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ADVOCATING BUSINESS ARCHIVES
By Ken Wirth
Introduction
Corporate archives seem to be perceived as barely necessary in today's corporate
world, as witness the six Wisconsin-based firms on "The Fortune 500." An inquiry
at each of these companies revealed that only two have a corporate archives
staffed with at least one full-time archivist. What is it about an archives that
those companies with them have recognized as important? Focusing on companies
that already have an archives may identify reasons which other companies may
consider to create their own corporate archives. Referring to examples of how
business archives meet the historic informational needs of a company may pique
the business executiveÂs interest, compelling him or her to consider the
arguments for the creation of a business archives.
Business Archives: Description and Use
Traditionally business archives has been defined as "a department specifically
charged with the systematic acquisition, preservation, and servicing of
corporate historical records and artifacts deemed to be of permanent value in
documenting the company's founding and subsequent growth." The meaning of this
definition may be enhanced by comparing a business archives to traditional
assumptions about archives and examining the uses of a business archives.
An examination of the characteristics of a business archives points to three
significant differences compared to a traditional public or academic archives. A
business archives, due to its private sector status, typically has very few, if
any, external provisions governing its organization. Indeed, business archives
are characterized by immense diversity of form, whereas public archives are
often required to follow an organizational structure dictated by statute. Hence
the first defining characteristic of a business archives: the business is free
to organize and control its archives as it wishes, within the guidelines of
company policy. This characteristic is particularly attractive to the business
that must follow statutory requirements in so many other aspects of the
business.
The influence management exerts on all aspects of business is well known in the
business world. It is management's influence, which governs the second defining
characteristic of the business archives: the informational aspect. Corporations
are required by statute to retain some information for certain periods. For
example, bank statements and related transactions are typically retained for
seven years per I.R.S. requirements.
However, management's responsibility to retain documents and provide information
for historical or other cultural purposes beyond the expiration of the legal
retention period is up to the individual management. In a similar way, business
archives have no requirement to provide information to any members of the public
and access to corporate records can be extremely guarded. As Elizabeth Adkins,
Kraft Foods, Inc. archivist, states, "the principle of equal access loses its
sacred quality in ... an environment [where companies] have the right to control
publicly released information ..." Contrast this with the cultural value which
an academic archives provides, or the freedom of information inherent in the
public archives. As Van Campen points out: "In modern constitutional states, the
legally prescribed duty of public responsibility, even for past policy, is the
underlying motive both for maintaining and for providing access to public
archives."
The third defining aspect of the business archives concerns the economic
environment of which it is a part. Businesses compete in a world where the most
successful are the ones which generate the greatest profit. The business
archives is one of many service departments whose costs are traditionally seen
"as being just as much a part of the cost of a company's finished product as are
materials, labor, and overhead." While the costs of the archives are
well-defined, the benefits are more difficult to quantify. Much depends on
management's view of the archives' worth. Contrast this scenario to that of the
public archives, which is not normally required to continually prove its value
in economic terms to the institution of which it is a part.
A corporate archives provides many services which do justify its existence;
several have been outlined in the Society of American Archivists brochure
"Business Archives in North America." The corporate archives serves as an
"internal record" to help guide company policy, as well as providing research
support. The corporate archivist selects and disseminates important records;
prepares exhibits and oral histories; maintains photographic collections; and
conserves old materials - it is the corporate archivist who selects and
preserves key documents that reconstruct the company's history.
Business Archives Survey
While the above may seem reason enough to warrant creation of a business
archives, the simple facts are that few companies have archives. For each
compelling argument advocating corporate archives, the corporate executive
stands ready with a counter-argument that seemingly refutes the need for a
corporate archives.
Yet, somehow, companies which have corporate archives have succeeded in the task
of advocating business archives, often in the face of opposition and
indifference. They also have continued to demonstrate the value of archives to
cost-conscious corporate executives. An examination of the facts and evidence
related to their experience provides a series of action steps to use to advocate
business archives. The successful business archives described here can be used
as examples by anyone who wishes to create the company's business archives.
During the course of the interviews conducted with eight business archivists,
three topics were mentioned repeatedly and provide food for thought regarding
the methods to promote business archives, or any archives, for that matter.
These three themes are:
Focusing on these three areas may suggest what it is about
existing business archives that keep them "in business." Stated in
another way: who are the business archivist's customers, and why do they use
business archives
as opposed
to some other source? What factors lead a company to want a business archives
in the first place? Does the business archives need to find a niche, which
warrants
its continued existence?
The Business Archives' Customer Base
The business archives customers can be divided generally into two groups: those
internal to the company, and those external to the company. The eight business
archivists interviewed were unanimous that the internal customer represents
the
largest group, providing between seventy and ninety percent of all inquiries.
