Coming to America: Dutch Archivistiek and American Archival Practice, by Marjorie Rabe Barritt,

Coming to America: Dutch Archivistiek and American Archival Practice, by Marjorie Rabe Barritt,

ARCHIVAL ISSUES Vol. 18, No. 1, 1993

ABSTRACT: Most archivists acknowledge that the antecedents of archival theory in the United States were theoretical developments in France, Germany, and the Netherlands in the nineteenth century. The author describes the influence of the principles of respect des fonds from the French and Registraturprinzip from the Germans on Dutch archival development which resulted in the publication in 1898 of the Manual for the Arrangement and Description of Archives by Samuel Muller, Johan Feith, and Robert Fruin. The influence of the Manual and of the principle of provenance on early American archival practice is traced through the speeches and writings of Arnold J.F. Van Laer and Waldo G. Leland. The article also discusses Arthur H. Leavitt's 1940 English translation of the Dutch Manual.

As archivists we may have been introduced to archival history as part of our archival education. After learning about papyrus and clay tablets and archives in Assyria, the focus probably shifted to the history of archival development in Europe and the chronology was certainly: respect des fonds from the French, Registraturprinzip from the Germans, and the Manual of Muller, Feith, and Fruin from the Dutch. We learned that three Dutch archivists, Samuel Muller, Johan Feith, and Robert Fruin wrote a manual of archival practice in 1898, Handleiding voor Het Ordenen en Beschrijven van Archieven. A literal English translation of the title is Manual for the Arrangement and Description of Archives. However, no English title or translation existed until 1940 when Arthur Leavitt, working at the United States National Archives, published an English edition.'

At first glance it seems the influence of the Manual on English-speaking archivists must have been minimal until 1940. But the spread of ideas and theories can be subtle; they often do not wait for translation to begin to affect change. In the case of the archival principles systematically written down and published in the Dutch Manual, several individuals championed them in the United States before the Manual was translated into English, most notably Arnold J.F. Van Laer and Waldo H. Leland.

Before tracing the migration of Dutch archival theory across the Atlantic, one should know more about Dutch archivistiek during the last half of the nineteenth century.2 What was Dutch archival practice at the time of the writing the Manual? Who influenced Muller, Feith, and Fruin? Did Muller, Feith, and Fruin develop the one-hundred archival principles in the Manual out of whole cloth or did their work represent a continuum of the development of modem archival theory in Europe? Were respect des fonds and Registraturprinzip at work in the Netherlands prior to the publication of the Manual in 1898?

Good primary and secondary sources are available about the work of Dutch archivistiek at the end of the nineteenth century and about the work of Muller, Feith, and Fruin in particular. As for general archival practice at the end of the nineteenth century-the practice that according to Muller, Feith, Fruin, and others needed reforming-the best description may be that in the Manual itself, in the commentary on Rule 8:

There are archive repositories in which all documents, regardless of their origin are put in one chronological order. There are also places in which documents, which were created by various agencies and bureaucrats, and are therefore evidence of different government duties, are assembled in one series. Men have, for example, assembled all documents about charities, or about the military, regardless of whether they came from the province, a city, or a cloister, into one series.3

Much of the following recounting of the writing of the Manual is based on a 1986 article by Eric Ketelaar, currently general state archivist of the Netherlands.4 As Ketelaar stated in his introduction,

Only a few people know more about its [the Manual's] authors than their names. Neither do colleagues abroad know much about the genesis of the Manual. My intention is to present the men and their Manual, as a contribution to the history of our profession.'

In his article Ketelaar introduced each of the three authors and several other Dutch archival luminaries of the time, especially P.J. Vermeulen and H.F. Van Reimsdijk. Vermeulen, who was Samuel Muller's predecessor as state archivist for the province of Utrecht, may be an important "missing link," in the migration of French archival theory to Holland. Ketelaar quotes a statement

Vermeulen wrote in 1850:

Archives are more than a simple collection of historical manuscripts which have no other link than having been put together in the same room [and] which, relating to the same or related subjects, can be catalogued by serial numbers.. ..Instead it seemed to me that in an archives catalogue an outline of the composition of the earlier administrations could and should be visible.... one of the prerequisites for the scientific arrangement and inventorization [is]...to restore the original order which once had been the most practical and which...surely can not be replaced profitably by any other.6

