UCLA Film & Television Archive Cataloging Procedure Manual--Voyager
Made one record for the issue, no story records. (Little to no unedited footage was input.)
Note: For Stage One, Commercial Services compilations were initially the only newsreel materials receiving inventory records. Later in Stage One, Hearst preservation materials were input from the old inventory cards.
Made one record for the Commercial Services compilation, with a 730 title added entry for each story in the compilation. If the compilation included a cataloged issue, or a story from a cataloged issue, the Cataloging Assistant made the compilation record as usual and forwarded the tapelist to the cataloger. The Cataloger then added the Commercial Services holdings to the cataloging record. If the Commercial Services transfer was a single story from the issue, the Cataloger input an analytic on the issue record, with a part/element note indicating the story and an "In:" note indicating the compilation title.
EX: 05-AAI-8460 (VA4079, compilation inventory record)
945 ‡aIN analytics made for some stories in contents note.
05-AAI-1830 (VA4079, analytic on cataloging record for issue)
‡zPART/ELEMENT: President Hoover baseball story. ‡zNOTES: In: Hearst newsreel footage. 30s, presidential baseball, tape 1, CS1104.
Thus, the full cataloging record listed all copies of the issue and all copies of all stories in that issue held by the Archive. (This resulted in very long records that frequently had to be split, and limited the amount of description that could be included for each story.) The Commercial Services compilation record would not list all copies, just those transferred to tape. A story on one compilation was linked to the same story on a second compilation through the title added entries.
There was no overlap between the Hearst preservation materials input from the old cards and the full cataloging records for preserved issues.
Inventory records only
Preserved silent compilation reels (HSN reels) are a sort of hybrid between a restored issue and a Commercial Services-type compilation. Compilations were created in more-or-less issue number order, although almost all issues are incomplete and the Archive lacks any documentation showing original release order of stories. Some compilations included silent vault material (unedited footage).
Where a compilation consisted of released stories organized by issue, a record was made for the issue. Since extant silent newsreel issues were almost always incomplete, a typical title would read:
245 00 ‡a[International news. ‡nVol. 7, issue 65--excerpts].
The record included a contents note and a title-added entry for each story. The holdings would include a note such as "Stories 1-3 on 1000-ft. reel with 15 other stories."
There was no overlap between Hearst preservation materials input in Stage One and HSN reels input in Stage Two.
Make one record for each story in an issue plus a "parent" record for the issue.
Make one record for each story or segment on the Commercial Services compilation, but no parent record for the compilation as a whole. If a compilation included two issues plus three additional miscellaneous stories, there would be a record for each story in the issue, a parent record for each issue as a whole, and an additional record for each of the three additional miscellaneous stories.
Ignore Stage One records when attaching holdings to bib records. Rely on title-added entries to bring together all copies of a story. In future, all the Stage One records must be broken down into item-level records.
Add the holding for the issue to the issue record and to each of the story records. Never add story holdings to the issue record. Add the holding for a story appearing alone or in a Commercial Services compilation only to the story record, not to the issue record. (Adding individual story holdings to the issue record would result in too many holdings on the issue record. For example, 10 stories times 3 Commercial Services-generated tapes would be 30 holdings from one Commercial Services compilation alone. This was more of a problem in ORION1 than ORION2, but even now, this many holdings present problems, since there is no logical way to order them.
If any segment or story has a corresponding or parent full cataloging record, the Cataloging Assistant inputs those segments without corresponding cataloging records, then forwards the tapelist to the Cataloger to input the remainder. If the Commercial Services compilation contains a full issue already represented in the catalog by a single issue-level (Stage One) record, the Cataloging Assistant inputs inventory records for each story, then forwards the tapelist to the Cataloger, who adds the videotape holdings for the issue to the fully cataloged issue record.
In an ideal world, preservation element holdings would be added to the story-level inventory records, since otherwise, holdings on the story records are incomplete. Unfortunately, this would require recataloging the Stage One issues and this has not been done (but could be).
With the NEH project, it was important to expedite cataloging to meet a deadline. Therefore, if Newsreel Preservation had preserved an entire issue, but only a single story was transferred to tape for the project, only the single story was fully cataloged. A record was kept of all the titles so treated so that the entire issue could be cataloged later. This has yet to be done.
When cataloging a single story from a preserved issue for which an issue record (only) had already been made, the Cataloger added a holding for each preservation element to the new single story record along with the NEH tape holdings, but did not break out the remainder of stories listed in the issue record. Never add story holdings to the issue record.
Prior to this time, newsreel outtakes were treated the same as outtakes from all other theatrical releases. A typical title would read:
245 _ _ ‡a[Hearst Metrotone news. ‡nVol. 7, no. 277--excerpt. Paris, France--Blum settles French strike--outtakes. HCOc660r2, X11560].
Extensive cataloging of outtakes as part of the NEH project pointed to significant differences between newsreel and other outtakes. (See February 20, 1996 memo.) It was found that Hearst newsreel outtakes are by nature conceptually closer to unedited footage than they are to outtakes from contrived theatrical releases. We therefore began inputting HCO ("Hearst Cuts & Outs") material as production footage, with a title based first on the Hearst index card title, and a note and added entry indicating the relationship between the production footage and the released story, e.g.,
245 _ _ ‡a‡a[800,000 workers go on strike, Paris, France. Hearst production footage, HCOc660r2, X11560, HNRv7n277].
500 _ _ ‡aPortions of this footage were used in: Hearst Metrotone news. Vol. 7, no. 277--excerpt. Paris, France--Blum settles French strike.
730 01 ‡aHearst Metrotone news. ‡nVol. 7, no. 277--excerpt. Paris, France--Blum settles French strike.
In future, all the Stage 1-4 outtakes records should be edited to conform to this pattern.
As of August 31, 2000, the following categories of Hearst newsreel footage have been inventoried and moved to SRLF.
| HNR (News of the Day) | some input, some in Cataloging backlog |
| TWS (This Week in Sports) | some input, some in Cataloging backlog |
| GST (General Sports Time) | in Cataloging backlog |
| Adventures in Sport | in Cataloging backlog |
| HCC (Hearst Color Cans) | inventory in process |
Overflow is integrated as the inventory is done, except overflow of safety material from the nitrate vaults.
Remaining to be done are:
| HVM (Hearst Vault Material) | procedures written |
| HCO | not begun |
| HTD (Telenews) | not begun |
| 35S overflow from nitrate vaults | procedures written |
Consolidate SRLF move inventory records with Commercial Services holdings, but ignore Stage One Commercial Services records. There is no overlap between the SRLF move inventory and the full cataloging records for preserved materials.
For HNR and TWS:
Last modified: February 5, 2007, my