Time to move
Quote:
Wanted: Grateful Dead librarian
If you were there in '77 at the Barton Hall show at Cornell when Jerry Garcia absolutely tore up 'St. Stephen', well, that wouldn't hurt. But more importantly, how's your Dewey Decimal these days?
The University of California, Santa Cruz is looking for an archivist to take control of their Grateful Dead collection.
"Having been a Deadhead is not in our list of requirements," said Christine Bunting, head of the school's Special Collections and Archive. "Being a fan would help. But we are looking for a professional, experienced person who has an interest in American popular culture."
Translation: Cut off the dreads, buy a tie, skip the herbal supplement, have a Master of Library Science.
Perks: Spend all day strumming Jerry's own Gibson Les Paul, earn $68,000 (U.S.) for the trouble.
The successful applicant will take control of a mountain of material collected by the San Francisco-based psychedelic quintet over their 44-year career. The band made it a gift to the university in 2008.
It's a perfect match. UCSC might the most laidback, groovy campus on Earth. The seaside school's mascot is a banana slug. The music department offers a course called 'Music of the Grateful Dead'. If UCSC had a soundtrack, the Dead would kick it off with a noodly, 15-minute guitar solo.
The Dead archive includes original recordings, photos, literature and posters from nearly 2,500 shows. Much of it is fan generated, a wild mélange of statuary, paintings, comic books, dolls and strange idols.
The Dead kept everything it was sent by their devotees, called Deadheads. The shifting membership of the band hired an in-house archivist to keep the stuff in reasonable order.
"If you ever wrote the Grateful Dead a letter, you'll probably find it (at UCSC)," guitarist Bob Weir said at the dedication ceremony.
Now a staff of five at UCSC is methodically going through it, photographing and cataloguing each individual piece.
"None of us were actually on the road with the band," Bunting said. "But we've attended concerts. My iPod's full of Grateful Dead. But being a true Deadhead's kind of a full-time job."
The librarians are a year into the collating process and don't expect to finish for "several" more.
"It's almost impossible to say exactly how much is in it," said Bunting. "Individually, it's tens of thousands of pieces."
Bunting writes a blog about the archive. Her pseudonym is 'Grateful Slug'.
Once the new archivist and his/her staff is finished, the entire collection will be viewable online. Academics and researchers will be able to study it at their leisure. Starting in late-2010, fans will be able to see select materials in 'Dead Central', a purpose-built room inside the new UCSC campus library.
Bunting preferred to say that the collection is "priceless," but conceded that if some square from, say, an insurance company were to value it, the archive is worth "millions."
Deadheads continue to pop by, hoping to dive into the cache. Until the cataloguing is finished, they're turned away. Much of the new archivist's new job may be acting as the world's most chilled out bouncer. Once the archive is sorted and 'Dead Central' is up and running, the archive may begin to travel. Bunting has already lined up a New York City show of some artifacts in March.
The remaining members of the band hit also NYC in a little while. They began touring again last spring after a five-year hiatus.
Does the band's revitalization extend to matters archival? Will UCSC applicants have to answer Phil Lesh's searching inquiries? Will Mickey Hart want to know what year 'American Beauty' was released?
"No, the band's leaving this one up to us," said Bunting. "They trust us."
So no meet and greet. Bummer.
