By the Numbers: 2010-2022

Numbers never tell the whole story, but they do provide insights that are useful for understanding the scope and impact of our work. Here are some of the numbers we have tracked that indicate how we have grown to make access happen, connect with customers, and maximize our value to the nation from 2010 to … Continue reading By the Numbers: 2010-2022

Moving our Mission Forward

Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, a large portion of NARA has been teleworking 100%. Even with limitations on our ability to conduct work on-site and despite the incredibly challenging circumstances, our employees have continued to demonstrate their creativity, initiative, and commitment to moving our mission forward.  Across the nation, staff from the Office … Continue reading Moving our Mission Forward

Animated Archives: Meeting People Where They Are

Our recently released social media strategy focuses on creating engaging digital content, while expanding digital storytelling to make records increasingly available and relevant with online audiences. The National Archives GIPHY channel does just that: combining our staff’s knowledge of new and emerging technologies with the rich content of the Archives showcases our holdings in fun … Continue reading Animated Archives: Meeting People Where They Are

Collaborate, Innovate, Learn

Difficult times demand innovative thinking. In March, the National Archives began closing buildings around the country in order to protect our staff and public from the pandemic. NARA staff members were plunged into a world where the work to support the mission of the agency became fully digital. In response, NARA quickly created a wide … Continue reading Collaborate, Innovate, Learn

By the Numbers 2019

National Youth Administration (NYA) Photographs showing Projects in New England and New York, 1935 - 1942. National Archives Identifier 7350922 Number of Record Group descriptions in the National Archives’ Catalog: 569*Number of Collection descriptions in the Catalog: 4,752Number of creating organization authority files in the Catalog: 100,714 Number of person name authority files linked to descriptions: 23,709Number of geographic authority files … Continue reading By the Numbers 2019

95%: Describing the National Archives’ Holdings

The National Archives Catalog has reached a milestone: we now have 95% of our holdings completely described at the series level in our online catalog. This is a monumental achievement. Why? Because the National Archives holds over 13 billion pages of records, and we are adding hundreds of millions of pages to that total every … Continue reading 95%: Describing the National Archives’ Holdings

Making Access Happen by Expanding Broadband

I recently attended the Institute of Museum and Library Services’ public hearing on broadband access, hosted at the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library in Washington, DC. I was joined by colleagues from Federal agencies, universities, museums and libraries to examine the need for high speed broadband access in America’s libraries, and how this access … Continue reading Making Access Happen by Expanding Broadband

Be Bold: Make Access Happen

Photograph of Women Working at a Bell System Telephone Switchboard. National Archives Identifier 1633445.   The first of our new strategic goals is to “Make Access Happen.”  Increasingly, access means digital, online access. Our first goal has one objective, to make our records available to the public in digital form to ensure that anyone can … Continue reading Be Bold: Make Access Happen