By CAMERON LUCADOU-WELLS
SIGNIFICANT parts of Greater Dandenong Council’s historic collection have been damaged due to inadequate storage.
A council report last week stated that the council and Dandenong and Springvale historical societies were running out of room to preserve the municipality’s growing heritage.
The council’s collections of artefacts, art, photographs, oral histories and documents are stored at a former childcare centre, Heritage Hill, and at the Springvale and District Historical Society.
The report stated the sites provided 152 square metres of storage for the “irreplaceable social history” — a shortfall of 198 square-metres needed to house the existing collection.
The collection was previously stored at the View Road depot, which has since been demolished. A total of 170,000 photographic negatives by former Journal photographer Graham Southam were stored at the site for 20 years, after they were donated to the council.
About 60 per cent of the negatives were damaged, and up to 25 per cent irretrievable, due to light and temperature variations.
Last year, the negatives were moved to the former childcare centre in Morwell Parade, Springvale — a space not temperature or humidity controlled. The council has purchased a humidifier, but it has not been installed.
The former childcare centre cannot provide a full archival-quality space, the report stated, adding that a storage site for sensitive items such as negatives would be found and opened by December.
The council has begun planning to move the historical societies into larger premises.
Dandenong and District Historical Society president Chris Keys said creating more storage space was “a growing challenge”. Springvale and District Historical Society president Colin Robinson said there was “a little bit” of storage space at its purpose-built headquarters.
Cr Matthew Kirwan said the humidifier needed to be installed as a matter of priority to minimise further damage.
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