Diary – 18 November 2006

In tandem with Asa Briggs, I am speaking at the Howard Gotlieb Archival Research Center atop Boston University. This is a truly remarkable institution, yet, even in Boston, Mass., surprisingly few people know about it. Gotlieb himself was an extraordinary man; a Rhodes scholar, he began by collecting British archives over 40 years ago — then discovered that no one had ever shown an interest in Hollywood memorabilia. He cornered the market. Asa and I are transferring all our papers to it, in my case 150 boxes dating back to the 1950s. In some quarters there is protest at British papers finding their way to the US, but as Asa puts it, had he bequeathed his to an Oxford college, ‘they would lie mouldering in steel boxes in some cellar; nobody would see them; and they would bring in no funds’. Here at BU ours are lovingly preserved by keen young research students in white cotton gloves.