Isle Hall Cleanout
My 2016-2017 academic year at Eastern Washington University was a transitional period for the Geography Department. The 40+ year careers of two recently-retired faculty covered a major technological and epistemic change in academic geography. Upon my arrival, the obvious physical legacy of that change was a collection of paper materials that had been accrued over the past half century with minimal organization and limited utility in a new electronic data era.
Coming from a family with a multi-generational habit of disordered collection, and with the support of new departmental administration desiring to optimize the usage of the building space, I took a personal interest (albeit with contradictory feelings) in facilitating the cleanout of the building so the space could better meet the needs of 21st century students.

Isle Hall

Isle Hall Cleanout

Isle Hall Cleanout

Isle Hall Cleanout





























EASI File

EASI File

Cabinets moving

Clearing the walls

Clearing the walls

Map Library, pre-reorder (video)



Map Library, post-reorder (video)

Dirt Room

Darkroom topographic maps

Darkroom topographic maps

Dirt Room, topographic maps

Darkroom topo maps removed

Darkroom topo maps removed

Atlases

Atlases

Dirt room

Topo maps

Map room

Map room

Slides

Slides

Carousels

Boxed slides

Cabinets

Order

Shelves for aerial photos

Former shelves for aerial photos

Aerial photos

Darkroom walkthrough (video)

Empty dirt room

Mercury poisoning

Mercury poisoning

Mercury poisoning