Processing Manual [legacy]

The following manual had its genesis in a project started by Leslie A. Morris in ca. 1993 to make guidelines based on the descriptive practice used in the Manuscript Section of the Houghton Library. These guidelines were assembled and added to by Bonnie B. Salt, as a beginning to a processing manual. In the fall/winter of 2009/10, the Manuscript Section of the Technical Services Department expanded the manual to include guidelines for various formats of material.

This manual covers the physical/intellectual arrangement of collections and their description in a finding aid.

Workflow for processing a collection (you can also follow the workflow with the checklist) :

1. Research
2. Curator consultation
3. Collection retrieval
4. Processing plan
5. Rehousing practices during processing
6. Arrangement and description of collection
   • Correspondence
   • Compositions
   • Photographs - Visual Material
   • Clippings
   • Subject Files
   • Printed Material
   • Realia
   • Audiovisual material
   • Long-form cataloging
7. Finding aid creation
8. Final finding aid review
9. Numbering folders, labeling boxes, send to end-processing
10. Posting finding aid to OASIS
11. Administrative recordkeeping