Archival Collections, ICOS, and Documentation Strategies
The Niels Bohr Library & Archives is the official repository for the permanently valuable records of the American Institute of Physics (AIP). Otherwise, the Archives does not try to acquire collections for itself, but seeks to preserve them at the most appropriate repository. The Archives will at times accept an important collection for which a better repository cannot be found (if a more appropriate repository is later developed, such a collection may be transferred there). All the collections are housed in modern climate-controlled facilities, and they are cataloged online in the International Catalog of Sources for History of Physics and Allied Fields (http://www.aip.org/history/icos). In addition, finding aids for many of our collections are online and indexed (http://www.aip.org/history/ead/).
Among the Archives’ holdings of AIP records are the records of the Directors of the Institute and of divisions such as Statistics, Education, Public Information and Publications, and the magazine Physics Today. The Archives also includes some records from most of AIP’s Member Societies, such as the American Physical Society and the American Astronomical Society. Many activities of the world scientific community since the founding of the American Physical Society in 1899, and especially since AIP’s founding in 1931, are documented in these files.
Some major collections of personal and professional papers held by the Archives are those of :
- Samuel A. Goudsmit, atomic scientist and editor of the Physical Review
- Lew Kowarski, a major figure in European nuclear energy development
- William F. Meggers, noted National Bureau of Standards spectroscopist
- John Van Vleck, renowned theorist
- Other important figures in the scientific and institutional development of modern physics, including Léon Brillouin, Karl Darrow, Isidor Fankuchen, Fritz Reiche and Robert W. Wood
In addition to the holdings of original materials, the Archives has a large number of unpublished collections on microfilm, including:
- Archives for the History of Quantum Physics, which includes papers of Niels Bohr, Hendrik A. Lorentz, Ernest Rutherford, etc.
- Sources for the History of Modern Astrophysics, including papers of Ejnar Hertzsprung, Edwin Hubble, Karl Schwarzschild, etc.
- Collections of correspondence of many others, including James C. Maxwell, Robert A. Millikan, Henri Poincaré, etc.
The Center for History of Physics and Niels Bohr Library & Archives conduct extensive research on the historical documentation of traditionally hard-to-document areas, including government-contract laboratories and multi-institutional collaborations (”big science”) and, currently, industrial research and development. For the findings and recommendations of these studies see our list of publications (http://www.aip.org/history/publications.html); for information on current work, contact us or see our newsletter (http://www.aip.org/history/newsletter/ or search http://www.aip.org/history/searchHistory.html in the category “Additional Materials”).
A Note About Electronic Files:
E-mail and other digital applications present special preservation problems for archives. Because of frequent changes in hardware and software, the absence of preservation standards for electronic media, and the simple lack of long-term experience, no one can guarantee that digital records will last indefinitely. But because such records are critical to documenting contemporary life, archives have developed interim practices for appraising and preserving them.
The Niels Bohr Library & Archives accepts digital files that conform to the collecting policy described above and that are 1) generated by software applications currently supported by AIP and 2) accompanied by printed documentation describing the contents of the files and the software used. We cannot guarantee that we will be able to maintain the data permanently, but we will follow generally accepted archival best practices in an effort to ensure their long-term preservation. Contact us for details.