Completed data cleanup tasks for Objects

Completed Data Cleanup Tasks for Objects

• Deleted objects that have no location and an accession number of "unknown," with the exception of the following: see list.
• Deleted all "Unknown" objects that were duplicates of artifacts currently or formerly on exhibit in BTS or FOX. Delete these.
• Re-formatted However, about 320 records are formatted like "IL-0004.0001." The hyphen should be removed.
• Classified lists of There is one list of assorted objects to classify and one list of books to classify. See full list of objects to classify and list of books to classify.

• Some of these objects have lot numbers but not individual accession numbers. Thus, the lot will contain multiple objects with the same 7-digit accession number.
  • According to Megan, many of these lots contain extent info for the entire lot, listed in the access database order, in their "Administrative remarks" fields. However, this is not a consistent pattern. See extent report on lots or groups of objects that have inventory extent info from the access database in the admin notes field here. We need to go through this data by hand and try to assign it to its proper place. Finish cleaning up this data. (Extent report).
• Some of these objects have no accession number (that is, their accession number is listed as "unknown."). Move data for "unknown" object extents over from the old access database.
• It appears that in MOST cases the cataloger mistakenly put the data for "Components" into this field instead. None of the objects that have data in "Extent" have data for "Components," so we could move the data into the "Components" field without worrying about writing over more recent/relevant data. There are relatively few fields with data for "Extent" (68 total), so we could easily move this data by hand. Still must do all the extents from 2002.007.

• Fix other formatting errors by hand. See history formatting spreadsheet.

• Subject:
  • 1989.26: Lists associated individuals, productions, corporations, collections, and subjects in "Subject." Each of these strings of names is preceded by one of the following four phrases: "By Corporation Name:", "Miscellaneous:", "By Personality/Character Name:", "By Production Title:". However, these typologies only refer to the first item in each list and the list may contain other names, production names, and subject keywords. There are over 1000 objects, so it would be possible (though difficult) to move this data by hand. Here are a few examples: 
    • "By Personality/Character Name:  Lombard, Carole ; Carole Lombard; Sports/Exercise/Martial Arts; Home/Family Life"
    • "By Production Title:  STAR MAKER, THE; Linda Ware; Louise Campbell; Bing Crosby; Ned Sparks; Walter Damrosch (Conductor/ Actor); Gus Edwards (Songwriter); Teenagers"
    • "By Personality/Character Name:  Bennett, Constance; Constance Bennett; Joan Bennett; Barbara Bennett; Children/Babies"
    • Spot-check the veracity of this data before going through it.
  • 1986.59: "Subject" field gives more specific info than the "Subcategory" field. This info is not repeated elsewhere and would map better onto Work Types. The values listed in this lot under "Subject" include: Behind the Scenes Photo, Behind-the-Scene Photograph, Behind-the-Scenes, Behind-the-Scenes Still, Candid Portrait, Cast and Crew Photo, Production Photo, production photograph, Publicity Color Transparency, Publicity Portrait, Publicity Still, Scene Still, Scene Stills. The values listed under "Subcategory" include "Industry and Production Photographs" and "Scene Stills." There are 270 objects, so this data is easy to move by hand.
  • 1992.6: "Subject" field contains entity information. 95% of this information appears to have been entered by hand  into "Entities" for each record. I think it is safe to delete everything in "Subject" for this -- we may lose one or two terms, but that would be it.
  • 1994.2: Same as 1992.6.
  • 1995.7: Can delete all.
  • 1996.3: There is some data in "Subject" for many items in this lot but it is not consistent in nature. The lot is small and someone should go through it by hand in order to move the information to the proper fields.
  • 1998.5: Entity info in "Subject": this is a small lot and it's easier to move this information by hand.