Series II. Executive Committee Minutes, 1843-1938, inclusive

With the generous support of the Leon Levy Foundation, all 20 volumes of the Executive Committee minute books were digitized in 2019-2020. Digitization of the volumes was done on-site at N-YHS by an independent photographer, Ardon Bar-Hama. Metadata is currently being applied to these images by N-YHS staff and the volumes are being made available on-line as each is completed. Links to the individual volumes can be found below in the container list. Links to all Executive Committee minute books can be found beginning at this landing page.

Guidance for Executive Committee Minute Books Keyword Searching in the Digital Library

In late 2019 and early 2020, the Executive Committee minute books were digitized. In preparing the metadata for these volumes, each page/image was skimmed for subject matter (in addition to page number and date), and brief summaries were added to the description field of each image. These descriptions are included in the full-text search indexing in the Shelby White and Leon Levy Digital Library. Certain specific subjects can be found directly with obvious keywords, such as Audubon (for the purchase of the drawings), Central Park (for the effort to locate the N-YHS galleries in the Park), Egyptian (for matters related to that collection), Publication Fund (for that particular publication initiative), Phoenix Fund (for purchases made over the years from that Fund), particular donor or collection names, and so forth.

There are however many other matters that were summarized in a more general or thematic way, using consistent keywords embedded in the description to facilitate discovery in searches, or to facilitate reviews of the images when looking at individual pages. These keywords include:

"Lecture," often used as "lecture arrangements," typically refers to making arrangements for papers to be read at Society meetings. It can refer to specific plans or attempts to schedule particular speakers, or delegation of general responsibility to a subcommittee to set a schedule. It also includes rejections of papers, or regrets from invited speakers. It can also refer to other, public lectures because references in the minutes to lectures are not always clear who the audience will be.

"Anniversary" will return results related to making arrangements for the events marking N-YHS's anniversary, usually held in November or December. The minutes refer to the anniversary events variously over time as either a meeting or as a celebration. "Anniversary" will also generate some results for events other than the N-YHS anniversary celebration, but those particular events are more likely found in searches of their unique name (e.g. Hudson-Fulton), or most often by the keyword "commemoration". "Speaker" and "remarks" are typically used as keywords rather than the varying oration/orator, discourse, address, and other terms found in the minutes in the context of anniversaries, commemorations, and other such events.

"Membership nominations" refers to the committee's consideration of proposed members. Most typically, the minutes include a list of the proposed members by name. "Members" or "membership" alone can generate results related to matters specifically related to membership rights, privileges, and obligations. If a woman's name was noticed while skimming the list of membership nominations, the keyword "woman" or "women" and her name(s) was included. In order to facilitate research into the history of women in the organization an attempt was made to use the keyword "woman" or "women" in other contexts as well, such as when a woman/women donated money or collection objects, requested access to the collections for research, etc.

"By-laws" includes proposed and adopted amendments to the corporate charter, constitution, and by-laws. "Rules" is typically used to refer to operational matters (such as establishing library access privileges) or internal administration (such as Executive Committee rules).

"Publication" will yield results concerning arrangements for publication of the Collections, annual reports, anniversary addresses, proceedings, etc. Publication Fund is a specific case of this keyword.

"Library" is used for matters directly related to collections of books, manuscripts, maps, newspapers, etc., as well as to specific operational matters, such as hours/access, etc. and the physical library/reading room. What we now refer to as the "museum" is more complex. Generally, the early volumes distinguish between "museum" collections, meaning artifacts, and "gallery/galleries," meaning the art collection and art galleries. When the minutes are unclear, the keyword "museum" was used (including when the minutes use "cabinet" or "antiquities"). But multiple keywords can be in play in this context, including "art", "gallery" or galleries, and "museum". "Conservation" was used for the repair, relining, or other work on objects.

The keyword "building" is used when the general physical plant is concerned, such as with renovations, maintenance/repairs, or rentals or other outside use of the facility. Outside organizations would commonly request permission for use of the "hall" and that keyword is typically used in that context. In the 1890s-early 1900s when N-YHS was based in its longstanding Second Avenue site while purchasing, maintaining, then constructing at its present Central Park West site, the keywords distinguishing the two sites are "Second Avenue" and "Central Park West site."

"Acquisition" is used as a keyword for potential or actual additions to the collections. "Donation" (rather than "gift" or "presented") and "purchase" are also used as keywords with acquisition ("acquisition by donation") when known. The word "deposit" and/or "custody" was used as a keyword, rather than "acquisition," when the minutes use that term. "Bequest" is used as a keyword instead of legacy or inheritance. Cash donations for general or specific purposes tend to use the keyword "subscriptions" in the first several volumes and "contributions" thereafter.

"Financial matters" refers most commonly to expense payments, which are listed for approval by the committee in the volumes. These expenses include staff compensation, printing, advertising, rent, coal, repairs, furnishings and supplies, meeting refreshments, collection conservation, etc. Payment for "strawberries" appears from time to time on the early bill lists and these were noted with that keyword. Payments made to specific staff for salary and/or services rendered are included in these expense lists. The at times controversial history of N-YHS's compensation to its Librarian, essentially the chief operating officer of the organization into the mid-20th century, can be traced through these bill lists. "Financial matters" also brings results for general financial issues, such as the financial state of the organization.

Beginning in early 1883 (Volume RG1.16), regular reporting of the bank balances of the general account and various special purpose restricted funds were reported and recorded in the minutes; accordingly, beginning with RG1.16, in addition to the keyword "financial matters," the terms "expense payments" and "bank balances" are used to facilitate more targeted searching. By the late 1800s, specific funds were used for particular purposes (e.g., Phoenix Fund for collection purchases, sometimes listed out specifically; Building Fund for the Central Park West site development) and those fund names were used as keywords. "Investments" is used for the investment of N-YHS funds in securities, mortgage loans and other vehicles.

"Routine business" is used extensively. For a typical committee meeting, this term refers to the approval of minutes, scheduling of meetings of the committee or of the Society, naming new subcommittee members, assigning routine tasks to ad hoc committees or officers, extending invitations to dignitaries or others to attend Society meetings, accepting officer or committee resignations and preparing related acknowledgements of them for the minutes, etc. One routine task was the charge to draft memorials on the occasion of a member's death; "obituary" is used where the minutes include the substantive, often biographical, wording of such a memorial, and "memorial" is used for briefer acknowledgements of a paragraph or two. "Routine business" also applies to the administrative actions taken at the committee's annual reorganization meetings, which took place in mid-late January just after the N-YHS annual business meeting. At the mid-January committee meeting, the names of the Executive Committee members for the year were recorded, subcommittees established, committee officers named, annual reports were ordered to be published, and so forth.