Among the internal customers, the following groups were among the most frequent
users of the corporate archives: corporate affairs, legal, marketing, public
relations/consumer affairs, executives, and staff personnel. As questions about
the companyÂs past arise, all invariably turn to the corporate archives,
although each has different needs, as described below.
The corporate affairs department might use the archives to obtain historical
information for stories in corporate publications. The law department typically
use the archives to obtain documents relating to the history of a trademark,
copyright, or patent. The marketing department might use the archives to obtain
information regarding how a certain product or brand has been positioned and
advertised over time, such as by requesting examples of old print ads, or
television commercials. The public relations/consumer affairs department may
find archival records useful to answer questions from the general public
concerning the company's history (to distinguish from those queries asked of
the archives directly). Corporate executives may use the archives to obtain
information regarding past policy decisions, product history, or even to obtain
quotes for speeches -- who but the corporate archivist would have the speech
given by the company founder at the laying of the cornerstone 100 years ago?
Staff personnel may ask the archives to answer general questions. For example,
The Sporting News Archives serves as an "in-house reference and research
facility", much like a library, because of the wealth of sports information
contained in the pages of its publication.
External customers are less plentiful, although still important. Such
researchers usually can be described as belonging to one of several groups.
The first includes individuals conducting research for articles or books who
require
information from the archives. For example, an author of baseball books wanted
to know about CIGNA's ownership of a professional baseball team in the 1950s.
The second group might be called the "inquiring public" looking for various
kinds of information. For example, a homeowner who has unearthed an old
Coca-Cola bottle in his or her backyard is interested in knowing how old it is
and whether it has any value. An amateur genealogist working on a family tree
would like to track a family member's job history. The third group includes film
and television producers who may require background information, or the use of
original props. The fourth group includes journalists looking for information to
confirm or refute stories and articles. Other business archivists requesting or
sharing information is a fifth group. A final group is public relations firms
which have been hired by the company and require historic information.
What can be concluded from a review of the archives' customer base? Many
companies have marketing, legal, or public relations departments, but only
a small fraction of these have an archives. Do they miss having an archives?
Probably not, because the services an archives could provide for these customers
are provided more - or less - efficiently by someone else, and no one has
broached the subject; the idea of a corporate archives may never have entered
these individuals' minds. For example, a marketing department has kept its
own
record of the history of a brand, the legal department has established the
history of a trademark. Why should another department be created to do something
that management feels is adequately accomplished right now? A good question,
yet
further probing may reveal places where the argument falls short. For example,
is the material stored and preserved in a professional manner? Can inquiries
about the material be answered in a timely fashion? Are marketing and legal
resources really being used in an effective and efficient manner when queries
must be answered by the $40 per hour marketing executive?
It is the task of the "archives advocate" to ask these questions of the
prospective customers, to describe to the lawyers and marketers the positive
aspects of having a corporate archives. It should be remembered that in a
business archives, as in any business, "the customer is king"; by filling an
identified need, the archives has validated its existence.
Factors Behind the Business Archives Creation
Three situations prompted the eight businesses reviewed to establish archives.
These suggest arguments for the creation of a business archives at other
companies currently without one. The situations can be divided into three broad
areas:
The first situation speaks of a
latent corporate interest to collect historic material, yet the interest was
never taken seriously by top management until
either complaints arose or employees came to realize the advantage of an
archives. This "hobby-like" interest in collecting old material was
mentioned by four of the eight business archivists, who recalled an individual
employee
collecting old company records and other material. At CUNA Mutual and CIGNA
the corporate secretary kept this material because of personal interest; at
P&G, it
became the part-time avocation of the employee who wrote the company magazine.
The material may have stayed in these collectors' hands were it not for certain
groups who recognized the need for one source for this material. At Kraft,
the material resided not in the hands of specific employees but in departments,
which recognized they were unable to devote sufficient resources to properly
care for the material they held. For example, the Kraft marketing department
had
a collection of old ad campaigns and other such memorabilia accumulated over
the years, but nothing was in one place and how much they owned was unknown.
An
additional consideration lay with Kraft's legal and corporate affairs
departments, which were doing their own trademark research and fact-checking,
but found this too time consuming and wanted others to do it. Some employees
in
these departments recognized the advisability of an archives, but this resulted
only in informal discussion and nothing more. A change in management, however,
prompted action. The new, "enlightened" Chief Executive Officer (CEO)
realized the efficacy of having an archives, especially the marketing advantages.
He felt
that by promoting Kraft's long-established brand names through nostalgic ad
campaigns, the consumer's comfort level with Kraft brands would increase,
hopefully leading to increased sales.
This required preserving information about the brands in the form of labels
and packaging and records of old ad campaigns, such as the print ads and
television commercials that were used to promote the brands over the decades.
