Michigan Archival Association Annual Meeting, June 14-15, 2018

NOTE: Remember to log in as a member for your member rate!

We hope you are able to join us for MAA’s 59th annual meeting! Located at the DoubleTree hotel in downtown Bay City, this year’s annual meeting features an assortment of exciting and enticing programs in a lovely facility. 

Many legacies of Bay City’s history are modern-day attractions for its current residents and visitors. Veterans Memorial Park offers a spectacular walk through Bay City history. Visitors can walk along the Riverwalk, a pathway that leads out over the Saginaw River on the supports from an old railroad bridge. The remnants of the Davidson Shipbuilding Company’s fleet of giant wooden vessels are still visible in the river. The Trombley/Centre House is Bay City’s oldest standing frame house and the location of Henry Sage’s lumber mill. Once described as the largest sawmill in the world, it has now been re-purposed as a marina. A stroll down Center Avenue presents an opportunity to appreciate the homes left by lumbermen and other successful entrepreneurs. And finally, the historic downtown district is experiencing a vibrant renaissance. 

An impressive list of informational and educational programs includes such topics as project management, outreach, audio collection management, student projects, collection security, diversity in collections, and uncovering hidden collections. Of particular note this year, the Northeast Document Conservation Center is sending a representative to lead a program on the basics of preserving audiovisual material. We also have a pre-conference workshop entitled “Scan Everything?!: How to Plan and Implement a Large Scale Digitization Project,” presented by Sarah M. Dorpinghaus, the Director of Digital Services at the University of Kentucky Libraries Special Collections Research Center. 

To acclimate you to Bay City, this year’s program includes not only a local history session, but also a walking tour of town, a tour of City Hall, and an open house at the Historical Museum of Bay County. We also have an exciting keynote presentation lined up about the history of ships and shipwrecks in the Saginaw River Valley. 

This conference is particularly exciting, as we’re celebrating MAA’s 60th anniversary! All our past presidents will be honored at our membership meeting luncheon. In addition, we are holding a special topic panel celebrating women in archival leadership. There will be prepared questions for the panelists followed by time for attendees to share memories and stories of their time with MAA.