Clearly, at least one Dutch archivist considered provenance and original order the proper archival methodology as early as the mid-nineteenth century. Samuel Muller became archivist for the city of Utrecht in 1874 and in 1879 succeeded Vermeulen as state archivist for the province of Utrecht. Muller had also attended a few lectures in 1873 at the Ecole des Chartes (the distinguished training school for archivists in Paris) and remembered that "the professor who taught the organization of archives, never tired of preaching the respect des fonds."7 Muller in turn influenced H.F. Van Riemsdijk who, after serving as Muller's assistant at Utrecht, became state archivist in the province of Gelderland in 1875. After leaving Utrecht, Van Riemsdijk had a meteoric career. He was appointed deputy national archivist (over Muller) in 1883 and general state archivist in 1887. In 1890, as general state archivist, he convened the first annual conference of state archivists with the intention of reaching agreement concerning the arrangement of archives in repositories. Van Riemsdijk and the state archivists developed classification schemes "based upon the Vermeulen-Muller-Van Riemsdijk principle that each archival group should be kept separate and that all documents from one provenance should be kept together."8

At about the same time that Van Riemsdijk, as general state archivist, was proselytizing among the state archivists for the provenance-based classification of archives, a new force appeared in the Dutch archival world; the Netherlands Society of Archivists was founded in June 1891. Johan Feith, destined to become a co-author of the Manual was among the founders of the new society.

Feith was a third generation archivist; in fact, in 1892 he became the third generation Feith to head the state archives of the province of Groningen. The new Society included forty of the forty-eight city and state archivists in its membership.

The Nederlandse Archievenblad, the journal of the Netherlands Society of Archivists, gives evidence that the "new" methodology was presented again and again at the annual meetings of the Society.9 Between 1892 and 1896, Muller himself presented papers on the ordering of archives, the organization of an inventory, and archives science and practice.'" Within the Society, a militant and polemic Muller and Robert Fruin, among others, promoted the new methodology with vehement persuasion. When it appeared that developing rules through discussions at the Society's annual meetings would take too long, the Society decided to elect a committee to write guidelines for arrangement and description. Muller, Feith, and finally Fruin, who in 1894 had been appointed state archivist in Zeeland, were elected to the committee which began its work in 1895.

The committee's work was careful and conscientious according to a 1938 letter from Arnold Van Laer to Arthur Leavitt at the time Arthur Leavitt was translating the Manual into English with assistance from Van Laer.

They [the committee] carefully weighed and considered every rule laid down and every technical expression used and submitted these for discussion at the meetings of the association of Archivists [Netherlands Society of Archivists]. After adoption by this Association, these rules and terms were once more discussed at the annual meeting of the archivists of the Kingdom, presided over by Dr. Th. F. van Riemsdijk, the Archivist General, who was not a member of the Association and who on some points held different opinions. Finally, the rules were submitted to the Minister of the Interior, who proposed some further changes. It is only in some such way that a satisfactory manual for the description and classification and transfer of archives in this country can be evolved."

The committee of three drafted strong rules, allowing for no equivocation. This autocratic tone found favor with Victor de Stuers, head of the Department for Arts and Sciences within the Ministry of the Interior, and the person through whom the draft rules were submitted to the Ministry. De Stuers, Van Riemsdijk's superior, was a strong-minded builder of a centralized policy in the field of archives, monuments, and museums. In June 1897 he promulgated new ministerial regulations concerning archival arrangement and description which matched those being drafted in the Manual. There was good communication between the professional society and the national archival bureaucracy-at least between the committee and the ministry through de Stuers. Both the committee and de Stuers agreed about the force with which the new methodology should be stated. Thus the Manual rules reflected the "new" archival thinking as filtered through the Netherlands Society of Archivists' drafting committee and matched the "new" thinking as outlined in the Ministry's regulations of 10 June 1897.

