President's Report 2013-14

Friends of the Launceston Mechanics' Institute Inc.

President's Report 2013-14

Introduction

It is a privilege to present this report to members on the occasion of our first Annual General Meeting. I take this opportunity to place on record what has been achieved already and to lay out our plans and aspirations for the coming year.

This group was formed at a public meeting on 18 October 2013. The goals adopted by that meeting were to establish and maintain a working research Launceston Mechanics’ Institute Collection, by:

1. Locating, selecting, organising, cataloguing and preserving existing materials once the property of the Launceston Mechanics’ Institute between 1842 and 1929;

2.  Liaising with local, state and national government and professional agencies and with relevant interest groups to promote the significance of the LMI Collection;

3.  Establishing a permanent home for the LMI Collection, in particular those parts not integrated with local and state government collections;

4.  Providing broad public access to the catalogue of the LMI Collection and enabling direct access to researchers needing to use the Collection.

Membership

FOLMI currently has 49 members, and membership continues to grow as supporters are made aware of our activities.

Achievements

By any measure much has been achieved in the short life of FOLMI.

The group had its ownership of a major part of the LMI Collection confirmed by a Launceston City Council resolution in November 2013, and since that time has progressively assumed management of the collection. FOLMI has:

•  Secured free tenancy of a suitable space for housing the collection at the University of Tasmania for at least one year;

•  Erected donated shelving in the designated room;

•  Received two of the three major parts of the collection allocated to it – the non-fiction and periodicals, about 14,000 items in all since March 2014;

•  Shelved these, and made excellent progress in organising and assessing the collection prior to constructing a catalogue/database;

•  Begun photographing  accession records in preparation for digitisation and use in comparison with surviving materials;

•  Established a web-site to promote our activities;

•  Submitted an application for Commonwealth Heritage Grant funding of a Significance Assessment of the collection.

A Significance Assessment will be a critical document in shaping our future priorities, informing our planning process, and – perhaps most importantly – building support in both the local community and a wider community of interest for the preservation of the collection.

If, as we expect, the collection is assessed to be of national significance, the assessor’s statement will be used to support further grant applications, to promote the collection in discussion with researchers, state and local government agencies, and to publicise the collection generally.

Future Activities

The next year will be an opportunity to build on what has already been achieved. Priority will be given to:

•  Producing an electronic version of the LMI Accession Registers.

•  Starting the recording all Launceston Mechanics' Institute items still held in the State Library of Tasmania's reference and heritage collections and in the Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery's collections.

•  Work on producing an inventory and photographic record of all surviving objects associated with the Institute.

•   Investigating options for cataloguing the collection, with current preference for participation in Libraries Australia and TROVE.

•   Pending the outcome of the Significance Assessment process, applying for funding to have a Conservation Needs Assessment done.

•   Investigating local options for a permanent home for the collection and establishing a project plan to achieve the preferred option.

Of these, undoubtedly the most important and the most challenging for our group is the identification of a permanent home for the collection.

Acknowledgements

In conclusion I acknowledge the contributions of our committee members, our hard-working volunteers, and the support of all members, in what has been achieved to date.

I also take this opportunity to record my thanks to our partners in this venture for their co-operation and assistance. We are most grateful to the University of Tasmania for allocating a very suitable room for our activities, and in particular thank the Newnham Campus Librarian, Wendy Hoyle, for championing our cause and for her practical assistance at every stage of our taking up occupancy.

I also thank the management and staff of the Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery, Launceston LINC and the State Library of Tasmania, for their assistance and support.

We are also indebted to the members of Mechanics' Institutes of Victoria Inc. for their unstinting generosity and guidance and their enthusiastic support.

Finally I thank the Alderman of the City of Launceston for entrusting this most important collection to our care.

Peter Richardson, 

President, 

2 May 2014