A librarian friend of mine had family members who were missionaries to Haiti. They have been evacuated from the country, but they have received some news of the situation with the libraries in the country.
The oldest library in Port au Prince collapsed. This is the Bibliothèque Haïtienne des Pères du Saint Esprit. This is located in Saint Martial College.
At least a portion of Haiti's national library has also collapsed.
Many university libraries have collapsed.
The St. Louis de Gonzague Library is weakened structurally but still standing.
This is somewhat bad news for those researching their Haitian roots! The earthquake will rewrite the chapter on doing Haitian genealogical research for generations to come. Let's hope that someone comes up with the funding to digitally preserve what remains of records of interest to future generations of genealogists.
No comments:
Post a Comment