Muller, Feith, and Fruin met several times, but most of their collaboration was in writing. They circulated drafts and each added comments to the original text and the amendments. Agreement was sometimes difficult. The evolution of the final text and the contributions of individual authors are revealed through P.J. Horsman's analysis of the original draft of the Manual preserved in the archives of the Society in the National Archives in the Hague.'2

The introduction gives the flavor of the work, but especially of Muller who drafted it. Muller began,

This is a tedious and narrow-minded book. The reader is warned!... Why have we together written about such trifles so exactly? Because we are convinced that the uniform treatment of inventories, in the small points as well as the main points, is of the utmost importance.... We do not intend to impose this manual as a heavy burden upon the shoulders of our colleagues. We shall not look sourly upon persons who either in small details or large break from these rules. But we hope that our colleagues will discuss with us their criticism of these rules.... We are asking for criticism, much criticism.... Our hope is that in a few years a second edition will be published of our work in which the approval of the association will have been sought and received. The second edition will, we believe, not have to endure the sense of evil which clings to this first draft. It bears the weight of the break from its origins.3

A strange ambiguity and contradiction exists between the didacticism of the committee in creating hard and fast rules and their professed tolerance of expected criticism and resistance by their colleagues. But it is very Dutch to be both didactic and tolerant.

The Manual is divided into six chapters: "Origin and composition of archival repositories," "Sorting of documents," "The description of documents,"

"Assembling the inventory," "Further description rules," and "About conventional terms and numbers." This last chapter constitutes a thesaurus of archival terminology and discusses the dating of documents. Following each rule are long explanations, or commentaries, which give credence to this as the work of a committee.

As Ketelaar pointed out, it is within chapter one, specifically in Rule 8, that the principle of respect des fonds is articulated and the authors leave nothing to misunderstanding. They state that, "The various archive groups placed in a repository must be kept carefully separated." In the accompanying commentary they illustrate unacceptable practice [as quoted on page forty-four] and caution that these practices violate respect des fonds. The commentary continues,

"Every document should be restored to the archive group of the administrative body or official to whom it originally belonged."'4

To the principle of provenance, the Manual added the principle of original order: not only should every document be restored to the archive group to which it originally belonged, but within that archive group to its original place. This was derived from the German Registraturprinzip. Original order is found in Rule 16, "the system of arrangement must be based on the original organization of the archive group (archief) which in the main corresponds to the organization of the administrative body that produced it.... In the arrangement of an archive group, therefore, the original order should first of all be re-established as far as possible. Only thereafter can one judge whether, and to what extent, it is desirable to deviate from that order."' 5 The minute instructions given in the chapters on the description of documents, the assembling of the inventory, the chapter on further description rules, and the chapter on conventional terms and numbers had a strong influence on Dutch archival practice, for in fact these 1898 rules mandated descriptive and procedural standards.

But what of the influence of the Manual and of Dutch archivistiek in the new world? Did the principles of provenance and original order make the crossing before Leavitt's 1940 English translation of the Manual? Evidence exists of a pre-1940 migration and the principal instruments of that migration were Arnold J.F. Van Laer and Waldo H. Leland. In 1897, the year before the Manual was published, a twenty-eight year old Dutchman, Arnold John Ferdinand Van Laer, immigrated to the United States, settling in Albany. He had earned a degree in mechanical engineering at the University of Delft and had archival training in the Netherlands; sometime later he received a bachelor of library science from the New York State Library School. Van Laer headed the Manuscript Division of the New York State Library from 1899 to 1915. In 1915, he moved his life's work of translating Dutch colonial documents to the New York Division of Archives and History, retaining the title of archivist. Van Laer is best known for his translations of New York's colonial Dutch records. His contributions to the archival profession and his efforts to encourage the preservation of historical records are frequently overlooked. 6 Although T.R. Schellenberg gave him the following credit, "The principle of provenance was first made known in the United States by Arnold J. Van Laer.... He applied the principle of provenance to the state archives, changing the method of arranging archives chronologically.....,",VanLaer is, perhaps, the most important, and yet least recognized, link in the transfer of Dutch archivistiek to the new world. In his "Arnold Johan Ferdinand Van Laer, New York State Archivist: Some Biographical Notes," James Corsaro also points to Van Laer's unheralded contributions.'7

Van Laer and Waldo H. Leland made the principle of provenance and other "new" methodologies known to their American colleagues in the American Historical Association (AHA) through their writings and presentations. Incorporated by Congress in January 1889, the AHA sought to promote "historical studies, the collection and preservation of historical manuscripts, and...kindred purposes in the interest of American history and of history in America."'8

