Snip from Bill:

> << Too bad Prince did not have a records manager.>>
> 
> What leads you to believe that he didn't?


And a snip from Peter

> going to agree with Brother Roach here. Bremer Trust probably acts as a
> trustee for dozens of estates. 

If you remember, a while back these a big discussion about The Grateful Dead and the Doors and a few other bands.

There were articles for months and month about the memorabilia, unrecorded music and so on.  And it was a topic of some RAIN and news articles.

I just think these issues bring some components of records management to light that are very interesting.  I think records management is a very interesting occupation.  Records managers, offsite storage companies and even vault manufacturers are often known by the volume of the records stored within the collection.  My mind goes back to the scene from Citizen Kane when everyone was trying to discover what “Rosebud” was in the main character’s life. The film examines the fictional life of Charles Kane, which was a character based in part upon the American newspaper magnate William Randolph Hearst.  Prince like Hearst was an American icon and it is through records managers and archivists who not only maintain but place order on the collections that bring great interest to the personalities.  Their influences, their path and their future effect on culture.

I did several vault projects for a mining company and their collection include some very exotic minerals and the artifact and the circumstances under which they were discovered were fascinating.  At other times, we are called in to open some very old vaults that no one even knows what is inside the vault chamber.

These discussions may be the last that are held on these topics as organizations seem to be phasing out vaults.  Information is stored in the Cloud.  The originality and history of the records and artifacts seem to be disappearing.  Like the ancient libraries of Alexandria and Pergamum, vast knowledge bases disappeared.   Original records have a magic about them. Which would you rather hold in your hand, the engrossed version of the Declaration, the Dunlap Broadside or the Smith Engraving.

I hope Prince has a record manager or that Bremer appoints an excellent archivist to oversee the collection. Somewhere in the collection is  a sheet with one special song that is first among all others. It is hard to explain.  If you have an opportunity to watch the movie “The Red Violin” it will make you understand.  It traces one mystical violin from the hand of a great master, probably intended to be Stadivari, from one owner to the next.  After seeing that movie you cannot hear Joshua Bell, or Itzak Perlman playing a Stradivarius violin and not think of the history of that particular instrument.  

Well I am done.


Hugh Smith
FIRELOCK Fireproof Modular Vaults
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