The Archives is the repository for Synod records and parish records and owes its existence to Bishop Frederick Wilkinson, who, just one year after his election as bishop in 1955, put into action a plan to preserve the records of the diocese. In 1956, he wrote to the following individuals to let them know he had appointed an Archives committee, and they would constitute the membership: the Rev. Dr. T. R. Millman, the Rev. H.N.W. Bracken, the Rev. B.G. Brightling, Professor W.H. Clawson and Dr. G.W. Spragge. They invited the diocesan historiographer, the Rev. Canon R.W. Allen, to be honorary chairman. Canon Allen’s collection, which was deposited in the Archives in 1959, is a typed compilation of information about important dates and events in the life of every congregation in the diocese up to 1957, obtained from various sources. We still routinely reference this collection almost 70 years later.

At the first Archives Committee meeting on Sept. 18, 1956, the committee established its mandate to collect, amongst other things, the registers and vestry minutes of churches. Between 1956 and 1983, the committee received 680 parish registers for deposit in the Archives. In 1983, the decision was made to hire an archivist, and more robust processes were put in place for documenting the transfer of records.

Since 1984, the Archives collection has grown extensively, with the addition of more than 500 accessions of material from 219 parishes. Within these accessions are over 1,900 parish registers, which include baptisms, confirmations, marriages and burials dating from as early as 1797. Some of these registers have come to the Archives showing significant signs of deterioration, while others have been damaged by floods or fires. Deterioration and damage can lead to the loss of information within the registers. Additionally, there are significant gaps in certain parish records due to the loss of registers in fires. In the Archives, we aim to prevent loss of information through our preservation and conservation efforts.

While at one time these registers might have been filled within 10 years, today we find that some registers are used longer, containing 30 or more years of records. In some cases, parishes hold on to completed registers with records going back 50 years or more. If a flood or fire were to occur, this could result in the loss of years of irreplaceable records. While some may argue that the provincial government maintains birth registrations and marriage registrations, there are times when these events have not been properly registered with the government, so baptism and marriage records in church registers are of vital importance for confirming information. This may allow for a late registration of a marriage where the marriage license was not received by the government after the marriage was solemnized, or where the marriage occurred by banns only and the necessary paperwork was not received by the government. For baptism records, these might help to provide evidence that the name as recorded on the birth registration was misspelled, or the date of birth was incorrectly recorded. These records may also be needed when someone is asked to be a godparent.

Beyond those very important reasons to ensure the records are maintained, there is the value that these records hold to genealogists researching their family history. While their access is limited to records that are considered open to the public, at some point in the future, a descendant of an individual may want to see the entry in the register to understand the person’s connection to the church. These registers also tell a story to future generations about those who attended a church, what the church demographics were and how families changed over time.

When these registers are transferred to the diocesan Archives, we ensure their ongoing preservation by storing them in a climate-controlled vault with a fire suppression system. These measures slow down deterioration, as the registers are kept at an optimal, consistent temperature and humidity without significant fluctuations, which may occur in a church building. Having the registers at the Archives allows our team to provide a copy of a baptism or marriage record to an individual who may need it for legal purposes or for their own family records. Certified copies can be provided when needed and any information about other individuals, when a page contains multiple entries, can be properly redacted for privacy. We can also help individuals who may be unsure which church they were baptised at, saving them the time and frustration of trying to connect to several congregations to conduct searches.

We honour the original members of the Archives Committee and Bishop Wilkinson by continuing to acquire and preserve registers from our parishes. We encourage parishes to transfer their registers to the Archives if they are full and no longer in use or if they contain records older than 30 years or are fragile but still have space. New registers can be purchased through the Anglican Church of Canada’s e-store.

To help facilitate these records being transferred to the Archives, particularly for those congregations who worship in the far reaches of our diocese, we will be accepting parish registers at Synod in November. The Archives will have a display table where you can bring your registers, along with a record transfer form, to deposit the records with us. The registers will be transported back to the Archives at the end of the day on the Friday of Synod – Nov. 7. We look forward to seeing you there!

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A record is information created and maintained by a congregation, regardless of media, used to control, support or document the activities of the congregation. Records include documents, photographs, video and film recordings, sound recordings, maps and drawings. An archival record is a record of enduring cultural, historical or evidentiary value and should be kept permanently.

How to store records

The first step in caring for parish records is to manage the records in the parish, making sure records that don’t need to be kept permanently are routinely destroyed when they’re no longer needed.

