By Susan Martin, Senior Processing Archivist
At the beginning of last year, my colleagues Caitlin Walker and Nancy Heywood introduced you to the MHS Digital Archive, our then-brand-new repository of born-digital and reformatted audiovisual material. The archive has grown by leaps and bounds since then. I’d like to plug one particular collection we’ve acquired that includes digital material: the records of Massachusetts Peace Action, or MAPA.
MAPA, a state affiliate of Peace Action, was founded in the 1980s, primarily in response to the proliferation of nuclear weapons. The organization advocates for an end to wars, violence, militarization, and imperialism around the world. Their records, donated to us between 2013 and 2020, fill fourteen record cartons and include meeting minutes, reports, newsletters, correspondence, financial records, newspaper clippings, etc.
The donation also included twelve audiocassettes and eight VHS tapes, dating primarily from the late 1980s and 1990s. This audiovisual material has been reformatted and is now available at the MHS Digital Archive. The easiest way to find it is to follow the blue links from the Massachusetts Peace Action collection guide.
You can listen to a conference call discussing organizing strategies; watch a 1989 forum of speakers from the Soviet Union (unfortunately the audio’s pretty rough on this one); or virtually “attend” some of MAPA’s conferences featuring speeches by Asoka Bandarage, Noam Chomsky, Robert Reich, Bernie Sanders, and others. There’s a wealth of information here; for example, I recommend the very interesting remarks of community activist Betty Richardson at a 1993 workshop on the intersection between race and the peace movement.
AI-generated transcripts are available, but I want to emphasize that all the description and metadata work for this material was person-generated. I’m particularly pleased with how well we’ve been able to integrate these digital and digitized items with the organization’s paper records.
When the MHS does not hold copyright to digital material, researchers must be physically present in our Reading Room to view it. But most of Massachusetts Peace Action’s digital material may be enjoyed from the comfort of your own home. So can many other items in the MHS Digital Archive, which we hope you’ll spend some time browsing through.