The legal
department reasoned that an archivist could also accomplish the research
and fact-checking for trademark questions, thereby freeing legal staff for
other
work. One may also assume significant labor cost-savings could result if
it was
found that a high-cost attorney's time could be replaced by the comparatively
low-cost archivist's time. Hence, the need to professionally process this
material coupled with the recognition that a part-time approach was not adequate
to answer the historical questions which originated from internal customers
was
one factor leading to the archives' creation.
The second stimulus prompting companies to create business archives occurred
in two of the eight respondent companies: the top executives of the firm
wanted the
company's past preserved. For example, executives of CIGNA, formed by the
combination of The Insurance Company of North America (founded in 1792) and
Connecticut General (founded in 1865), recognized already at the end of the
last
century that the company was aging and that both firms' pasts were worth
preserving. At Motorola, Bob Galvin, son of company founder Paul Galvin,
was sensitive to the corporate culture and knew how easy it was to lose sight
of
one's past. He wanted to establish an archives to permanently preserve the
corporate culture. Hence, the second way a corporate archives may be created:
the founder's descendants, either familial or corporate, recognize the
importance of history and the preservation of the past to benefit the future.
Because they have the authority to command it, the archives is brought into
being at their behest. These executives, with an abiding respect for the
importance of history, become the archives' "champion." Throughout the ensuing
years the champion will see to it that the archives has, at minimum, a staff of
one full-time archivist; will support its acquisition policy; and will avoid
archival budget cutting during lean times.
While the champion keeps the best interests of the archives in mind, one
inevitably wonders what happens should this individual depart the company
and
a less enlightened executive takes over. Three of eight respondents identified
an
individual that could be defined as such an archival "champion." However, each
was quick to point out that since its founding, the archives had developed a
reputation of providing services to many other corporate customers and that the
beneficial relationships nurtured with these customers would hopefully
counteract any negative overtures by the "champion's" less archivally-enthusiastic
successor. The Sporting News archivist, Steve Gitschier, mentioned that since
1986, the year the Sporting News archives was founded, a number of publishers
have come and gone. Yet each new publisher has come to value the archives, due
in no small part to the archivist's services.
A third reason for the business archives' creation is one that the archival
profession hears so very often. The celebration of a significant anniversary
such as a centennial gives cause to reflect on past accomplishments and take
stock and plan for future goals.
It also is a good marketing opportunity. Half of the respondents mentioned
that an anniversary had a direct impact on the founding of the archives:
In
1971, the CEO and president of John Deere (now Navistar) was interested
in cataloguing old company records, in anticipation of the company's sesquicentennial
ten years hence! He was also interested in having a company history researched
and written. In 1973, a full-time archivist was hired to accomplish these tasks.
Can anniversaries be used by the
archives advocate? Three lessons contained in the above examples point the
way to advocating business archives.
First, the archives advocate must ascertain whether historic information
is readily available, and if it is in the form needed by management, or whether
historical records have been haphazardly collected over the years. If the
answers to these questions indicate the need for someone to gather all the
records and assemble or make them available in a professional, efficient
manner,
then the archives advocate stands ready to offer his or her services as "problem
solver."
Second, the archives advocate must keep abreast of current business archives
literature to ensure full understanding and consideration of all theories.
Executives at CIGNA and Motorola, convinced of the importance of their company's
history, created business archives to preserve the past for future generations.
But such convictions are not easily nurtured in business people who have
a "myopic emphasis ... on short-term objectives." The curriculum at North American
business schools places a far greater emphasis upon capital budgeting and cost
accounting than upon history and culture.
Thus, a direct plea to the executive's historical sensibilities, while
important, may not be all that is needed. Indeed, it must be made clear to
the executive who is not favorably predisposed to history exactly how establishing
an archives and recording the company history will be worthwhile, even
profitable. In his article "Dusting Off the Cobwebs: Turning the Business
Archives into a Managerial Tool," George David Smith provides some examples of
how an archives can provide support through historical documentation. In
litigation research, for example, the archives provides documentation which can
avoid the company significant expense. In "Where Memory Serves," John Thackray
relates how AT&T Technologies, Inc. was able to collect a $70 million invoice
from a Federal Government agency with proof from the corporate archives. It is
up to the archives advocate to keep abreast of current literature concerning how
historical information has been put to use in modern business, and to provide
these examples to the corporate decision-maker.
Finally, the archives advocate must be aware when the targeted company is
having its next "significant" anniversary. Even ten years prior to that date, the need
to organize historic documents and summarize these in written form may already
be recognized by top management. The resourceful archives advocate might contact
those companies anticipating anniversaries to offer his or her services. As we
have seen, even if the anniversary has passed, the company may be anxious to
continue collecting historic records or maintain the collection amassed before
and during the celebration. Three or five years after an anniversary celebration
the archives advocate may celebrate the fact that he or she has convinced a
company to create a professional program.
