CITY OF SURREY ARCHIVES Collections & Surrey Leader Newspaper Fonds

Surrey Archives Internship 2025 

Young Canada Works Program Placement

Carson was tasked with 4 main projects, 3 site tours, 3 outreach booth events, 4 job shadowing opportunities, 3 public speaking roles, and 30 reference enquiries in total. Some of the main skills developed during his internship include digitization, database navigation, applying restrictions using the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act, and creating descriptions at different levels according to the Rules for Archival Description. Carson worked under the Supervision of Stacey Gilkinson, Archivist.

Reference enquiries primary surrounded family and/or property research such as for the Staull Family research for obituaries on December 10, 2025, as well for the Galiczs’ Surrey Zoo research for a roundabout art installation on October 18, 2025. Each enquiry took 2 hours of research where Carsons responsibilities included keyword searching textual documents such as The Surrey Leader. 

The Canadian National Railway Cloverdale Station research on October 18, 2025, was for family research related to the Great Northern Railway station in Cloverdale from 1929-1931. Carsons responsibilities included keyword searching textual documents such as the Council Minutes from 1926-1945 and 1946-1953, the Semiahmoo Gazette and Surrey Gazette, directories, and reference files. He consulted the “Railways Pt 2 - History,” “Settlers, Early – General,” “Settlers, Early – Q-Z,”  “Cloverdale to 2010” reference files, as well as Surrey Story by G. Fern Treleaven, and Land of the Peace Arch by John Pearson over 3 hours of research. 

The Cloverdale Heritage Sites research on September 25, 2025, was for the re-evaluation of Heritage designation for certain buildings. Carsons responsibilities included referencing textual documents such as Heritage Inventory Identification Sheets, The Surrey Leader, directories, as well as visual references like COSMOS aerial map images and Z-Drive township maps over 7 hours of research. 

The Nicomekl River research on September 3, 2025, was for the timeline of rerouting of the river meander on the 145 acres of the NW Section 36 Township 1 land plot. Carsons responsibilities included locating and reviewing maps, municipal park heritage plans, environmental assessments, and water management documents. He referenced textual documents such as municipal environmental reports, The Surrey Gazette, The Semiahmoo Gazette, and The Surrey Leader newspapers, as well as Surrey City Council Minutes from 1880-1925 over 6 hours of research.

The Vandrishe Family research on August 8, 2025, was for the potential donation of a collection of family records. Carsons responsibilities included identifying gaps in archival materials related to the Vandrishe family to help determine the need for the collection acquisition. He referenced textual documents such as The Surrey Gazette, The Semiahmoo Gazette, and The Surrey Leader newspapers, as well as Surrey City Council Minutes from 1880-1925 over 5 hours of research

Carson also had the opportunity to job shadow donor meetings and review collections for donation, where he learned about interpreting policies and understanding the role of deed of gift and transfer forms. He also attended and presented educational talks in a variety of settings to diverse audiences. 

The Sally Ito Book Talk on Microsoft Teams was held from 6:30pm to 7:30pm on September 4, 2025, with Sally Ito for her book “The Emperor’s Orphans,” where Carsons responsibilities included counting attendees, assisting with technical difficulties, continuing the discussion with prompts, and recording meeting notes. Twenty-five people attended the event.

The Youth 4 A Change Collection Acquisition at The Surrey Archives was held from 2:00pm to 3:00pm on July 22, 2025, where Carsons responsibilities included reviewing donation material for acquisition, referencing the virtual tour of the Y4AC exhibit to verify public access, and transferring materials into archival storage. Record types included photos, posters, academic publications, text panels, awards, medals, and buttons that fill an existing gap in the current 2SLGBTQ+ collection at The Surrey Archives. 

Carson was a co-presenter of the Veteran War Stories Presentation at 6:30pm on November 13, 2025, hosted on Microsoft Teams from The Surrey Archives. My responsibilities included creating a script for half of the 1 hour presentation, touching on Surrey connections to both WWI and WWII, referencing documents, images, and audio clips from various collection fonds. Sixteen people attended this program out of twenty-one registered. 

Carson transcribed the information from Surrey Leader Newspaper film negatives, organized them into archival quality enclosures and Hollinger boxes, and numbered them according to accession code into the MINISIS M2A Database. He placed restrictions on the public access of images that contained personal or sensitive information, while digitizing the 2.5 x 3.5 cm B&W and Colour film using Epson Scan Software and ACDSee Photo Studio to create access files. 

He worked with images taken (and often published) between May and July of 1997 where the most common Photographers at the Surrey Leader during this time included Joseph Boaz and Evan Seal. Carson researched The Surrey Leader publications on Newspapers.com and focused on digitizing images that have been published with articles and advertisements. He created a workflow document that allowed me to keep track of all numerical elements, which items he had restricted, which items had unknown photographers, and which items have a published story as well as the links to those stories. Carson adjusted to reading and transcribing hand-written information that was often misspelled or lacked clear printing. 

Common themes throughout images in this project included Surrey’s 36th General Election, the Cloverdale Rodeo Fairgrounds, advertisements for local businesses and real estate, community improvement efforts such as construction, public art, and responses to natural disasters, as well as sports events such as hockey, lacrosse, rugby, baseball, wresting, and golf. The goal for this project was to digitize 2500 photos, and Carson ended up digitizing 2056 images, describing 8464 images, and processing 311 items (envelopes of film negatives) in total. This was because during the time designated for Project 1, he was also attending outreach events, job shadowing presentations and collection acquisitions, as well as doing research for reference enquiries.

