Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Library and Archives

Archivists Celebrate Preservation Week

On April 26, 2017, archivists and preservation specialists will take to Twitter to answer your questions as part of Preservation Week 2017. This special preservation-focused edition of #AskAnArchivist Day, sponsored by the Preservation Section of the Society of American Archivists, will give you a chance to ask questions about how to care for your collections, get information on what to do with your family heirlooms, or just satisfy your curiosity about what those folks in the preservation department are doing. As experts who do the exciting work of protecting and sharing important historical materials, archivists have many stories to share about the work they do every day in preserving fascinating documents, photographs, audio and visual materials, and artifacts. Increasingly, archival work extends beyond the physical and includes digital materials.

#AskAnArchivist Day gives you a chance to get answers directly from experts, whether it is about boxes of papers, collections of historic paperclips, or your favorite mix-tape from high school. No question is too crazy or too mundane. Discussing preservation is a process that helps us all.

How does it work? #AskAnArchivist Day is open to everyone—all you need is a Twitter account. To participate, just tweet a question and include the hashtags #AskAnArchivist in your tweet. Your question will be seen instantly by archivists around the country who are standing by to respond directly to you. Have a question for just the Rock Hall archivists? Include our Twitter handle with your question: @RockHallLibrary. We may not know every answer right away, but we’ll get back to you after we’ve had the chance to do some digging. Just want to follow along? Search Twitter for #AskAnArchivist to see questions and answers as they are shared.

So get ready! Archivists from universities, museums, historical societies, churches, businesses, local and state governments, and other organizations are taking to Twitter to answer your questions all day long on April 26 at #AskAnArchivist.

A Valentine for World Poetry Day

“Blue Valentines” by Tom Waits

She sends me blue valentines all the way from Philadelphia To mark the anniversary of someone that I used to be And it feels like a warrant is out for my arrest Baby you got me checkin in my rearview mirror Thats why I'm always on the run it's why I changed my name And I didn't think you'd ever find me here

To send me blue valentines like half forgotten dreams Like a pebble in my shoe as I walk these streets And the ghost of your memory baby its the thistle in the kiss Its the burglar that can break a rose's neck Its the tatooed broken promise I gotta hide beneath my sleeve I'm gonna see you every time I turn my back

Oh you send me blue valentines though I try to remain at large They're insisting that our love must have a eulogy Why do I save all this madness here in the nightstand drawer There to haunt upon my shoulders Baby I know I'd be luckier to walk around everywhere I go With this blind and broken heart That sleeps beneath my lapel

Instead these blue valentines to remind me of my cardinal sin I can never wash the guilt or get these bloodstains off my hands And it takes a whole lot of whiskey to make these nightmares go away And I cut my bleedin heart out every night and I'm gonna die just a little more On each St. Valentine's day Don't you remember I promised I would write you

These blue valentines Blue valentines Blue valentines

Image: A page from the handwritten lyrics to “Blue Valentines” by Inductee Tom Waits. From the Jeff Gold Collection.

Music Magazine Archive is a subscription database of digital collections focused on 20th and 21st century genres such as Rock, Folk, and Hip-Hop & Rap. It is available onsite at the Library & Archives.

These publications uniquely capture the social and historical context of each genre, and together support scholarly research areas such as race, class, gender, American studies, youth culture, and more across some of the most progressive decades of the 20th and 21st centuries. The database contains 1,460 issues comprising 100,552 pages and 91,254 articles. Researchers will find all material represented in the original publications, preserved in its original context, fully searchable and in high-resolution full color.

Titles include:

The Bob

Broadside

CREEM

Dirty Linen

Fairport Fanatics

Folk Works

Fusion

Hootenanny

Hotwire

Jazz and Pop

The Little Sandy Review

Maximum RocknRoll

Old Time Herald

OP (Lost Music Network)

Option

Paid my Dues

People’s Songs

Raygun

Royal’s World Countdown

Slash

Trouser Press