For records that are archival and need to be kept permanently, it’s important to make sure they’re being properly cared for. Records should ideally be stored in a location that maintains a relatively consistent temperature and humidity all year round, with temperature around 20 degrees Celsius and relative humidity of 45 per cent. Where such ideal conditions aren’t possible, the parish should aim to keep the records in an area that doesn’t experience significant fluctuations in temperature or humidity during the year. Records stored in areas with high temperature, high relative humidity and low air circulation are at risk of developing mould. If your parish has any records that show signs of mould, contact the Archives to get advice on how best to deal with them.

Records not stored in a file cabinet should be stored in boxes raised off the floor on metal shelving. This keeps them safe from water damage in the event of flooding and helps to protect against pests that make their home in wood. It’s a good idea to place sticky traps in areas where you’re storing records, preferably in darker corners where pests may hide. Check the traps on a routine basis to make sure you’re not experiencing a pest problem. Several insects, including silverfish and book lice, will cause damage to records. If you notice insect activity, contact the Archives to discuss ways to remediate this issue.

Newspaper

Records within a parish archival collection may also need special care and consideration. If you are keeping newspaper clippings of articles about your congregation, make sure to note the name of the newspaper, the date of publication, and the page number where the article appeared.

Newspaper is very acidic and should be stored in a separate file folder from other material, or in an archives-safe enclosure if stored with other items. Items that are stored with newspaper, without any sort of buffer, will discolour and deteriorate more quickly.

Photographs

Photographs can be a wonderful way of documenting an event in the life of your congregation, but only photographs that have some historical value, providing evidence of people or events significant to the parish, should be kept permanently. Ideally, the subject of the photograph should be clear and identifiable. If there are multiple photographs showing the same image from the same event, keep only the best one.

It’s important to provide some written context for the photo, such as the date it was taken, the name of individuals photographed, and the event or location where it was taken. This ensures that when future generations view the photograph, they can understand the context and historical significance. To make sure the photograph isn’t damaged when adding this information, you can use an index card stored behind the photo in a photo album or storage box. Alternatively, writing on the back of the photograph with a pencil is an acceptable choice. Write lightly around the edges to avoid damaging the focus of the photograph at the centre.

To ensure the long-term preservation of archival photographs, they can be stored in a box or in albums. If stored in a box, the box should be archives-safe quality that is acid-free and lignin-free, as photographs stored in an acidic environment will become discoloured over time. If stored in a photo album, they should be kept in acid-free sleeves made of polyester, polypropylene or polyethylene; avoid plastic sleeves made of polyvinyl chloride (also called PVC or vinyl). Photographs should not be adhered to the pages in any way, as glue and tape can cause discolouration and lead to deterioration of the photograph.

Photographs should be handled with care and only touched while wearing white cotton or nitrile gloves to avoid oils from fingers being left on the surface of the photograph, leading to deterioration over time. If the photograph is in fragile condition, arrangements should be made to transfer it to the Archives so we can make sure it’s stored in the best conditions possible.

Audio-visual materials

Audio-visual material may be recorded on various media formats, including acetate-based film strips, magnetic tape like VHS, and CD/DVDs. Unfortunately, many of the formats can’t be viewed or listened to as the necessary hardware becomes obsolete. This is an issue particularly with formats that require a specific viewing machine that is no longer manufactured. VCRs can be difficult to find these days, and many computers no longer have a CD/DVD drive. This can also mean that if audio-visual materials have not been labelled properly, they become meaningless, as the contents cannot be verified. Take time to properly label these types of records, including title, date of recording and length of recording.

Audio-visual materials are more prone to deterioration, due to environmental conditions, than paper and should be handled carefully. They should be stored in a relatively cool location with relative humidity around 40 per cent.

Repair & conservation

If your parish has records showing signs of deterioration or damage and you feel they should be repaired, this work should be conducted by a professional conservator. Trying to repair records without the necessary knowledge or expertise may cause more damage in the long-term. In particular, regular transparent tape should never be used to mend tears in documents or photographs.

Transferring records

For records that are considered archival, we encourage you to transfer them to the Archives when they can no longer be properly cared for in the parish, perhaps due to age, condition or space issues. The Archives has storage with the ideal environmental conditions to slow deterioration of fragile records, and will allow us to schedule conservation treatments if needed.

