housed in their library.
The collection is being catalogued by Genny Silvanus who has been cataloguing for 14 hours a week at Durham University since last January, first on papers of religious women’s orders, and now on the Federation papers. As we hold approximately 5.5km of archives and 7.5km of books here, each file, volume or item has a unique number so that we can find records, preceded by the acronym for the collection. For example, the minutes of proceedings at the Third and Ninth Annual Conferences of Cremation Authorities is numbered FBC/1/1 . The catalogue will be put on the university website in due course, and researchers and members of the public can visit the searchroom and view the records.
She is currently about half way through the FBCA records, cataloguing, repackaging into acid free folders and boxing, and numbering.
Genny is confident that the work will be completed by May 2021 as it is proving quite straightforward and well organised. Durham University is hoping that it will be well-used as it includes the ethics surrounding burial and cremation in the later 20th and early 21st century.
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