Like many Greater Boston municipalities Newton predates the American Revolution itself, with its first village establishing itself almost 400 years ago.
This old age means a massive amount of history is being archived, preserved and maintained by the entire City of Newton’s Archival team—Jessica Eldrige-Young.
“I think Newton is very proud of its history. The villages, you know, each of the villages have their own very distinct stories, and people still feel a lot of connection to those stories, even as Newton has, you know, exploded in population and has changed a lot in some decades, there’s still a lot of old Newton left, and people care about it,” said Eldrige-Young.
She loves finding “Things that you know are not really part of, like the bigger historical story, but were very important to people at the time and might not exist anymore.”
Meeting minutes, special permits, zoning laws, student records dating back to the 19th century to some are just pieces of paper, but to Eldrige-Young, they are little bits of history with fascinating perspectives and stories to tell.
This incessant fascination with discovering history through municipal records drove Jessica to pursue her Master of Library and Information Sciences at Simmons University. Post-grad she worked for various special archives, before finding a document imaging position at the City Archives in Newton. After the previous city archivist retired Eldrige-Young was tapped for the position.
For the government, she’s a professional researcher, helping the city access these documents both physically and digitally so they can inform their governance through carefully categorized history.
When the city announced it was developing a new city seal, Eldrige-Young was tasked with combing through the archives for records of the initial seal’s creation and the reasoning behind its design.
For the general public, she’s assisting with things like genealogy.
“I love helping people find information about their family. People like to do it’s called House Genealogy, so basically researching the history of their home. You know, because there’s a lot of old and beautiful homes in newton,” said Eldridge-Young.
She helps dig up old blueprints and historical photos of their homes, and also provides assistance with using websites like Ancestry.com.
Eldridge-Young places immense importance on maintaining physical copies themselves, with herself being in charge of maintaining temperature control in what’s called “The Vault,” located in Newton Free Library, where a large portion of Newton’s historical documents are stored.
At its core, her job is about providing everyone access to historical information. Central to this is digitization, which Eldrige-Young actively advocates funding for.
“Because that’s the best way to preserve a document,” she says, “is to make sure that, you know, no one is touching it anymore.”
The City Archive is still growing. Eldrige-Young is making an active effort to reach out to historical record-keeping groups in Newton to integrate their special archives into the city’s.
“[We’re] trying to sort of integrate our records with their records, or veterans groups that have records that are different matters, and trying to sort of say, well, where’s the weakness that we have that you can kind of help bolster?” said Eldrige-Young.
She provides an essential service to the City of Newton not only as a historian and teacher, but also as a fierce advocate for preserving its long and rich history.
Those interested in perusing the City Archives can do so on the Internet Archive or can make an appointment with Eldridge-Young via email or phone.