Archive challenge

A new degree in Community Regeneration has been launched by the University, aimed at helping community and public service workers improve our local urban and rural communities.

As part of Radio Scotland's 25th Anniversary celebrations, the University Archives recently played host to Rector, Fred MacAulay. Rather fittingly - albeit a coincidence - Fred had graduated from the University of Dundee in 1978, the year Radio Scotland began broadcasting.

Fifteen members of the public who had some interest in local history were invited to join staff from the Archive Services and the Department of History in a quest to find an engaging story from the past. On display were a number of archival documents from the University Archives and Dundee City Archives.

These included case books from the lunatic asylums of Dundee and Montrose, the diary of a millworker from the 1860s, plans showing Dundee's growth from the 18th century to the present day, scrapbooks of newscuttings reporting on the founding of the University and college magazines from 1978.

Professor Charles McKean, from the Department of History, spotted a story that made the news in 1776. A page from the Dundee Weekly Magazine recounted how a young woman from Aberdeen passed herself off as a soldier for five weeks and was only found out when a woman 'became amorous of the supposed handsome young lad, and made such advances as brought on a discovery of the recruit's sex.'

The University's Records Management team also found Fred’s student file, and with his permission (given data protection restrictions!) we are reproducing a photograph of the young, fresh-faced student here.

The exercise was a success and made people aware that there is more to the archives than dry, old volumes and parchments - indeed, it is usually the human element that makes the collections so special.