Ensuring Continued Support and Existence
The one common element on which most business archivists agree regarding
their archives continued existence is the ability to deliver good service
in a timely
way. At Sporting News the idea is to "become as indispensable as possible to as
many people as possible as much as possible," something the archivist defines as
"in-reach," or selling the archives potential within the company. The Coca-Cola
archives provides services calculated to "enhance the company's image in some
way." The Motorola company archivist echoed this by stating that the archivist
must "be responsive to one's customers," a sentiment echoed by the CIGNA
archivist who underscores the business archivistÂs strong service emphasis. A
business archivist who "disdains the researcher" will be effectively committing
professional suicide; according to one, the business archivist is "customer
driven and must want to serve."
Selling the idea of an archives, then, is to sell service, to fill a need.
And as with any service function, performance must be measured. The archives
advocate should point out to the decision makers that the archives' performance
will be tracked in terms such as, "customer questions answered within one day by
the archivist versus in three days by the non-archivist." This should give the
skeptical manager some slight peace of mind; service quality can indeed be
measured and reported, though not in the normal, time-honored tradition of
profit and loss. (Although some archives can claim their contribution to
corporate-wide cost savings; at Coca-Cola, the archives is the mainstay of the
licensing program, which generates royalty revenues amounting to $7 million
every year.) Some archives go beyond one-time performance statistics and conduct
follow-up surveys to make certain that what they've provided is effective. CUNA
Mutual uses a feedback survey form to find if the information provided was
helpful and timely; further follow-up is accomplished by phone.
Additional Arguments for Business Archives Advocation
The methods to advocate corporate archives are many. Some other issues to
address as needed with the target firm's management include:
In the business environment, archives and records management compliment one
another well. Yet twenty-five percent of the companies surveyed did not have
records management programs, and of the six which did, only two had strong
connections between the archives and records management functions. (One records
management program was actually part of the archives.) One might consider
combining the case for an archives together with the case for a records
management program, especially since business people are usually more familiar
with a records management program and such programs can more easily be made
to
identify cost savings.
If the records management function is combined with the archives, the next
step is continued centralization of information functions. At P&G, by centralizing
information resources at one source, the company can obtain information more
efficiently and save hours of on-line access time because the centralized
function is quicker and more efficient than an outside source.
The idea that the archives advocate understands the importance of corporate
confidentiality cannot be overemphasized. Management must be comfortable
that the historic material being gathered is kept under lock and key, that
access
is
restricted, and that security measures will be in place. The legal department
especially must be assured that no company secrets will become open to the
public because of the archives! In fact, the archives can work for the benefit
of the legal department. An archivist at United Technologies is quoted as
saying, "[the attorneys] like the fact that there is a firm policy over what
gets kept and what is thrown out. What concerns them is individuals saving stuff
they don't know about." The archives advocate must convey the image of the good
corporate citizen, looking out for the best interests of the company.
For the company expanding its markets to the former Soviet Union, the
Soviet-dominated East European states, China, and other markets with a
heretofore minimal exposure to Western products, an archives will be an
effective means to inform the prospective consumer about the history of the
product, as well as the history of the people that sell it. Coca-Cola did
precisely this when they took a traveling version of the corporate archives
on the road to new markets in Russia, Asia and Eastern Europe. The astute
archives advocate will investigate whether his/her target firm does such
business and
assess the advisability of such a strategy.
Many firms also routinely acquire foreign subsidiaries, but may be clueless
as to what to retain of the acquired company's documents. The archives advocate
stands ready to assist here, as well - especially if he or she possesses
foreign language fluency.
At P&G, orientation tours for new employees and international visitors begin in
the lobby which houses the exhibit of the company's history. What better way for
the uninformed to become informed by a visual display. The archives advocate who
visits the target firm and notes a dearth of historic information in the front
lobby should take note - this presents an opportunity for promoting the archives
through a display.
Conclusion
The best way to begin to advocate a business archives is to provide examples,
as outlined here, and ask questions of the target firm, the first one being "what,
if anything, is being done to preserve the company's history?" The initial
inquiry should take the form of a letter, followed by a personal meeting. At the
meeting, utilize as many advocacy steps as possible; several are sure to make
their impression. For example, if it is known that a competitor has an archives,
this should be pointed out. A company never wants to be outdone by its
competition in any way.
The success of the promotional process will depend on the number of valid
arguments made and the receptiveness of the listener to these. It is worth
remembering, though, the odds of finding a company without an archives are
in
favor of the archives advocate. Recall that in Wisconsin alone, four of six
companies on The Fortune 500 did not have a corporate archives. The
opportunities to advocate and convince are enormous.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Adkins, Elizabeth, "Access to Corporate Archives: Whose Business Is It?"