We strongly encourage parishes to send in their parish registers of baptism, confirmations, marriages and burials as soon as the registers are no longer in use. These records are accepted as proof of birth and marriage, and in some instances where there have been errors or omissions in provincial registration of these events, they can be used to confirm the correct information. Due to the irreplaceable nature of these records, it’s important to make sure they’re sent to the Archives for storage in our vault, which has a fire suppression system. Several congregations have had devastating fires over the years, and in some cases records have been destroyed. For registers still in use or kept at the parish, we recommend they be stored in a fire-resistant safe or file cabinet.

If your parish has determined you may have records that should be transferred to the Archives, there are several steps you need to take to move that process forward. Before arranging to transfer records, the records must be boxed in clean boxes. You’ll also need to fill out a record transfer form that provides a file-level listing of the records to be transferred. This form is available on our website, www.toronto.anglican.ca/archives, or you can contact the Archives and we will send you a form. Once you complete the record transfer form, scan it and send it to us so we can review what you’re planning to send.

The Archives doesn’t accept bibles, prayer books, banners, or liturgical vessels and linens. If these are no longer needed by your parish and have associated memorials, you can take a photo of the item and the inscription to keep permanently. These items can then be offered to other churches through a notice in the diocesan Bulletin Board; send an email to editor@toronto.anglican.ca. You can also reach out to the bishops’ administrative assistants in case they’re aware of churches looking for these items. Otherwise, they can be reverently destroyed.

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Since 1994, the Archives’ collection has grown extensively, with the addition of more than 500 accessions of material from 219 parishes. It has also become evident that some of the registers received need conservation treatment to stabilize and preserve the unique information they contain. Archives staff determine if a register needs conservation when it is accessed to either conduct genealogical research or to prepare copies of baptism or marriage records. If it is in critical need of conservation, the register is added to a conservation planning spreadsheet and categorized by the level of need.

In an effort to revive conservation work, the Archives connected with Vincent Dion of Conservation+Culture in August 2021 and collaborated to apply for a grant from Library and Archives Canada’s Documentary Heritage Communities Program (DHCP) to get the funding needed to begin conservation of 25 of the most at-risk parish registers. On March 31, 2022, we learned that we had been awarded a DHCP grant of $20,310 for this work. Since April 1, Mr. Dion has been working on the necessary conservation treatments. He has been able to work on-site so that the registers remain safely accessible in the vault, since such fragile registers could be damaged in transit. On the days that he comes to the Archives, he spends time evaluating the register for what damage exists and what repairs need to be done to remediate it, then proceeds to implement the repairs. He further documents the process to produce a report.

The registers that are part of the grant application may need conservation work for a variety of reasons such as broken bindings, brittle or damaged pages, degrading tape and damage caused by iron gall ink. Conservators have been trained in methods to help remediate those issues.

When registers have damaged bindings, the text block and pages are carefully removed as a preliminary step. For registers with brittle pages, the concern is that the edges begin to break off, causing important and irreplaceable information, such as an individual’s name or date of birth, to be lost. Many of the registers that are being treated have at least some brittle pages that show signs of flaking. It has been interesting to find that some more recent registers have more serious damage. One reason for this is the use of heavily processed wood pulp in recent paper-making that produces finer pages that are more susceptible to embrittlement and breakage than earlier papers made from cotton and flax fibers. The conservator uses Japanese papers and stable adhesives to create an edging that stabilizes the page, preventing any additional breakage.

In some cases, non-archival tape, such as regular transparent tape or even duct tape, have been used to try and secure pages to the bindings where they have pulled away, or to fix tears. These have caused pages to yellow and deteriorate where they have been exposed to the unstable adhesives. Additionally, in some places where they have been used to secure pages to the binding, the pages are beginning to split at the edge of the tape, causing loss of information. Where possible, the tape is removed using specialized tools, heat and/or solvents. Japanese paper strips are then used to join the two pieces of the page. The repair papers are thin enough that inscriptions remain visible through the repairs.

Some registers may have entries where very acidic iron gall ink was used and, with exposure to damp prior to coming to the Archives, the ink is beginning to eat through the page, leading to loss of information. Here again, Japanese paper is used, but with an alcohol-based adhesive. The most severely affected pages are then interleaved with an archival paper containing an alkaline reserve to buffer the acidity.

Specialized conservation work is not inexpensive and the market rate for such services range from $75 to $150 an hour for treatment time alone, with additional funds needed for supplies. While we are thankful for this grant to complete work on 25 registers, we currently have another 25 registers where we have identified conservation treatment is required and hope to find additional funding to move forward on their treatment when our current grant work is complete.

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