Blog

Margaret Merrick, PHS Records Manager, provides training to new stated clerks as part of the biannual orientations offered by the PC(USA) Office of the General Assembly. Orientations are held in May and November in Louisville, and Margaret presents sessions on using retention schedules, the disposition of records, and the challenges of managing and preserving electronic records. The training is designed to introduce new stated clerks to records management in both paper and electronic formats, as well as provide information on the services that PHS offers to mid councils.

Margaret is...

Let me give some straight talk to members of session: It’s not at all uncommon for ruling elders to hold on to volumes of church records after they’ve resigned from session, filing minutes and registers in the attic or basement, lost to time. You’re not alone. Retrieved records are a wonder to behold.

We received one such surprise visit the other day from Ron Shaffer of Old Pine Street Presbyterian Church, right in PHS’s backyard. Mr. Shaffer, an appraiser by trade, had taken an interest in the gaps in Old Pine’s collection of records held here, and...