The Tomball Archive and History Center is growing as staff work to preserve more local records and make Tomball’s history easier for residents to access.
What this means
During a May 18 Tomball City Council workshop, City Historical Archivist Allison LaRocca said the center has doubled its collections from three to six since its last update.
The archive, located on the Lone Star College-Tomball campus, houses historic city records and community-donated materials tied to Tomball and the surrounding area. As previously reported, the center’s goal is to preserve municipal records and community history while eventually making those materials easier for the public to search and use.
What’s new
The Tomball Garden Club collection is now fully processed and open for research through the center’s catalog system, LaRocca said. The collection includes seven boxes, or about 9.25 cubic feet of materials.
Staff are also working through the First Baptist Church collection, which is the center’s largest physical collection so far. LaRocca said it includes about 50 boxes, 10 oversized folders and 42 cubic feet of archive space.
The center has also added a fully digital collection of Trinity Evangelical Lutheran Church ledgers, which date back to 1902 and include some of the oldest items in the archive.
By the numbers
Over the last quarter, the center added 467 new digitized objects, moved materials into 64 archival-quality boxes and is managing about 30 gigabytes of digital preservation and access copies.
Staff also responded to one emergency preservation issue after inactive mold spores were found in a First Baptist Church scrapbook.
Also of note
The archive is seeking help from anyone who can read or translate German. LaRocca said some of the Trinity Evangelical Lutheran Church records are handwritten in German and need to be transcribed before they can become fully searchable and easier for the public to use.
What’s next
The center is also partnering with the Railroad Depot Museum to care for two 1897 dresses, with a local textile conservator expected to help move the dresses into new display cases this summer.
Once that happens, the archive plans to use new space at the depot for rotating exhibits, starting with one focused on the depot itself. Staff also plan to inventory and catalog depot items, which LaRocca said have not been fully documented.
Looking ahead, LaRocca said the center’s priorities include securing digital hosting so more materials can be viewed online, strengthening relationships with community groups and working with city staff on promotion efforts, such as school research guides, workshops, social media campaigns and pop-up exhibits.