In 1899, ten years after its founding, the AHA established a Public Archives Commission and included a report from the Commission in its Annual Report. Beginning in 1909, a conference of archivists was held in conjunction with the annual meeting of the AHA. Schellenberg credited the annual meetings of the Public Archives Commission with giving the principle of provenance exposure among American archivists.'9 Waldo G. Leland's paper to the first conference of archivists in December 1909, "American Archival Problems," constituted the opening of the discussion of proper archival methodology in the United States. Leland made extended visits to Europe in his capacity as head of the Carnegie Institution's historical mission to France. He attended the course on the Service des archives at the Ecole des Chartes; he also visited archival institutions in Belgium, the Netherlands, and England. In his 1909 AHA paper Leland said,

The problem of the classification of archives presents certain difficulties. In general, the principle enunciated by the Dutch, and adhered to in most European archives, the "herkomstbeginsel," the "respect des fonds," or "principe de la provenance," should be adopted. The archives should be classified according to their origin; they should reflect the processes by which they came into existence.... Nothing is more disastrous than the application of modern library methods of classification to a body of archives.2°

Van Laer's paper to the second conference of archivists in Indianapolis in December 1910, in which he reported on the international conference of archivists at Brussels in August of that year, established his role in the spread of European archival principles. Van Laer described the background and preparations for the Brussels conference, one of a series of international congresses arranged in connection with the Brussels Exposition, which "...for the first time brought together representatives from various countries for the discussion of questions relating to the care and administration of archives." 2' The archivists' meetings in Brussels included about sixty persons with the Netherlands sending a delegation of nine members including Muller and Fruin; France, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Italy, Spain, and the United States each having from three to six members in their delegations; and Great Britain, Portugal, and Russia represented by one or two members. The American Historical Association, through its Public Archives Commission, sent Gaillard Hunt, Dunbar Rowland, W.G. Leland, and Van Laer. Van Laer gave a detailed account of the four-day conference to the archivists assembled in Indianapolis.

According to Van Laer, preparation for the conference had been thorough,

The organizing commission had at an early date consulted prominent archivists and librarians in various countries as to topics most suitable for discussion at the congress and prepared from the answers for each section a list of questions on which papers were requested. For the archives section the schedule embraced 25 questions.

The second topic of the first session on archives was the adoption of the "principe de la provenance" introduced by the archivist of the city of Rotterdam. Van Laer editorialized about provenance in his report.

This principle, which at present is accepted by nearly all the archivists of continental Europe as the only rational basis for the classification of archives, has been frequently discussed in foreign reviews, but is, I believe, as yet but vaguely understood and rarely applied in England and the United States. It may not be amiss, therefore, to state that, according to Dr. Muller's definition, by the term "principe de la provenance," or "Provenienzprinzip," as the Germans call it, is meant a system of arrangement of public archives whereby every document is traced to the governmental body, administrative office or institution by which it was issued or received and to the files of which it last belonged when these files were still in process of natural accretion. In other words, the principle demands that documents shall be classified, not like books, according to their subject matter, but with reference to the organic relations of the papers, the files of each body or office being kept by themselves. Simple and logical as this principle may seem, it has been ignored in nearly all the earlier arrangements of archives in this country. As a result we find the papers of various legislative and judicial bodies and administrative offices combined in such miscellaneous series as "Colonial manuscripts," "Revolutionary papers," "Military papers," "Land papers," "Accounts," etc., which fail to reflect the functions and activities of each body or office, hide the gaps in the existing files, and make it difficult to ascertain the nature of the papers that are missing.

Van Laer recounted that the Brussels meeting adopted the following resolution, "That the 'principe de la provenance' be adopted for the arrangement and inventorying of archives, with a view to the logical classification of separate documents as well as in the interest of comprehensive historical study."23

Van Laer ended his report to the Indianapolis meeting with a summary of the ideas from the Brussels conference which seemed to him to be of special interest to archivists in the United States---the need to preserve modem administrative records, especially of large cities; an appreciation of the value of economic records; the unanimity among European archivists as to the importance of provenance for the arrangement of archives; and "A growing realization among the archivists of different countries of the need of cooperation in order to bring about improved and uniform methods of archive administration, which can not fail to benefit countries which like the United States are backward with regard to archival organization."24

Van Laer's report brought praise from archival leaders such as Waldo G. Leland who wrote in 1911 expressing condolences respecting the New York State Library fire and noted "I cannot sufficiently express my admiration for your paper.... It is...the best thing the Association has ever printed on archives."

