Five new repositories join A2A

A2A - Access to Archives | Home: "The A2A database was last updated in December 2005
and now catalogues 8.7 million filed items from 395 record offices and other repositories. "
The latest update to A2A (Access to Archives) - the English strand of the UK
archives network at http://www.a2a.org.uk - took place on Wednesday 21st
December 2005. We welcome the following new contributors: Warrington
Library Museum and Archives Service, Essex Record Office, the Army Medical
Services Museum (Army Dental Corps), the Alpine Club Archives and the
National Motor Museum at Beaulieu.

1,211 new catalogues were added to A2A. The database now contains 100,237
catalogues with 8.7 million entries at file/item level, describing archives
held in 395 record offices, libraries, museums and other repositories all
over England.

Six new projects are up for the first time:
* Alpine Club Archives: Records of the Alpine Club
* National Motor Museum: various records including personal papers relating
to motoring
* Cambridge University, King's College Archive Centre: various personal
papers
* Essex Record Office: Quarter Sessions and local government and authority
papers
* Isle of Wight Record Office: land deeds and estate papers
* Warrington Library, Museum and Archives Service: Beamont MSS
* Wellcome Library for the History and Understanding of Medicine: personal
papers


New catalogues have been added from the following projects:
* Bell, Book and Candle (Tyne and Wear Archives Service) - non-conformists'
records

* Local Governance and the Community (Centre for Kentish Studies) - records
relating to local government

* Pay and Power (Dudley Archives and Local History Service) - business
records

* Reaching Out Across the Riding (East Riding of Yorkshire Archives and
Records Service) - local authority, personal and estate papers

* Regimental Museums (Army Medical Services Museum: Royal Army Dental
Corps) - records of the Dental Corps

* Sussex Parish Chest (East Sussex Record Office) - Parish and Poor Law
records

* Yorkshire Signpost (East Riding of Yorkshire Archives and Records
Service) - various papers including personal and land records
The What's New section of the home page now links through to a list of A2A
contributors via the "395 record offices" link. Each name in the list as a
link to the ARCHON database, and also to a list of that repository's
materials in A2A.

Additionally there have been house-keeping amendments to the A2A database,
tidying up indexing and removing duplicate entries.

To see the new catalogues at a glance, you can restrict your A2A search by
using the "Dates of Catalogues" feature on the standard Search page, then
sorting the results by "Location of Archive".

A list of the new finding aid titles is available from the 'new this month'
link on the right of the home page. You can search and browse A2A
catalogues from the home page by clicking on the Search button or the
magnifying glass icon.
A2A has now been searched 7.9 million times since launch and there have been
18.9 million catalogue downloads as a result.

For further information contact:
Monica Halpin
Regional Liaison Coordinator, A2A
The National Archives
Kew
Richmond
Surrey TW9 4DUTel: 020 8392 5328
Fax: 020 8487 9211
E-mail: monica.halpin@nationalarchives.gov.uk
http://www.a2a.org.uk
http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk
http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/partnerprojects/a2a