The Laws of Archivy

These profound bits of wisdom are variously attributed to F. Gerald Ham, Terry Abraham, John Fleckner, Stephen Balzarini, Judy Combs and Anne Frantilla.

  1. When in doubt, throw it out.
  2. What is backlog is prologue; or, there are no temporary solutions.
  3. Garbage is garbage, no matter how long you keep it.
  4. If you've seen one archives, you've seen them all.
  5. If it doesn't fit in the box, fold it; if you can't fold it, toss it.
  6. The thoroughness of appraisal is inversely proportional to the remaining space.

    7. Source: Quoted in message of Mimi Bowling to Archives discussion list, 25 April 1995, retrievable from Society of American Archivists discussion list http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/archives.html

    In September 2006 the Archives list moved to a new address. The archives of the former list will apparently remain at the old address. The address for the new list is http://forums.archivists.org/read/?forum=archives.

    Return to this site's home page Links fixed, 7 February 2003. New address added, 10 January 2007.