J Magazine Winter 2019
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Alan Bliss, executive director of the Jacksonville<br />
Historical Society, is looking forward to renovating<br />
the Casket Factory and the added space it brings.<br />
space to store files of newspaper stories<br />
and photos. The clip files are at the Main<br />
Library Downtown where they are available<br />
to the general public.<br />
“I was determined that the Times-<br />
Union collection would be preserved, and<br />
be preserved in Jacksonville,” Bliss said.<br />
The society and the library staff worked<br />
diligently to arrange the safe storage of<br />
newspaper items.<br />
Newspaper photos at the old Casket<br />
Factory still need to be catalogued and<br />
organized. That’s a job for volunteers led by<br />
Chief Archivist Mitch Hemann.<br />
The old St. Luke’s Hospital<br />
building is crammed with<br />
material, but it is carefully<br />
organized and the items<br />
are recorded in a database.<br />
But the old building is not<br />
state-of-the-art because it still has too<br />
much ultraviolet light, there is inadequate<br />
climate control and the building is<br />
vulnerable to severe storms.<br />
“We are excruciatingly short on processing<br />
space,” Bliss said. “We need space<br />
and resources that can function in a<br />
secure, organized, safe professional way.”<br />
Enter the Casket Factory. The old<br />
building needs major renovations to give<br />
archivists the room to do their work. Only<br />
one floor of the three-story Casket Factory<br />
is air conditioned.<br />
That is why the Historical Society is<br />
raising $300,000 to renovate the building.<br />
Thanks goes to Delores Barr Weaver for an<br />
initial $50,000 grant that is designed to be<br />
matched. The grant honors Emily Lisska,<br />
who retired after 21 years as executive<br />
director of the Historical Society.<br />
The archivists do a lot of sorting and<br />
sometimes discover real finds.<br />
Recent discoveries include the second<br />
edition of Zephaniah Kingsley’s treatise on<br />
slavery from 1829.<br />
There are a few yellow fever immunity<br />
cards that residents used to move around<br />
freely, including one from the governor’s<br />
son, Francis Fleming Jr., with a physician’s<br />
name on it.<br />
There is a letter from W.E.B. DuBois<br />
on Crisis <strong>Magazine</strong> letterhead looking for<br />
information on African-American judges.<br />
Included in the archives is 16 mm film<br />
from the JAX Chamber promoting Jacksonville<br />
as well as political campaign film from<br />
the 1950s and 1960s.<br />
A collection from the Jacksonville<br />
Women’s Club dates to the late 1800s. A<br />
part-time archivist is working on it.<br />
Too often the artifacts are like orphans.<br />
“We are very accustomed to getting rich<br />
collections of old photographs with no<br />
information,” Bliss said.<br />
In fact, many of the old Times-Union<br />
photographs have no identifying information<br />
on the back.<br />
Much of the Times-Union material can<br />
be recovered digitally, Bliss said. Some material<br />
is badly deteriorated. But nothing will<br />
be thrown out until everybody signs off.<br />
The Casket Factory will provide the<br />
space to organize the work with limited<br />
ultraviolet light, secure from storms. In fact,<br />
the location is relatively high even though<br />
it is near Hogans Creek. Windows on part<br />
of the second floor have been bricked over,<br />
so most of the sensitive material will be<br />
stored there.<br />
Jacksonville has a rich and fascinating<br />
history. Thanks goes to the Jacksonville<br />
Historical Society for continuing to preserve<br />
it in a professional manner.<br />
MIKE CLARK is Editorial Page Editor of The<br />
Florida Times-Union and Editor of J. He has<br />
been a reporter and editor for the Jacksonville<br />
newspapers since 1973. He lives in Nocatee.<br />
Mitch Hemann, archivist for the Jacksonville<br />
Historical Society, will have plenty of work<br />
researching and cataloging artifacts once the<br />
Casket Factory in renovated.