A St David’s teenager has been undergoing a work experience with a difference this summer.
For 16 year-old Katherine Brooks has been helping care for some of the historic documents in Pembrokeshire County Council’s Archives and Local Studies centre.
Katherine has been making protective covers for the wax seals found on some of the county’s oldest documents.
Working in the new conservation studio alongside her mother Margaret – a trainee conservator at the Archives – Katherine has been crafting small seal bags made of soft wrap and tyvek material heated and welded to the size required for the seals.
Seal ‘bags are placed over historic seals to protect them from being damaged during handling.
In addition Katherine also wrote a brief condition and description for each of the seals to add to the catalogue of information on the collection.
“I found the time with the staff at the archive enjoyable and it gave me the chance to become more familiar with archive work and the documents,” said Katherine.
“Working with documents that date back hundreds of years from our county was a really unique experience.”
The collection that Katherine was working on was part of the Haverfordwest Borough Records. This part of the collection had parchments written with iron gall ink and the seals attached to the earliest document she worked with dated back to 1379.
Katherine who just finished her studies at Ysgol Dewi Sant will be leaving Pembrokeshire after the summer holidays to study for her International Baccalaureate at Atlantic College in Llanwit Major. One of her subjects will be History!
Based at the Pembrokeshire Archives building in Prendergast, Pembrokeshire Archives and Local Studies is part of Pembrokeshire County Council.
Details of opening hours, location, readers’ tickets, scale of charges and other information can be found on its web-site www.pembrokeshire.gov.uk/archives.
Contact can be made by email record.office@pembrokeshire.gov.uk or telephone 01437 775456.
Pembrokeshire Archives and Local Studies also has a Facebook page at www.facebook.com/PembsArchives.
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