Presented at the Annual Meeting of the Society of American Archivists, September
16, 1992, Montreal.
"Business Archives: A Special Issue," The American Archivist, Volume 45, Number
3 (Summer 1982).
"The FORTUNE 500," FORTUNE, April 29, 1996.
Gamel, Faye, "Are Your Association's Archives Hiding in an Attic?" Association
Management, June 1977.
Garrison, Ray H., Managerial Accounting: Concepts for Planning, Control,
Decision Making. Dallas, Business Publications, Inc., 1979.
Hedlin, Edie, Business Archives: An Introduction. Chicago, Society of American
Archivists, 1978.
Jones, Arnita A. and Philip L. Cantelon, Corporate Archives and History:
Making the Past Work. Malabar, Florida, Krieger Publishing Company, 1993.
Kurtz, Wilbur, "Business Archives in the Corporate Function," ARMA Quarterly,
April 1970.
Marsh, Betsa, "Then, Now and Tomorrow", Moonbeams, April 1989.
Simmons, Joseph, "Business Records in the Company Archives," Special Libraries,
January 1968.
The Society of American Archivists, "Business Archives in North America,"
Brochure, 1991.
The Society of American Archivists, "Directory of Business Archives in the
United States and Canada," 1990.
Teresko, John, "Should You Keep An Archives," Industry Week, 188, March 15,
1976.
Thackray, John, "Where Memory Serves," Across the Board, July/August 1991.
Van Campen, Marcel, "The Archivist in the Business Environment," Presented at
the XIIth International Congress on Archives, 1992, Montreal.
to top of 1997
INTERNET OUTREACH AND COPYRIGHT PROTECTION AT JCPENNEY.COM
by Jerry Probst, Historian and Archivist, JCPenney Archives and Historical
Museum and Michael Ponder, Senior Project Manager, Associate Information
Programs, J.C.Penney Company, Inc.
For the corporate archivist, web publishing provides a valuable new tool to
serve the public. Many corporate archives are already on the web. Archives sites
usually support a companyÂs main web site under a link entitled "History of . .
." or "About . . . ." Wells Fargo, Levi Strauss, Ford Motor Company, Coca Cola,
the New York Stock Exchange are just a few examples of companies with historical
web sites.
As a public relations tool, a historical web site can be a great asset for a
company. The ability to combine text, images, still photographs, movies, sound,
and interactivity in a well-designed page allows the archivist and web designer
to bring the companyÂs history alive in a rich and engaging way.
Visitors interested in a company often go directly to the archives site to learn
more about its history, business philosophy, important personalities, and
events. Whether the visitor is a customer, a prospective investor, a supplier,
or a student working on a report, an archives site provides company information
in a convenient and accessible way (often in greater detail than is available
elsewhere). For the casual browser, an interesting archives site may provide a
hook to capture the readerÂs interest and thereby encourage him or her to read
on to learn more about the organization.
As a reference tool, an archives site can provide informational brochures and
answers to frequently asked questions. Having this information live on the web
frees the archives from answering many routine questions that typically take up
valuable staff time. A web site is also useful as an outreach tool to tap into
the growing internet audience. The recent announcement that NASA received 100
million hits on July 4 when the Mars Pathfinder mission landed on the surface of
Mars is evidence of the enormous scale and audience potential of the Internet.
The JCPenney Archives began publishing historical material on the web in
February, 1996. This article discusses the JCPenney Archives and Historical
Museum web site; what we are doing and where we are going; and a new approach we
have employed to secure copyright protection for the images and other media we
publish on our web site.
The Archives home page is located on JCPenneyÂs main internet site
www.jcpenney.com under a link entitled "History and Guiding Philosophy."
Like many sites, PenneyÂs site is under constant modification and development.
The site is modest by comparison with efforts at some other companies, but it is
carefully tailored to present JCPenney history to JCPenneyÂs customers,
associates, and the public in a clear and attractive way.
The Archives home page is simple in design. Because students are likely to visit
the site, the page is designed to be light and friendly. A rotating graphic
immediately catches the visitorÂs eye showing a hand-tinted picture of a Golden
Rule Store (JCPenneyÂs original name) on one side and a modern JCPenney Store on
the other. A multi-colored navigation bar displaying former company logos runs
along the left margin. Beneath the rotating store a short introductory paragraph
welcomes visitors to the site and explains what the visitor will find during his
or her stay. This is followed by several links leading to the siteÂs main
features.
Links lead to electronic versions of the Archives printed brochures. Each
section is designed to have its own look and feel, but elements such as the logo
navigation bar, page headers, and navigation buttons at the bottom of the page
are common to all.
