From the Harry Price Library
by Stefan Dickers
Assistant Archivist at Senate House Library, University of London
SEPTEMBER, 2004
I have just started work on finishing the
cataloguing of the Harry Price Archives. A large degree of the material
was completed before I arrived, although there was still a large amount
to be done, mainly photographs, playbills, posters, press cuttings
scrapbooks and artefacts. So far I have completed most of the work and
am at present working my way through cataloguing the photographs, which
include a large selection of Borley photos, many of which were
uncatalogued and not available to researchers previously. Highlights
include a wealth of photos of the Rectory, Church and village before the
fire and a whole series of photos taken onsite of the fire damage, along
with some quite amusing pictures of Peter Eton and Alan Burgess
recording at the Borley site in 1947 for the BBC radio programme, 'The
Haunted Rectory'. I have also managed to catalogue, conserve and make
available a few other items, such as Ivan Banks' structural plans of
Borley Rectory and a wonderful oil painting of Borley Rectory by
H.E.Wilson.
Besides the Borley material, I have also been cataloguing photographs
and other materials covering all other areas of Price's investigations
which has been fascinating, from 17th century cuttings on conjuring to
letters from Sir Arthur Conan-Doyle from the 1920s to videos containing
documentaries concerning Harry Price or his investigations from British
television in the 1990's!
I thought you may be interested (if you haven't seen it already) in this
information on a small exhibition that is taking place at Senate House
Library at the moment on Harry Price and his work. There is some more
information and a downloadable brochure available.