Ohio Archives Month Poster 2025 – Voting Open

Help select the images used for the 2025 Ohio Archives Month Poster!

This year, the annual Society of Ohio Archivists’ October Archives Month poster theme will highlight Ohio-born companies.

The submitted images from around the state include internationally, nationally, and locally known companies that were born in Ohio. Thank you to all our submitters for sharing these pieces of history!  We had great submissions this year from many wonderful Ohio institutions.

Now YOU can help us narrow down the field for the final poster! Please look through the images and their descriptions and vote for up to 10 images. The top 10 images to receive the most votes will be sent on to the designer for consideration in the final poster design.

Use the Google form to vote between April 22 and May 6, 2025. Please only vote once.

On behalf of the SOA Advocacy and Outreach Committee, we thank you for participating!

Questions? Contact the Advocacy & Outreach Committee cochairs Sarah Aisenbrey and Jim McKinnon.

Last Updated on April 22, 2025 by Emily Gainer

SOA Constitutional Amendment – Revision Proposal

Revision Proposal

Edit (April 25, 2025): Thanks to member feedback, proposed language changes linked below to the SOA Constitution will be modified and presented at the annual meeting before voting takes place.

After reviewing our governing documents, SOA Council recently approved an amendment to the SOA Constitution to align the Constitution with current SOA Council meeting practices and Ohio’s Revised Code. The proposed language change, rationale, and information from the Ohio Revised Code can be found here. The amendment will be voted on by members during the business meeting at the SOA Conference (Friday, May 16th, 2025), with a majority vote in the affirmative being required for approval. If desired there will be time for discussion of the proposed amendment during the business meeting. I also welcome all thoughts and questions by email prior to the meeting.

Thank you everyone, and I look forward to seeing many of you at our annual meeting in just a few weeks.

Matt Francis
SOA President

Last Updated on April 25, 2025 by Emily Gainer

Council Meeting Minutes from Feb. 28, 2025

The Society of Ohio Archivists most recent leadership meeting minutes from February 28, 2025, can now be found on the Council Meeting Minutes page.

Interested in SOA over time? Also on that page are minutes dating back to 1997. In addition to documenting actions from the leadership meeting, minutes include reports from the treasurer as well as from committees and task forces.

Questions about minutes? Contact SOA Secretary Shelby Beatty.

Last Updated on April 3, 2025 by Emily Gainer

Annual Meeting 2025 Registration Now Open

Registration is now open for the 2025 Annual Meeting: Show Me the Money: Sustaining Archives and Archival Programs, May 15-16! Register online or mail-in in this form (PDF).

This May, the Society of Ohio Archivists Annual Meeting will be traveling to Toledo, Ohio! Join us on Thursday, May 15 (virtual), and on Friday, May 16 (hybrid) at the University of Toledo. Day one (Thursday) is comprised of all virtual sessions, available to all registrants. Day two (Friday) is a full day of in-person sessions with one session in each time block live streamed for virtual attendees.

Photograph of a woman against a red background. She is wearing glasses and a black jacket.Keynotes: We are excited to announce Patricia Hswe as our morning keynote speaker. Patricia Hswe is the program director for Public Knowledge at The Mellon Foundation. As the Foundation’s program area that supports libraries and archives, Public Knowledge makes grants that strive to increase equitable access to—and activation of—recorded knowledge that helps to build an informed, heterogeneous, and civically engaged society. Patricia is currently a member of the board of trustees for the Metropolitan New York Library Council and sits in the advisory team for LibraryPAC. Continue reading →

Last Updated on April 3, 2025 by Emily Gainer

Women’s History Month – Celebrating Catholic Sisters

The Sisters of the Precious Blood in Dayton, Ohio, have always been women on a mission. Like other congregations of women religious in the United States, the Sisters of the Precious Blood have been integral members of the societies where they lived, worked, and prayed. They were often some of the first university-educated women in the country. They educated immigrants in the 1840s in the wilds of Northern Ohio – and they were immigrants themselves, coming mainly from Germany and Switzerland, leaving their homes for parts unknown, not knowing if they would ever see their families again. They were and continue to be teachers and educators, nurses and doctors, chaplains, housekeepers, weavers, painters, poets, advocates for justice and ecology, administrators, and so much more. 

Because there are too many photos and stories to include in one blog post, I grouped the Sisters’ ministries into four photos from their archives. Each photo represents an aspect of the Sisters’ ministry over time: prayer, teaching, healthcare, and domestic arts.

