#Archive30 28: Unusual item

This is an object not found in many archives - a life ring! It's from the SRS (Sea Ranger Ship)  Margaree; the unit was named after an Esquimalt-based Canadian Navy ship. There were Sea Rangers in Canada 1927-1969 (Source: GGC Ontario Archives ). The ship's bell from another Sea Ranger unit is also in the SVI archives, as are some Sea Ranger unit records and extensive scrapbooks, so we will be posting more about this branch in the future.

#Archive30 9: Animal

This wise old owl must have been at the centre of many Brownie meetings in SVI once upon a time, but is now living out a leisurely retirement in the archives. It does not have a label, so we wonder which Pack's owl this was, who made it, and whether it had a name - we hope the answer will be revealed somewhere in the records as we work through them. We'll add information here as we find it.

#Archive30

October is American Archives Month! Since Canadian archives are North American archives, we will use this as a (hardly-needed, and thin) excuse to start tying our work no the SVI archives in to some social media features.

#Archive30 is a Twitter meme used by archivists and others who look after and work in archives to highlight interesting things in their archives and shine a bit of light onto their day-to-day work, which is often behind the scenes and 'invisible' even to most users of the archives. Much of what many archivists do, and the content of the records we deal with, is confidential and/or governed by copyright, privacy and other regulations and legislation that means we can't discuss it. But in fact our work is usually not only interesting and important but satisfying and fun, and this is one way to share some of the shareable bits with more people!

If you're on Twitter, have a look at the hashtag #Archive30 to see what's happening in archives near and far...

#Archive30 blog posts about the SVI archives will be linked from this index page as they appear - not necessarily in order.

1. Your archive

2. Favourite item

3. The weather

4. Your work space

5. Something small

6. Diary/letter

7. Sums up your job

8. Drawing

9. Animal

10. Archive building

11. Favourite colour

12. Typical day

13. Journey to work

14. Typography

15. Pattern

16. Something big

17. Friendship

18. A collection

19. Favourite tool

20. Something fun

21. Favourite archive

22. Where you started

23. Self portrait

24. Free time

25. Happy

26. Recommended read

27. Object

28. Unusual item

29. Handwriting

30. Why archives?