The first link "JCPenney Archives and Historical Museum" describes the ArchivesÂ
holdings, services, location, hours of operation, and contact information. The
second "A Short History of JCPenney" is an informational brochure. Subsections
outline the history of the Company from the opening of the first Golden Rule
Store by James Cash Penney in Kemmerer, Wyoming in 1902 to the present.
Hand-tinted photographs of JCPenney stores and street scenes evoke the CompanyÂs
early days as a main street merchant.
The next link "JCPenney Milestones" presents a chronology of important events in
JCPenney history. Extensive use of photographs and graphics illustrate important
sections of the text. A new brochure "James Cash Penney: His Life and Legacy"
presents a short biography of the life, philosophy, family, farming interests
and philanthropies of PenneyÂs founder.
A final link displays a Quicktime VR movie of Mr. PenneyÂs statue in the main
rotunda of the JCPenney Home Office in Plano, Texas. Quicktime VR (VR meaning
virtual reality) allows the visitor to view the rotunda in a full 360-degree
range of view and to move around the statue and zoom in on interesting details.
Since it went live in June, this movie has become the most visited location
within the site. This fall, another link entitled "James Cash Penney, the Golden
Rule, and Customer Service" will be added that presents Mr. PenneyÂs belief in
the principles of the golden rule, and how he instilled those principles in the
operations of the JCPenney Company.
The JCPenney Archives and Historical Museum operates two web sites. One site is
located on JCPenneyÂs main internet site at
www.jcpenney.com and a second site is located on the companyÂs private
intranet server called jWeb. These two sites are, for the present, nearly
identical, but will be developed independently in the future. While the sites
share much in common, each is designed to serve a different audience. The
jcpenney.com site was developed with the public in mind, while the jWeb site was
intended to provide historical information and communicate corporate culture to
an internal audience.
Future developments on the jWeb page could include a store history database,
department and product histories, and a quotation finder from Mr. PenneyÂs
speeches and written works. Another development could be a virtual museum that
may include exhibits, displays, a virtual reality walk through of the museum,
and a theater showing video interviews of Mr. Penney.
For those interested in developing their own archives site a few tips on web
design might be helpful. First, try to make your site appealing to the eye. Web
surfing is the ultimate in short-attention-span theater. You may only have a few
seconds to catch your readerÂs attention. If your page is not immediately
appealing, one quick click and youÂre history.
Second, once youÂve captured your readerÂs attention, you must keep it with
interesting content. This should not be an issue for many archivists, because
our collections are generally content rich. But remember, interesting content is
what your readers want; give it to them.
Next, a site must be well organized. Links to content pages should be clearly
labeled and prominently positioned. The site should also be easy to navigate.
You should employ nonlinear navigation so the reader can get back to your home
page from lower pages with one click. On individual pages, keep the amount of
scrolling required to view the page to a minimum. If you have a wealth of text,
consider breaking it up into smaller parts and publish each part as a separate
page under a common heading.
Finally, nothing is more frustrating to a reader than to have to wait several
minutes for a page to load. To ensure quick load time, do not load large graphic
files. Full-screen graphics may be visually appealing, but the time required to
load the graphic may cancel their effectiveness. Consider quick-loading features
such as side bars, text based pages, and smaller graphic files.
With web publishing comes the question: How do we protect the images, text, and
multimedia clips that we include on our pages? JCPenney was concerned about
putting previously unpublished images of Mr. Penney and other images from the
collection on the web without copyright protection.
To address the question, JCPenney has employed a new form of copyright
protection called data hiding, currently under development by the News in the
Future group at the Media Lab at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology under
the direction of Walter Bender.
Data hiding is not currently available as a commercial product, but the idea is
worth noting here. Data hiding is essentially embedding an electronic watermark
within a digital file. The watermark is placed in a file so that the digital
tags cannot be seen, cannot be separated from the file, and do not noticeably
compromise the quality of the file. Instead of preventing access to copyrighted
material, this technique allows copyright holders to send a web crawler out on
the net to find anyone who is using their material without permission. The web
crawler continually searches the Internet. Whenever it finds a file with the
embedded tag, it will report to the copyright owner, with the address. If the
site using the file is doing so without authorization, the publisher can contact
the responsible webmaster directly.
According to international copyright law, a copyright holder who does not try to
protect his or her rights can lose them. Having data-hiding technology in place
and operating protects copyright ownership. JCPenney includes a copyright notice
on the Archives home page notifying readers that photographs are encoded with
digital watermarks and may not be reproduced without permission.
Another possible use for the technology includes imbedding keywords and
identification numbers within digital photographs or sound files for quick
retrieval. For more information and examples of the data hiding research at MIT,
see the data-hiding page at the MIT Media Lab at http://nif.www.media.mit.edu/DataHiding/.