 In this photo, Sister Rosemary Laux prays in the Salem Heights Chapel in Dayton, Ohio, in 1994.

sister reading
The adoration of the Blessed Sacrament was the catalyst for Mother Maria Anna Brunner to begin the Congregation of the Sisters of the Precious Blood, and prayer has been central to their lives. Throughout their history, the Sisters have continued this tradition with nocturnal and perpetual adoration, writing prayer services, working as pastoral ministers and sacristans, and praying for thousands of requests from people worldwide. Continue reading →

Last Updated on April 3, 2025 by Emily Gainer

Archives Month Poster: Call for Images 2025

For this year’s annual Society of Ohio Archivists’ October Archives Month, the theme will be “Ohio-Born Companies.” Ohio has a rich history of entrepreneurship, industry, and ingenuity, which we want to highlight through this poster.

We are looking for archival images related to Ohio-born companies that have impacted locally, statewide, or nationally; they can relate to corporations, small businesses, or other Ohio-based businesses. Some examples include construction workers building the company’s headquarters, workers working in an office or other environment, showcases of products made by the company, etc. If your institution has archival images with an intriguing backstory, please submit them for a chance to be featured in the poster this year.

We are hoping to receive submissions from across the state of Ohio. If you are interested in participating, please submit your related images to Nina Herzog at [email protected] by Monday, April 7, 2025.

Institutions or individuals can submit a maximum of three (3) images. Please ensure that the image quality is a minimum of 300 dpi; higher quality is encouraged. With your submission, please include a description of the image that explains its importance AND a brief one-sentence caption that can be used on the poster if the image is selected.

SOA members can vote on their favorite entries between Monday, April 21, and Friday, May 4, 2025. Entrants do NOT need to be members to submit images. If you know of organizations with archival materials that fit this year’s theme, please share this information with them!

We look forward to your participation!  View previous Ohio Archives Month posters.

Questions? Contact the Advocacy & Outreach Committee cochairs Sarah Aisenbrey and Jim McKinnon.

Last Updated on March 17, 2025 by Emily Gainer

Join us for Coffee Chat on April 8, 2025

Grab a hot beverage and join us for the next Society of Ohio Archivists (SOA) Coffee Chat on Tuesday, April 8th 2025, from 10-11am on Zoom! These casual gatherings are an opportunity for SOA members to network, share challenges and successes in their work, and bounce ideas off colleagues outside of the Annual Conference.Graphic of coffee cup with the words SOA virtual coffee chat April 8 10-11am around the cup.

This quarter we will be sharing how we’re handling the challenges of recent federal legislation and the tumultuous political climate, from how this has directly affected your work to how you’re supporting your staff. Please register here to join the conversation! We will send a Zoom link to all registrants the day before the meeting. We hope to see you there!

Questions?  Contact Kristen Newby and Jim DaMico, SOA Council Members.

Last Updated on March 11, 2025 by Emily Gainer

Council Meeting Minutes from Jan. 24, 2025

The Society of Ohio Archivists most recent leadership meeting minutes from January 24, 2025, can now be found on the Council Meeting Minutes page.

Interested in SOA over time? Also on that page are minutes dating back to 1997. In addition to documenting actions from the leadership meeting, minutes include reports from the treasurer as well as from committees and task forces.

Questions about minutes? Contact SOA Secretary Shelby Beatty.

Last Updated on March 10, 2025 by Emily Gainer

Have Your Voice Heard! Attend Ohio Statehood Day on March 5

-contributed by Sarah Aisenbrey, SOA Advocacy & Outreach Committee co-chair.

On March 5, Ohio history, archaeology, and historic preservation professionals will gather alongside legislators and stakeholders at the Ohio Statehouse in Columbus to advocate for Ohio’s history and celebrate its birthday. This year, Statehood Day’s theme is “From Canals to Computers: Connecting Ohio to the World,” reflecting the 200th anniversary of the Ohio & Erie Canal. Continue reading →

Last Updated on March 11, 2025 by Emily Gainer

Council Statement on Recent Federal Government Actions that Impact Archivists & Archives

The leadership of the Society of Ohio Archivists are deeply alarmed by many recent actions taken by the U.S. federal government, including, but not limited to:

These actions undermine the invaluable work of archivists and cultural heritage workers across this nation and the state of Ohio, as well as the transparency, accountability, and integrity that are foundational to democratic governance.

SOA Council condemns these actions and the reckless nature with which they were undertaken, as they unnecessarily jeopardize the livelihood of dedicated professionals and damage our ability to preserve and make accessible the rich tapestries of our national, state, and local histories. We will continue to monitor this rapidly changing landscape, and will proactively work to provide support for the Ohio archival community in accordance with our core professional values.

As we move forward please feel free to contact the current SOA President Matt Francis with any suggestions, questions, or concerns and we encourage you to contact your federal representatives to make your voice heard.

United we stand.

Society of Ohio Archivists Council

Last Updated on February 24, 2025 by Emily Gainer