Nelson Replaces Desrochers as Academy Archivist

The Phillips Exeter Academy Class of 1945 Library has hired a new head of archives and special collections, Peter Nelson, who will begin work next month to preserve Exeter’s digital communication, formulate a process of digitizing the archives and give archival materials a larger presence online. Nelson will be taking over the position from former head archivist, Edouard Desrochers, who retired at the end of last summer.Nelson has worked as the Amherst College archivist for nearly fifteen years and was the director of a three-year digitizing project specific to the history of women’s higher education for the Five Colleges Consortium. For this project, Nelson digitized approximately 25,000 individual items onto the web. In addition, Nelson has worked with Amherst to facilitate several other projects such as digitizing the school newspaper.

“My work in school archives has always been really fascinating to me. I know Exeter will be suitable and interesting for me.”

Nelson’s experience with digitizing archival materials was one aspect of his resume that head librarian Gail Scanlon found intriguing in the hiring process of the new head archivist.“A lot has to be done to secure current email and other online records,” Scanlon said. Currently, Exeter’s archives are based mainly in paper, and the librarians have yet to find a concrete system of capturing important digital documents and information that are created and sent through Google documents or email. Similarly, due to lack of resources and knowledge about the process of digitizing, Exeter has a very small online archival presence at the time.Nelson said he would like to make descriptions of primary sources, rare book and manuscript collections more readily accessible on the web to interested users. According to Scanlon, because Nelson has experience digitizing materials for other institutions, he will be able to “help [the library] formulate a process for digitization at Exeter.”Upon his arrival to the Academy on February 1, Nelson will begin by familiarizing himself with Exeter’s archives and special collections, reaching out to faculty and staff and determining more precisely the goals that he wishes to achieve as head archivist.Nelson said he would like to speak to faculty who are interested in using the archives and the often-neglected rare book collection for themselves and their classes more feasibly and frequently. In his first days here Nelson said he has an interest to “build some bridges and listen and hear what people would like to do.”Nelson said he found the library staff to be “dedicated people, extremely friendly, very knowledgable about the work that they do and very open to new ideas.”The general friendliness and interest of the people in the Exeter community impressed Nelson and made him eager to work with them. “My work in school archives has always been really fascinating to me. I know [Exeter] will be suitable and interesting for me,” Nelson said.