The era of web publishing is here to stay. As corporate archivists we have much
to contribute. Our collections are rich in the stories, images, and sounds of
our companies. James Cash Penney once said "Business is just another word for
the social, industrial and economic organization of our world." President Calvin
Coolidge once said "The chief business of the American people is business." By
telling the stories of our companies we are adding to our understanding of our
history; not just business history, but social, scientific, industrial, and
economic history as well. Web publishing gives us a tool to share that history
in ways few of us considered just a few short years ago. It is up to us to put
it to use.
to top of 1997
SPORTS, ENTERTAINMENT AND PIZZA: A WINNING COMBINATION
By Sharon Arend, Company Historian, Little Caesar Enterprises, Inc.
The holdings of the Little Caesar Enterprises, Inc. Archives document the
history of four major Detroit area institutions -- Little Caesars Pizza, the
historic Fox Theatre, the Red Wings professional hockey team, and the Tigers
professional baseball franchise.
Pizza
Little Caesars was founded by Michael and Marian Ilitch, a husband-wife team,
who took a neighborhood pizza restaurant and developed the company into one of
the world's largest international pizza chains.
The first Little Caesars opened on May 8, 1959 in Garden City, a suburb of
Detroit. One of the prized possessions of the archives is a spiral notebook with
the financial figures of the first week's business hand written by Marian Ilitch.
With her practical and logical approach to financial concerns, Marian is still
the financial wizard behind the business today. Her abilities complement the
aggressive and creative approach of her husband, Michael Ilitch, the marketing
genius and new product developer.
The corporate archives was established in October 1989. Little Caesars was
preparing to relocate its corporate headquarters from the suburbs to downtown
Detroit, and Marian Ilitch, a natural historian herself, was concerned that
important records would be lost during the transition. I was hired to oversee
the move and manage the collections.
Six hundred-fifty cubic feet of documents, 33,500 photographic images, 18,800
slides, 950 videos and 140 audio cassettes or tapes are maintained in an
1800-square-foot facility. The major part of the archives represents marketing,
promotions, public relations, franchise services and training; however, some
executive business correspondence and an extensive video library of past
television commercials, business speeches and media coverage are available, as
well.
Active records are kept in the Records Center, and records managment and the
archives departments work together. With the exception of records that have a
predetermined disposition schedule, documents are not destroyed without first
being considered for the archives.
I keep things simple, and as a one-person operation, this is a must. The
collection is managed on dBase III Plus. Field definitions correspond with the
departmental and subject orientation of the archives. I can scan through a
subject or department category and determine what is available, and I can also
search by topic. A printed report from the database serves as an inventory of
the collection and as the finding aid.
The Little Caesars Enterprises, Inc. Archives is maintained for internal use
only. While the marketing, corporate communications and legal departments are
the most consistent users, many other departments request information from the
archives. I receive approximately 250 internal inquiries a year. Some are simple
requests, such as "When did we open our 1000th Little Caesars restaurant?" or
"How many restaurants did we have in 1970?" Other requests require extensive
research, such as compiling information on every promotional product Little
Caesars has offered since 1959.
Every effort is made to keep the archives fresh in the minds of employees and
management. Periodically, I write articles with historic information for
inclusion in a bi-weekly corporate newsletter. Photo murals have been installed
throughout the corporate headquarters accompanied by information plates that
highlight important events in Little Caesars history. When a new executives are
hired, they receive information about the archives. The company celebrates
Little Caesars birthday each year, and in 1995, I developed an extensive
historical display to commemorate the occasion.
The Fox Theatre
The decision to move Little Caesars corporate headquarters to downtown Detroit
was prompted by an investment made by the Ilitches in July 1987 when they
purchased the Fox Theatre in downtown Detroit's neglected theatre district.
DetroitÂs Fox Theatre is one of several movie palaces commissioned by William
Fox of 20th Century Fox. Built in 1927-28 and designed by noted theatre
architect, C. Howard Crane, it is a splendid example of the Siamese-Byzantine
style of architecture. In its heyday, the 5000-seat theatre was a venue for
films, vaudeville and big band sounds. In the 1960s, it featured local talent
such as Motown stars, followed by Kung-fu and horror movies in the late 1960s
and 1970s. By the 1980s, it was rarely used and had fallen into serious
disrepair.
Several million dollars were spent to restore the Fox Theatre to its original
splendor. Its re-opening on November 19, 1988 brought rave reviews, and in 1989,
it was designated a National Landmark. Today, Broadway shows, concerts, family
entertainment, and movie premiers are featured, and it is one of the top
grossing theatres of its size in the country.