Carson worked with City of Surrey records to describe files from the 1970s-80s for public access and research. He rehoused the files into Hollinger boxes, arranged and described the contents of the bankers’ boxes, and kept track of these details in a workflow document that enabled me to easily track accession numbers, alphanumeric designations, Archives Storage and MINISIS Database locations, as well as box and file re-numbering. 

He became familiar with Section 22 (Disclosure Harmful to Personal Privacy), and 36 (Disclosure of Archival or Historical Purposes) of the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act. Common themes throughout the files in this project included inter-office memos, correspondence, and reports relating to Land Use Contracts, schedules and participation logs for seminars and conferences, Bylaw and policy guidelines, service request and petitions from residents, and considered tenders for industrial developments and specific Community Improvement Projects such as for roads, sewers, and sanitation. 

Carson placed restrictions on files that contained personal and sensitive information while summarizing the vast file content into short paragraphs focused on addresses, neighborhoods, and landmarks tied to developments as they appeal to research. These civic records can be requested for access by the public through a Freedom of Information Request where this personal information will be redacted, along with legal advice, law enforcement matters, as well as investments, negotiated contracts, and financial matters. 

Carson worked with Archival records to categorize their storage locations and content designations in preparation for renovations of 1912 Hall and temporary relocation of the entire Surrey Archives Collection. I applied adhesive labels to the shelving units to replace the magnetic labeling system in the Archives Storage Vault. He photographed every shelf and titled the photos according to the shelf numbering system, and transcribed the titles, accession numbers, and any other information for every material documented, ensuring this content is visible and clear in the photographs and metadata spreadsheet. 

He made several decisions to increase the readability of the spreadsheet that will be referenced post-renovations to return Collections records to their correct locations in the Archives Storage Vault. The goal for this project was to photograph and document 4 aisles of shelving inventory in the Archives Storage Vault in three weeks, and Carson ended up labeling and photographing 11 aisles of shelving inventory, 8 aisles of which have been transcribed and documented in the same duration of time. This was because the timeline was just an estimation for the work, since the project had not been done before. Carson completed the inventory documentation for all Processed Archival Materials, which is approximately 300 linear metres of archival records.

Carson transcribed the information from Surrey Leader Newspaper born-digital images, organized the images by date and event into the MINISIS M2A Database, and placed restrictions on the public access of images that contained personal or sensitive information. He worked with images taken (and often published) between February and July of 2015 where the most common Photographers at the Surrey Leader during this time included Joseph Boaz and Evan Seal. He also researched The Surrey Leader publications on Newspapers.com to identify images that have been published with articles and advertisements. 

he created a workflow spreadsheet that allowed him to keep track of image locations in the M2A Database, Z-Drive, MINISIS Data Drive, and desktop folders, as well as the links to publications, the dates, photographers, restrictions, the public access status, and the number of images described and selected for representation. Common themes throughout images in this project included advertisements for local businesses, features of honoured community members, coverage of press releases and official ceremonies, as well as events such as fitness initiatives and sports like rugby, baseball, and soccer. The goal for this project was to select 2500 photos for representation, and out of the 34,290 images Carson described, 2501 were selected out of the 30 items (discs) he processed over the four weeks. 

On November 19, 2025, at 3:00pm Carson met with Linda Jennings (Collections Curator) at the Beatty Biodiversity Museum. He was most interested in viewing the Vascular Plants Collection as well as the Fungi and Lichens Collection in the Herbarium as they relate to biodiversity conservation. Carson learned that Huber Moore was a BC community scientist and collector whose donations contains hundreds of vascular plant and moss specimens, as well as one butterfly all collected in The Lower Mainland and Okanagan between 1980-2005. The Museums volunteer classrooms also feature animal taxidermy, fish preservation, and specimen cataloguing. 

On November 6, 2025, at 1:00pm Carson met with Heather Gordon (City Archivist) at the City of Vancouver Archives to tour the preservation lab and view glass plate negatives as they relate to film preservation/restoration. Carson learned that their Archive Collection walk in freezer was the first designed based off research from the Smithsonian, and that they have a custom video digitization setup for magnetic media such as VHS tapes.

On November 14, 2025, at 3:00pm Carson met with Angel Chirnside (Assistant Manager of Special Collections) at the Vancouver Public Library to view their Special Collections. He was most interested in looking at the Rare Books and the Historical Photographs, especially the Province Newspaper Collection. Carson learned that the Rare Book Collection includes a page from the Gutenberg Bible from the 1450’s. There were 180 copies made and 48 still survive. Also that the Vancouver Sun fonds of film negatives was acquired from a dumpster!

On-Call Outreach 2026

Parks, Recreation, and Culture 

Carson assists with hosting outreach tables to promote the Memory Map project at community gatherings across Surrey. For all outreach events his responsibilities include bringing equipment to the outreach site, setting up the booth, handing out heritage references, business cards, and prizes, as well as counting participation while explaining and encouraging activity engagement with community members. References included pamphlets for the Historic Stewart Farm, Totest Aleng Indigenous Learning House, Historical Re-enactor Performances, Surrey Archives, and Museum of Surrey. Activities included the Memory Map of Surrey where participants added their own location-based memories, and a guessing game that involved placing historical and modern images in the correct locations the map. Other events featured a wheel to reveal facts about certain places or topics in Surrey, as well as a stereoscope image viewer. Prizes include stickers and pencils.