In The Management of Archives, Theodore Schellenberg used the American Historical Association Annual Reports, among other sources, to describe the history of archival methodology as practiced in the United States and to trace the acceptance of the "new" methodology within the American archival community. Even as late as the 1940s, according to Schellenberg's analysis of the Historical Records Survey's archival guides, "two thirds of the repositories arranged items chronologically, and about one third by subject, though a combination of methods was employed in many repositories."26

According to Schellenberg, one of these combination methods,

The chronologic-geographic scheme of classifying records....evolved, late in the nineteenth century, in the Manuscripts Division of the Library of Congress.... The chronologic-geographic scheme represents the extreme opposite of the archival principle by which records are kept according to their provenance, and led to the practice of tearing manuscript collections apart---a practice that has immeasurably retarded the development of an effective control over the documentary resources of the nation." 

Schellenberg went on to recount that even in Van Laer's own manuscript repository there had been back-sliding. Shortly after Van Laer moved his translation work to the New York State Division of Archives and History, his successor in the New York State Library recommended a scheme in which classes were established for chronological periods. Likewise, Schellenberg reported, Gaillard Hunt, who had attended the Brussels conference in 1910, accepted the chronologic-geographic scheme of classification for naval records.

Unfortunately, Schellenberg found that thirty years after the adoption of the principle of provenance by the Brussels congress, most archivists in the United States either ignored or misunderstood the principle and did not apply it to the records in their care. Schellenberg found that, especially in manuscript repositories, when archivists sought new methodologies they often imposed various artificial schemes, many of them library derivatives, upon the records. Inroads where being made, however, "With the establishment of the National Archives in 1934 the principles of Leland and others, which represented to a large extent views derived from European practices, were applied for the first time to a voluminous mass of modem records. 28

For forty years the principles of Dutch archivistiek as published in the Manual and translated into several European languages, were still coming to the United States by word of mouth, sometimes in words translated through several languages. But in March 1938 Arthur H. Leavitt of the United States National Archives sent Van Laer chapter one of Leavitt's translation of the Manual. Leavitt's publisher, the H.W. Wilson Company had asked Van Laer to review Leavitt's work. Leavitt wrote to Van Laer,

I should inform you that my translation was made in the first place from the French translation by Cuvelier and Stein, with occasional reference to the Dutch and German texts. In making the revision of Chapter I, which I am now sending you, I have consulted the Dutch original much more. I have been aware that the French translation departs to a considerable extent from the original. Although I do not know Dutch, I am able to follow it sufficiently to correct or improve my translation from the French work. 9

Evidently Van Laer owned no copy of the Manual because Leavitt and Van Laer sent the National Archives' copy of the Manual back and forth as they exchanged drafts and corrections. To Van Laer the translation of technical terms was the most troubling problem of the work.

The translation strikes me as being very well done, but as not wholly satisfactory in the use of certain technical terms, due to the difficulty of finding suitable Engish [sic] equivalents for French expressions like "depot d'archives" and "fonds d'archives."... In a work of this sort it is essential to define once for all certain terms that have been agreed upon by a competent committee, so as to secure uniformity in their usage. As far as I am aware, this has not been done.""

Van Laer also suggested that the footnotes be related to circumstances in the United States, "In other words, whether it would not be better to make the English version more of an American adaptation, instead of a literal translation."'" After reviewing the whole of chapter one, Van Laer commented,

The fundamental trouble with the translation, as I see it, is that a number of technical terms, which occur in the very first definition and upon whose correct use the entire treatise rests, have not been satisfactorily rendered. 

The Society of American Archivists has appointed a Committee on Terminology.... It seems to me that this Committee should propose to the Society a set of definitions of technical terms to be used in archival work and that an English translation of the standard work on the subject should not be undertaken until a consensus of opinion on the use of these terms has been reached. Without such agreement as to the use of the terms, the publication of an English translation of the Manual will only create confusion... 

For a manual, which is to be consulted in the course of archival work and which is designed to bring about uniformity in the preparation of inventories and descriptions of archives, the matter of terminology is of the utmost importance.... 

