Stories of Service, Enduring, Accessible, and Timeless, Held Within ArchivEra

The Daughters of Charity Provincial Archives, housing their historic collection and library, is located at the site where the community’s founder St. Elizabeth Ann Seton lived and served in Emmitsburg, Maryland.

In 2011, the Daughters of Charity established The Province of St. Louise, bringing together the West Central, East Central, Southeast, and Northeast Provinces of the United States. Coming together has allowed these communities to collaborate more easily and address important issues collectively for greater impact. One of these collaborations is the Provincial Archives, managed by Archivist Scott Keefer. Per the Daughters of Charity Constitution, the Archives of the Province of St. Louise preserves records of enduring value, memorializes the life and work of the founders, promotes the community’s works, past and present, and makes their collections available for research.

The consolidation of the Provinces was the catalyst for a new collections management system (CMS). Per Mr. Keefer, “We needed a centralized CMS, with a public front end. And because our collections increasingly include born-digital materials, we wanted a certain level of backup for high profile digital content that would also make it searchable. We looked at a number of systems and vendors, and Lucidea stood out because of their great customer service; everyone was always willing to work with us and be flexible. ArchivEra itself gives us flexibility—it incorporates guidelines and principles, but gives us room to innovate; for example, we can design a hierarchy that fits our unique needs.”

We sat down with Mr. Keefer, for a rich conversation about the community’s history and tradition of service, and the implementation of ArchivEra to document and support their mission. We invite you to read their full success story here.