Our UK-based colleague, Alex, travelled to the American Association for State and Local History (AASLH) conference in Mobile, Alabama, held from 11 to 14 September 2024.
As an exhibitor at the conference, I met delegates who had collections ranging from just a handful of items to, in one case, over 5 million.
Speaking with them, it was mostly a familiar picture of folk who were either dissatisfied with their existing collections management systems and were looking to switch to something more intuitive, or those still reliant on old databases and spreadsheets who were researching ways of providing digital access.
There were also a handful of those who had recently implemented a CMS but were nevertheless curious to see what else is out there.
Finally, it was nice to meet a new user who has “come on board” since the AASLH conference in Boise last year: the Lahaina Restoration Foundation in Hawaii, who only had good things to say about their experience of using eHive for their collections.
After two days of conference, I went on a tour of coastal Alabama. This concluded with a visit to impressive Fort Morgan, a pentagonal bastion fort at the mouth of Mobile Bay.
Designed by a Frenchman, Simon Bernard, construction began in 1819 and it took a total of 15 years to complete. Over 30 million bricks were manufactured for its construction by enslaved men, women and children.
It saw conflict throughout the American Civil War during the period 1861-64. Later upgraded, it was used during World Wars I and II before being turned over to the State of Alabama as an historic site in 1946.
Vernon Systems develops innovative software for cultural organisations to manage and share their collections. We've been dedicated to the cultural sector since 1985.