The February Lecture
Lecture · since 1981 · Once a year, at a different house each year, on the Saturday after the reconciliation.
An hour, in a long room, free, to whoever comes, on a subject of the speaker's choosing. It is not a keynote and there is no platform: the speaker sits, as everybody sits.
The Institute does not approve the text, does not see it beforehand, and has printed lectures that were substantially about how the Institute is wrong. The 2003 lecture, by a hospice matron, is the one most often asked for and consists largely of complaints about volunteers.
Nothing is collected. Nobody speaks before or after the speaker except to say where the tea is.
Made byGiven by a person invited by the stewardship, about half of whom have no connection with the Institute.
PriceFree to attend. Printed text $4; recording, where one exists, free.
Goes wrongAttendance at the lecture has grown faster than the rooms, and two houses have turned people away at the door, which the stewardship regards as a failure of planning and not as a sign of interest.
LEC/2003/01 — The February Lecture 2003: a hospice matron on volunteers · LEC/2024/01 — The February Lecture 2024: on the maintenance of unremarkable buildings
House circulars
Circular · since 1975 · Monthly at seven houses; quarterly at three; South House when the post allows.
Two sides of paper: the rota, the maintenance, who is ill, who has died, what the kitchen needs, and a paragraph of complaint about parking.
Circulars are the truest record the Institute keeps, because nobody writes them for posterity. The archivist takes two copies of each and does not correct the spelling.
Made byWritten and duplicated by whoever the house has landed with it, usually the rota clerk.
PriceFree to members and to anybody who asks. Postage at cost.
Goes wrongThree houses have quietly stopped printing the deaths, on the grounds that it upset people, and the archivist has objected in writing twice.
CIR/2025/07 — North House circular, July 2025
The recorded accounts
Oral history · since 1994 · As people agree. Between none and four a year.
An hour with one person, asked what it has been like. Twenty-nine held. Nine printed.
The printed selection carries at least as many critical accounts as favourable ones, by the archivist's standing rule of 1998.
Made byRecorded by the archivist, or by a house's own correspondence group, on the house's equipment.
PriceFree. Transcripts at cost of copying.
Goes wrongPeople who are pleased with the Institute agree to be recorded more readily than people who are not, so the holding has to be corrected at the selection stage, which is a poor substitute for a representative holding.
ORA/1996/01 — Recorded account: G. Idris · ORA/2011/03 — Recorded account: P. Halloran · ORA/2023/02 — Recorded account: A. Boateng
Reader recordings
Reading · since 1986 · Occasional. Fourteen held.
Passages from the Reader, read aloud at ordinary speed by whoever was on the reading rota that month. They are not performances and several of them contain mistakes and corrections.
The set was begun in 1986 at the request of a member losing her sight, and it is still catalogued under her original request number.
Made byRecorded at the houses, by eleven different readers, for people who cannot read print easily.
PriceFree, in whatever format is asked for.
Goes wrongFourteen recordings against a Reader of ninety-one pieces. The gap has been on the access list since 2009.
REA/1986/01 — Reading: the passage on obligation, read by M. Sandoval · REA/2018/09 — Reading: the weather entry, read by R. Katsuragawa, in Japanese
Field recordings
Field recording · since 1990 · Made when somebody thinks of it.
Rooms and weather: the Karst water gauge in flood, forty minutes of the North House long room empty, the Cedar House road being cleared, the Shore House repair table during a repair.
They exist because a steward in 1990 observed that the Institute had thousands of pages about what the houses do and no record at all of what they sound like.
Made byBy houses, of their own rooms and work.
PriceFree.
Goes wrongNobody has ever asked to hear one except researchers, and two are unplayable.
FLD/1990/02 — Field recording: the long room, North House, empty · FLD/2014/05 — Field recording: the Karst gauge in flood
The printed calendar
Calendar · since 1979 · Annual, printed at Orchard House.
Twelve leaves: the gatherings, the maintenance year, the reconciliation, and the dates the houses are closed. One photograph a month, of a building or a piece of work, never of a face.
It is the single most requested item the Institute prints and is the only one that has ever sold out.
Made bySet and printed by the print shop, from the rota clerks' returns.
Price$11, or free where the price is a difficulty.
Goes wrongFour hundred copies of the 2019 calendar remain in the Orchard House loft.
CAL/2025/01 — Printed calendar, 2025
The annual report
Report · since 1979 · Annual, issued in February or as soon after as the accounts allow.
The figures, the accounts, the discrepancy list, the findings against the houses, and the things not done. Never revised after issue.
Made byCompiled by the treasurer and the archivist; signed by named people.
PriceFree. Posted to anybody who asks, indefinitely.
Goes wrongReports for the years 1982 to 1986 were issued and have not been located. The gap is printed in every subsequent report.
ACC/2025/01 — Summary of Accounts, 2025
Selected correspondence
Correspondence · since 1993 · A selection printed every few years.
Letters from outside: relatives, reporters, neighbours, the county, and people who think the Institute is wrong. The reply is always printed with the letter, and where the reply was poor, that is visible.
Made byChosen by the archivist, with the writers' consent, and printed with the replies.
Price$6.
Goes wrongConsent is easier to get from people who were answered well, which tilts the selection. The archivist prints the refusal rate in the preface: of 61 letters proposed for the 2022 selection, 14 writers declined.
COR/2022/14 — Exchange with a critic, printed entire
Repair manuals
Manual · since 1984 · Six titles, revised when somebody learns something.
Sash windows, lime pointing, book cases, chair joints, wood boilers, and the one on damp, which is mostly about how to tell whether you have found the cause.
They are used well outside the Institute; the sash window one is on a community college reading list in Nova Scotia, which the house found out by accident.
Made byWritten by custodians and binders, illustrated by hand.
Price$9 each, at cost.
Goes wrongThe boiler manual describes two boilers nobody can now buy parts for and has not been revised since 2004.
MAN/1997/02 — The repair of sash windows
Accessibility notices
Notice · since 1994 · One per house, revised after every survey.
What is step-free and what is not, in the plainest words available, with distances, gradients, door widths, and the location of the nearest lavatory that works.
The notice states what has not been done and when it was first recommended. It does not say we are committed to improving access; it says which step is still there.
Made byBy the custodian, checked by whoever asked for the last change.
PriceFree, posted or read aloud over the telephone.
Goes wrongTwo houses' notices were four years out of date when checked in 2023, both in the direction of claiming more than the building offered.
PLN/1994/02 — Ground Floor Plan and Access Survey, River House
Photographs
Photograph · since 1971 · Continuous. About nine thousand held.
Buildings, work, weather, tables laid, roofs off. Faces only where the person is named and agreed, which is why almost none of the nine thousand are of faces.
Nothing is used in Institute material without the consent of everybody identifiable in it, including people photographed in 1974.
Made byBy members, mostly badly.
PriceCopies at cost.
Goes wrongThe habit of not photographing faces has left the Institute with an extensive record of buildings and almost no record of the people who kept them.
PHO/1989/07 — Portrait of E. Vale, c. 1989