Proud and Exhausted: Recounting the Move of the Archives of Ontario to a New Facility

Abstract

The Archives of Ontario move in 2009 was not only the largest move of the collection to date, but also the most ambitious and complex. In addition to the physical challenges of packing and transporting irreplaceable historical items, the move gave the institution the opportunity to go through each item in the collection to improve our overall intellectual control. The move to the Archives new facility was the beginning of the best chapter in the history of the second largest archival collection in Canada, resulting in a custom designed facility with ideal temperature and humidity controls that provides the highest level of physical and interactive service to the public.