The Dutch archivists have taken the utmost pains to arrive at a satisfactory solution of this problem of terminology. The compilers of the Manual, all three of them now deceased, were learned men, who were eminent in their profession and who had many years of experience.... The present translation, of course, does not attempt to supply such a manual, but it would form an excellent basis for the preparation of such a manual and it is important that the terms and definitions used reproduce as accurately as possible those of the original work.2

Leavitt did not seem dismayed by these comments and his work continued. In April 1938, while revising chapter two, Leavitt wrote to Van Laer that he was comparing his translation to the Dutch text "learning the Dutch language as I go along." In July he wrote that he had "recently been put on the Committee on Terminology here in The National Archives for the present year and this may help me to get some additional help with regard to certain words.)3 3 Again in July 1938 while reviewing Leavitt's last chapter, chapter six on terminology, Van Laer commented that this would be the most troublesome chapter on account of the difficulty of translating definitions.

The extant correspondence between Leavitt and Var Laer about the translation of the Manual ends on September 30, 1939. Leavitt's translation was at the printers and was expected out in early 1940 and Van Laer was preparing to retire from "State service." Van Laer ended his correspondence with Leavitt with the following,

I am glad to know that the book will be out before long and wish you much success with it. I noticed in the program of the meeting at Annapolis that the name Muller was spelled with a German umlaut, "MUller." I hope that the printer will not make that mistake on the title page. 34

The care lavished on the translation by Leavitt (and Van Laer) was acknowledged by Theodore C. Pease who reviewed the just-published translation of the Manual in the American Archivist. Pease called the Manual's one-hundred rules, aphorisms or principles of archival organization. He commented favorably on the translation,

Mr. Leavitt has done his work skilfully. His translation at once gives the flavor of the original, and the substance of irreproachable English idiom. He has been indefatigable in searching out the various meanings of the same technical term and assigning in each case the exact English equivalent....he has put the profession in the English speaking countries under heavy debt of gratitude to him.35

When the Dutch codified provenance and original order and a standard terminology in the published Manual it represented the culmination of European archival development to that point. The Manual was important not only because it embraced, codified, and gave explicit implementation instructions for provenance and original order, but also because it attempted to impose standardization on archival practice from records management to the management of archival repositories, from the use of archival terms to the preparation of inventories. Of the principle of provenance in a 1940 American Archivist article, Ernst Posner wrote, "the well-known manual of the Dutch archivists gave the final sanction to this theory and a change in theory brought about a change in the character of archival institutions and of the work of archivists.36

In the words of T.R. Schellenberg the Manual "became a Bible for modem archivists." Dutch archivist Joan van Albada quoted Schellenberg in his Summer 1991 American Archivist article, but cautioned that the Dutch archival profession is "on the move" and although "the average Dutch archivist pays more deference to the manual than to the Scriptures" the Manual is currently only a part of the archival Bible for Dutch archivists.37

Archivists in the United States had no archival Bible to guide them through the founding decades of their profession. During this period when American archival practice was, in the words of Van Laer, backward, it was greatly influenced by the history and library professions. European archival theory as codified by the Dutch in their "Bible for modem archivists," did not at first find fertile ground in the New World in spite of the efforts of Leland, Van Laer, and a few others; the acceptance of the "new" methodology in the United States was uneven and incomplete for many decades. With the publication of Arthur Leavitt's 1940 English translation and the writings of T.R. Schellenberg, European archival theory found greater acceptance. Almost a century after the Manual was published and more than fifty years after Leavitt's English translation, the search for standards and the codification of archival practice continues.

But now archivists in the United States have, if not an archival Bible, at least a large and growing body of archival literature on which to base their search.


ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Marjorie Rabe Barritt is associate archivist for university records at the Bentley Historical Library, the University of Michigan. This article, originally given as a presentation at the Midwest Archives Conference, Cleveland, Ohio, November 1992, combines two of her interests: Dutch archivistiek and the history of archives and the archival profession.



NOTES

1. S. Muller, J.A. Feith, and R. Fruin, Handleiding voor het Ordenen en Beschrijven van Archieven (Groningen: Erven B. Van der Kamp, 2d ed., 1920). Translation of the second Dutch edition by Arthur H. Leavitt published as Manual for the Arrangement and Description of Archives (New York: H.W. Wilson, 1940, 2d ed., 1968).

2. Archivistiek is the Dutch translation of the French word archivistique. The ICA Dictionary of Archival Terminology (1984) uses "Archive(s) Administration"'as the English equivalent of the French "Archivistique" and gives two definitions: (1) The theoretical and practical study of policies, procedures and problems relating to archival functions. (2) The direction and management of archives.

