We'll reach out to those outside our Archive too

2013 provided many opportunities for talks to promote the Archive, its holdings and services. During this year of the Royal Edinburgh Hospital’s bicentenary, three talks were given to Morningside local community groups on the history of the Hospital. A further talk was given to the Bank of Scotland pensioners on the history of the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh. We were also pleased to team up with Centre for Research Collections colleagues to present talks on our use of social media to a wide range of professionals within the wider archives and libraries sectors at conferences in Edinburgh, Dublin and Aberdeen.

We’ve also passed on LHSA’s approach to preservation and conservation within two workshops, both near and far – one in Midlothian and one in London, and we’ve continued to use social media to advertise our popular user services to as wide an audience as possible - our in-person outreach work merging with the virtual as LHSA conference presentations got plenty of Twitter mentions!

The image below is from a set of digital images we produced from collection items that illustrate the creation of the NHS. These were used to mark the NHS's 65th anniversary in July, and they proved popular with Facebook and Twitter audiences.