University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

The Record of Business and the Future of Business History: Establishing a Public Interest in Private Business Records

Kirsch, David A.

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https://hdl.handle.net/2142/13601

Description

Title
The Record of Business and the Future of Business History: Establishing a Public Interest in Private Business Records
Author(s)
Kirsch, David A.
Issue Date
2009
Keyword(s)
  • Digital preservation
  • National Digital Information Infrastructure Preservation Program (NDIIPP)
  • Business history
Abstract
Long-term preservation of and access to business records of the sort that business historians have relied upon for decades and that supported the development of applied fields, like business strategy, is increasingly threatened by their growing value. The expansion of entrepreneurial capitalism following the end of the Cold War has produced a new era of business ascendant across much of the globe. At home, we are reminded of President Calvin Coolidge’s observation that “the chief business of the American people is business.” Not since Coolidge first uttered these words more than eighty years ago have they rung more true. And if the business of America is business, then surely the history of America is the history of American business. Yet, if we have witnessed a new gilded age in American industry, the evidentiary record of these events may disappoint future scholars, policy makers, and the interested public.
Publisher
Johns Hopkins University Press and the Graduate School of Library and Information Science. University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
ISSN
0024-2594
Type of Resource
text
Language
en
Permalink
http://hdl.handle.net/2142/13601
Copyright and License Information
Copyright 2009 Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois.

Owning Collections

Library Trends 57 (3) Winter 2009: Library of Congress NDIIP Program PRIMARY
Library Trends 57 (3) Winter 2009: Library of Congress NDIIP Program. Edited by Patricia Cruse and Beth Sandore