I am posting this correspondence in it's entirety, so it will be self-explanatory. PLEASE, if you feel strongly about this, DO something - even if it's only an email !!
Thank you.
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This is the message that I hoped I will never have to send, concerning the
archives of DERA, the UK test establishment formerly known as the RAE
(Royal Aircraft Establishment), the British counterpart to Edwards AFB.
It was known that DERA will not keep its huge photo archives anymore and
that this will be broken up between the Imperial War Museum (IWM) and the
Farnborough Air Sciences Trust (FAST) and that material described as being
"not-worth-keeping" will be discarded.
This is of course totally unacceptable to me, as I consider that no RAE
archives are "not-worth-keeping." All the X-Planes books that I produced
have relied on such "not-worth-keeping" stuff, for the detailed
nut-and-bolt project history.
Many detailed histories of British X-Planes will not be written and ARE
LOST FOREVER because the material that would have sourced such a book was
destroyed as being "not-worth-keeping".
The outlook had seemed positive earlier this month. Mike Baker - Chairman
(FAST) assured me in an e-mail dated Sunday 8 July 2001 that "there is no
question of any (DERA) negatives being destroyed" and that "no records will
be discarded!."
For a while this statement put my mind at ease and I was able to get some
sleep.
The review and selection of DERA photographs for permanent preservation is
being carried out under the direction of the Public Record Office (the UK's
National Archives). The officer responsible for this review is Joe Kelly at
the Public Record Office.
His e-mail:
[email protected].
I wrote to Mr. Kelly, suggesting that they give me the DERA material they
thought of as "not-worth-keeping," with myself paying the shipping costs.
Below is his reply, e-mailed to me yesterday:
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Dear Mr Matthews
Thank you for your enquiry. I appreciate the interest you have in this
material. However I cannot give the undertaking that you seek.
These photographs are, as you know, public records as defined in UK
legislation and will be subject to the usual measure of value-review
required by that legislation. That review will sift out material deemed,
by experts, to be of no historic value and which will be discarded. We
are under remit, as always, to discard the ephemeral and preserve that
which is of true historic value, and we will do that.
The review will also identify material that the Public Record Office does
not wish itself to preserve but which those who are carrying out the review
may feel to be of some historic interest. We have agreed to present that
material to FAST, under the terms of the Public Records Act 1958 Section
3(6). The Act allows us to do this where the receiving institution has
both the interest and the resources properly to care for the material and
to allow access to it by the general public. It would be inappropriate and
unacceptable to present public records under any other circumstances.
I am sorry that I cannot give you the reply that perhaps you would have
hoped for, but I hope that this is nonetheless helpful in clarifying the
position.
Regards
Joe Kelly
Records Management Department
Public Record Office
Telephone 0208 392 5330 extn. 2359
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So this, briefly, is the situation: Historical RAE material which is
decades old will be destroyed as being "ephemeral" and "of no historic
value."
In the past, flight log books, biographies and pictures of test pilots were
discarded under the same pretence.
Even if they dont give me this "not-worth-keeping" material, I am sure
there are many aviation museums in the UK and elsewhere who will accept it.
Can anybody help, please?
Henry Matthews
Author/Publisher
nullHMP Publications