Additionally, the Ilitches restored the Fox Office Centre, adjacent to the
theatre, and in December 1989, it became the corporate headquarters of Little
Caesar Enterprises, Inc. and Olympia Entertainment, Inc. (also an Ilitch-owned
company) and the centralized location for the corporate archives.
The Fox Theatre Collection is fortunate to include old press books, from the
mid-1930s through the 1950s, with advertisements and articles outlining the acts
and movies that played at the theatre and the promotional efforts surrounding
those performances. Some photos and posters also have survived. The company owns
the original 1 928 program, printed on parchment, and I have purchased
additional old programs at auctions. Old accounting records and approximately
1738 linear feet of musical arrangements remain unprocessed. While not
particularly rare, these musical scores as a whole have great historical value
in the context of American, theatrical, and musical history, as well as the the
history of the Fox Theatre. Most scores are mimeographed, but the collection
does contain a few rare handwritten scores.
In 1996, the Theatrical Society of America held its annual meeting in Detroit,
and we developed a display for the theatre lobby utilizing the materials from
the Fox Theatre Collection.
Red Wings Hockey Team
In 1982, the Ilitches purchased the Detroit Red Wings professional hockey team.
At the time, the team ranked near the bottom of the National Hockey League, and
season tickets were difficult to sell. In the last fifteen years, the Ilitches
have rebuilt the team and established a solid organization. Today, the team is
ranked among the most valuable in the NHL, and the percent of capacity
attendance at games is the highest in the NHL. In 1997, the team brought home
the Stanley Cup for the first time in 42 years.
In 1926, the Detroit Red Wings played their first game at the Border Arena in
Windsor just across the river from Detroit. In 1927, the Olympia Stadium in
Detroit (also designed by C. Howard Crane) became the Red WingÂs home ice, where
they played until 1979. At that time, the team moved to Joe Louis Arena, and as
a result, most of the franchiseÂs archival records were lost or sold.
The Red Wings Collection consists primarily of ephemera that has been donated or
purchased and publications, such as media guides and programs. Some player's
contracts from the 1960s and 1970s are also available.
While most sports teams photographs are managed by their public relations
departments; however, with the exception of current playerÂs photographs, the
Illitches requested that the collection of approximately 9000 Red Wings
historical images be kept within the corporate archives. Photocopies of all
images are made available to Public Relations
Images from the photo collection are heavily used during the hockey season for
internal publications, promotional materials and external sports publications.
Photographs from the collection were also used in large murals, which were
installed in the arena in 1993.
Archival material is displayed in a custom-designed case in the arena.
Memorabilia, miniature Stanley Cups, photographs and a game jersey worn by "Mr.
Hockey", Gordie Howe, may be viewed by the fans. ESPN featured the display
during the Stanley Cup playoffs this year.
Tigers Baseball Franchise
Baseball has enjoyed a long history in Detroit dating back to the mid 1800s.
After the American League was formed in 1901, the Tigers became a charter
member. Many baseball greats are associated with the team, including Ty Cobb,
Mickey Cochrane, Hank Greenberg, Hal Newhouser and Al Kaline.
Ilitch purchased the Tigers franchise in 1992. As a former player with the
Tigers farm system, he fulfilled a life-long dream to work with the team. Faced
with declining attendance and an outdated stadium, Illitch has been approved to
construct a new stadium, which will be built across from the Fox Theatre.
The Detroit Tigers Collection measures approximately 235 cubic feet. The
historical records are maintained in a storage area under the stands at the
stadium. Often referred to as "The Gold Room", this area contains the documents
representing the day-to-day management activities of the franchise.
The collection includes correspondence from the 1930s when Walter Briggs owned
the team and extensive files of James Campbell, the front office executive for
more than 40 years. In addition, all the player's contracts from 1948 to the
present are available. Currently, I am bringing all historical Tiger photographs
to the archives and have processed 7000 images thus far. Photocopies are made
only of the most popular sports figures.
Many people have supported and help build the diverse holdings of the Little
Caesars Archives. The public relations departments for both sports teams and the
corresponding equipment managers are my greatest sources for collecting sports
memorabilia. A local television station assisted in transferring more than 200
reels of baseball films infected with vinegar syndrome to video tapel. John
Fetzer, owner of the Tigers from 1966-1983, and the Fetzer Institute archivist
have been very generous in donating duplicate items to the archives, as well.
The archives has received many artifacts from a previous team museum, which are
displayed during Tigerfest each year. Upon completion of the new stadium, I
expect to maintain a permanent Tigers exhibit.
The Little Caesars Archives documents the pizza, entertainment and sports
businesses owned by Michael and Marian Ilitch, as well as the careers of
professional sports figures. But equally important, it documents the history of
an urban society and its leisure activities, and it is an important part of the
history of Detroit.
