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fwd re: National History Day ("Science , Technology, Invention in History: Impact, Influence, Change") 

Forwarded to STHC-L for subscriber whose address changed.  Michele 
Aldrich, consulting archivist for the Otis Historical Archives [N.B.: 
the elevator company, not the operation of the same name headed by Mike 
Rhode at the National Museum of Health & Medicine (U.S.)!], is now 
re-subscribed at the new address,  .  My 
thanks to her for her informative response to my query about National 
History Day.

Russell Johnson


----------Begin forwarded message----------  
Date: Mon, 15 Feb 1999 16:25:50 -0500
From: Otis Historical Archives <historical.archives@otis.com>
Subject: FW: Chicago Metro History Fair and National History Day
 ("Science , Technology, Invention in History: Impact, Influence, Change")
To: "'STHC-L@library.ucla.edu'" <STHC-L@library.ucla.edu>


Otis Elevator Archives has long been a favorite site for students working
on History Day and Science Fair projects, but with the 1999 theme, we 
are getting far more History Day inquiries than in previous years. 
Dennis Barrow, my predecessor (now archivist at Aetna Insurance) had 
developed a standard "starter packet" on elevator history which I 
modified to cope with the school children. My version adds good copies 
of several images (portrait of Elisha Otis, old prints and clippings, 
ads, etc) suitable for display plus a bibliography of articles on 
recent elevator history created from America: History and Life (minus 
all the references to grain elevators, which fascinate historians 
because of their connection to populism). I refer the students to 
amazon.com for books on elevators and to the historical pages of the 
Otis website, as it is important to increase the students' research 
skills and not do it all for them. It takes me about a half hour
to cope with student requests using the packet.

By cooperating with librarians, I've taken some of the pressure off 
the Otis archives for dealing with students. The state library in 
Vermont (Elisha Otis was born in Vermont) has a copy of the packet to 
distribute, as does a town library in South Carolina. 

The Otis archives, like most corporate enclaves, exists primarily for the
benefit of the company, and I give priority to company requests, not to
school requests. Sometimes I am able to do a little extra for a child. If
the student tells me that they have a thesis to their project and what it
is, I may be able to copy a few extra documents, usually text but
sometimes images, to support it. Or if they have done research before 
they call me and ask for specific items not in the packet for which 
there are no copyright complications, I will try to copy and send them. 
But there are limits. One wanted to borrow old movies of elevators, and 
I referred them to the American Film Institute catalog (they had the 
resources of the Stanford University Library available to them).

Often it is Mom or Dad who calls, not the student. This makes me uneasy:
who is doing the project? The students (and their paretns) often leave 
the project till the last minute (something we never do, of course!).
Fortunately Otis has a rate with Airborne that is competitive with 
1st class mail rates, and I can ship express at no extra cost to Otis.

Another pitfall is that I sometimes have to remind students that Otis has
competitors. It's up to the student to find them but I feel obliged to
mention that. Otis didn't lead in every elevator innovation.

Amother subtle point is that the Otis story as usually told is the classic
creation myth. But Elisha Otis existed in a context that needs to be
explored -- not just other elevator inventors, but a social and economic
matrix. It is hard to get students wised up to the new thinking in the
history of technology, because their teachers are often unaware of it, and
the students may actually get a lower grade if they get too far ahead of
the class.

Science Fair projects require a slightly different packet. These students
may be building an elevator, and need to know how it works, or need to
know about contemporary elevator technology,so I send a variant mix of 
articles compared to the history packet.

There is little interest in escalator history. It's as if there are
standard idea lists for school projects, with elevators on them and 
escalators not.

Michele Aldrich
Consulting Archivist
Otis Historical Archives
----------End forwarded message----------
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