You're watching an interview with Dr. Colleen Shogan, 11th Archivist of the United States,
for National Archives News, part of the National Archives and Records Administration.
This interview was recorded on May 23rd, 2023, at the National Archives Building in Washington, DC.
Dr. Shogan, welcome. This is our first time talking for National Archives News.
This is your first week here, tell us about what the last week has been
like for you as head of the National Archives. Well, it's been a whirlwind. It's been a very
exciting time and I've been waiting a long time for this. I've really enjoyed being able
to visit many of the staff who work here at A1 and also had the opportunity to visit Archives 2
in College Park, as well. You were able to actually see some records
and some documents in the last week, including General Order No. 3, which is really a treasure here.
What's it been like to see those records up close, firsthand? I mean, it does give you chills
down your spine. I wasn't even expecting to see General Order No. 3 when I walked into that room.
So that was a very welcome surprise, considering that we are entering into civic season very soon
with Juneteenth and then, of course, the 4th of July. What are you most looking forward to as Archivist
of the United States? I really am looking forward to learning...the Archives is a complex place,
so there's a lot of a diversity of programs, diversity of people who work at the Archives.
And what I'm looking forward to most is being able to, of course, get to know the people who
work here in the Washington, DC area, but also to travel to the 40-some other locations around
the United States that also house and preserve federal records. Are you planning to visit every
facility? I will visit every facility, and we will try to group those in a way that makes sense,
so that I can visit more than...in many trips, I'll be able to visit
more than one facility in a given trip. But we'll try to do this as efficiently and
economically as possible. Your first one up is NPRC? It's the first visit outside of Washington, DC,
outside of Archives 1 or Archives 2, will be to the NPRC in St. Louis and then also to
the Civilian Records in Valmeyer (Illinois). There is a lot going on down there. Yes, there is.
If you watched any of my confirmation hearing or any of the interaction that I had with the
Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee that considered my nomination, I said this in both
of my hearings, that that would be my top priority, top discrete priority; there's larger priorities,
but I view veterans records, that is a critical part of access, right? That's an important part
of keeping that strategic focus. And due to, you know, really no fault of anyone, there
is a backlog of those records requests due to the pandemic. And we're figuring out ways in which we
can reduce that backlog and eliminate that backlog as quickly as possible, so that we can serve our
veterans community and they can have access to their full service record if they need it.
You've said that you are going to be in a sort of listening and learning mode these
first few months, I guess. What does that mean for you? What is this listening and
learning mode to start off with? Like I said, this place is a very complex place, so it's
not just that there's one or two different, discrete functions at the National Archives,
there's many functions. So when I say listening and learning, I do mean that,
to understand what a variety of divisions and programs do, what their mission is, and then
also hearing from staff, what are the problems? What are the things that you're worried about or
concerned about? And trying to chronicle those for myself, keep track of them and figure out ways in
which we're able to make things better, not for our staff, of course, but also for
American citizens, the customers that come here to view the records and engage with the Archives.
This has definitely been, for the National Archives, a very high profile few years.
Is there an opportunity in that to engage more with the public,
to perhaps engage more with communities that we have not engaged sufficiently in with before?
I think there is I think that, yes, it's been a extraordinary 12 months to 24 months
for the National Archives. So it's been unprecedented in that way. If you had,
you know, maybe walked out into the street and asked anybody, you know, over a year ago, do you
know what the National Archives was? They may, if they saw "National Treasure," they may
"Oh, is that the place where the Declaration is?" They may know that. Now, I think you would
go out and ask people, and particularly people who watch the news or view the news
on some regular basis, they will have an idea of the role of the National Archives and
what it does. It may not be a full roll, a fully accurate depiction of what NARA does,
but at least were on people's radars. And I think with that, it poses a lot
of opportunities. So we want people that are curious about us, that want to learn more.
Go to the website, of course, that's how people are going to across the United States,
mostly engage with us, and we want them to learn more about how the agency works,
of course, but also to engage with the records and particularly the records we have online.
So we should always be trying to figure out how are we going to convert people
who are curious about the Archives or even our visitors that come here to Washington, DC
to view the founding documents, how we can we convert those individuals into users.
We have to really think about that. People of casual interest to hear the Archives in the news,
we want to make them users, but also the people once again who physically visit us in DC or
any of the other installations across the United States, the Presidential Library, for example.
How can we convert them into a user that is able to really engage with our records for a lifetime?
When you spoke to staff for the first time last week during our All Hands meeting,
you made a comment about the personal aspect of finding, you know, personal records
within the National Archives system. And then just the bigger, the bigger picture, you know,
pulling these massive, you know, founding documents, we have with so many of the crucial
documents and records of the country. Can you speak more to that? I guess the
versatility of the National Archives for the public? Right, we have to meet people where
they are, where they want to come and interact with us. There will be people that will be
aficionados and lovers of American history, and they will want to see the most important
documents.; like I was able to see that leads to the creation, commemorates Juneteenth,
leads to the creation eventually of a federal holiday to commemorate that moment.
So there will be people that will be very appreciative of that, but there will also be
people who are looking at immigration records, that are looking at census records, who are
looking for their veterans records or maybe their their parent's or their sibling's veterans records,
and so very individual type of experiences and either seeing those for meaningful reasons or
seeing them for reasons because they need those records to establish criteria for benefits or
other things that the federal government really does owe them in a fair manner.
And so we have to realize that people are coming from all kinds of different perspectives,
and we have to be able to once again serve people for the reason and that they are
coming to the National Archives. That also means serving communities that have maybe traditionally
used the National Archives previously, and that will determine strategically.
And I know this work is already being done here at the National Archives, but thinking
about what records we choose to digitize and make available online and in the catalog; records that,
for example, the Alaska Native records, and that's really critically important because otherwise,
how are people going to be able to access those records? There's real barriers there.
And so when we ask why aren't all Americans using the National Archives, it's because of those
barriers. And so we have to figure out where those barriers are and how can we eliminate them. And,
you know, once again, throwing the treasure chest open to everyone also means keeping
that in mind when we decide strategically where to put resources for things like digitization.
When you think forward, you've been in this position for not even a week yet, but when you
think forward to what you want your legacy to be as the 11th Archivist of the United States,
the first woman who's held this position permanently, what do you see as what you'd
like your legacy to be here? One word I really keep in my head, which is access. And I mean
access in all the ways that we've talked about in this interview; access for people who are who
are curious, who want to learn more; access for people who need the records for a particular reason;
access for people that maybe haven't find interacting with a government agency
or a government institution intimidating. I mean, this is a beautiful building,
but it is also an intimidating building. When you walk up and, you know, in the way (it's) designed
and how it is. So it can be intimidating for some people. So we have to figure out ways in which
we make sure that all Americans feel welcome at the National Archives and they're able to
go on their own journey and facilitate it. So that's really the word that I keep in my head,
and it means a lot of different things. It doesn't just mean one thing, but we are here to preserve
those records, but we are also here to share them. And to me, that's very, very important.
We have to keep both of those elements really at the foremost of our minds as we're doing our work.