3. Muller, Feith, and Fruin, Handleiding, 16. Translated by the author.

4. The national archives of the Netherlands is referred to as the General State Archives. There are branches of the General State Archives for each province. These are referred to as the state archives for the province of Gelderland, Utrecht, etc. The position of general state archivist is equivalent to the position of national archivist in the United States.

5. Eric Ketelaar, "Muller, Feith and Fruin," Miscellanea Carlos Wyffels: Archives et Bibliotheques de Belgique 57 (1986): 256.

6. Ibid., 257. The translation from the Dutch is Ketelaar's.

7. As quoted by Ketelaar in "Muller, Feith and Fruin," 257.

8. Ibid., 258.

9. Vereniging van Archivarissen in Nederland, Nederlands Archievenblad (Groningen: Ervan B. van der Kamp, 1892-).

10. Samuel Muller Fzn., "De inrichting onzer archief-inventarissen," Nederlands Archievenblad (1892-1893): 44-46; "Nog eenige regelen voor het ordenen van archieven," Nederlands Archievenblad (1894-1895): 22-27; and "Wetenschappelijk en praktisch," Nederlands Archievenblad (1896-1897): 46-51.

11. Arnold J.F. van Laer to Arthur H. Leavitt, March 10, 1938, Arnold J.F. Van Laer Papers, Manuscripts and Special Collections, New York State Library, Albany (hereafter cited as Van Laer Papers)

12. Ketelaar, "Muller, Feith and Fruin," 260.

13. Muller, Feith, and Fruin, "Een Woord Vooraf' (Introduction), Handleiding, unnumbered. Translation by the author.

14. Ketelaar, "Muller, Feith and Fruin," 261. The translation is Ketelaar's.

15. As translated by Ketelaar in Ketelaar, "Muller, Feith and Fruin," 262.

16. Finding aid for the A.J.F. Van Laer Papers, Manuscripts and Special Collections, New York State Library, Albany.

17. T.R. Schellenberg, The Management of Archives (New York: Columbia University Press, 1965) 43; and James Corsaro, "Arnold Johan Ferdinand Van Laer, New York State Archivist: Some Biographical Notes," Society of American Archivists Archival History Newsletter, April 1990, unnumbered.

18. "Act of Incorporation," Annual Report of the American Historical Association for the Year 1910 (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1912), 5.

19. Schellenberg, Management of Archives, 43.

20. Waldo G. Leland, "American Archival Problems," Annual Report of the American Historical Association for the Year 1909 (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1911), 346.

21. Arnold J.F. Van Laer, "The Work of the Intemational Congress of Archivists and Librarians at Brussels, August 28-31, 1910," Annual Report of the American Historical Association for the
Year 1910 (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1912), 282.

22. Van Laer, "Work of the International Congress," 283.

23. Ibid., 285.

24. Ibid., 282, 291.

25. As quoted in Corsaro, "Arnold Johan Ferdinand Van Laer," unnumbered.

26. Schellenberg, Management of Archives, 33. The Historical Records Survey was conducted from January 1936 to June 30, 1942.

27. Ibid., 38, 39.

28. T.R. Schellenberg, Modern Archives: Principles and Techniques (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1956), 181.

29. Arthur H. Leavitt to Arnold J.F. Van Laer, March 5, 1938, Van Laer Papers.

30. Arnold J.F. Van Laer to Arthur H. Leavitt, March 7, 1938, Van Laer Papers.

31. Ibid.

32. Van Laer to Leavitt, March 10, 1938.

33. Leavitt to Van Laer, April 4, 1938; Leavitt to Van Laer, July 18, 1938.

34. Van Laer to Leavitt, September 30, 1939.

35. Theodore C. Pease, review of Manual for the Arrangement and Description of Archives Drawn up by direction of the Netherlands Association of Archivists, as translated by Arthur H. Leavitt, American Archivist 3 (1940): 116, 17.

36. Ernst Posner, "Some Aspects of Archival Development Since the French Revolution," American Archivist 3 (1940): 168.

37. Schellenberg, Modern Archives, 175; and Joan Van Albada, "On the Identity of the American Archival Profession: A European Perspective," American Archivist 54 (1991): 401.