According to the Vancouver website, the "City of Vancouver Archives, a division of the City Clerk’s Department, is responsible for acquiring, organizing, and preserving Vancouver’s historical records and making them available to the widest possible audience."

Victoria’s archival mandate is very similar to the Vancouver repository’s mission. A general segment from the website reads as follows: "The purpose of the Victoria City Archives is to identify, acquire, preserve and make accessible archival material in the form of civic and private records documenting the history of the City of Victoria."

All three repositories have similar-sounding missions to preserve city records and make them available to amateur and professional researchers alike.

Primary Clientele of Each Repository
The primary clientele of all three archives seems to be genealogists, a conclusion I base on the large amount of content on each site dedicated to how the archives can aid these researchers. Historians and scholars use the archives as well; there are universities in all three cities. However, none of the websites appear to be directly advertising their services to historians; rather, they are gearing the presentation of their holdings and services to the general public and to their perceived users, the most active of whom are conducting genealogical research.

Of the three websites, the New Orleans repository’s site provided the most information about their collections for potential scholarly research. Many of the very detailed and interesting descriptions of its holdings associate an indexed series to a significant historical event. Neither of the descriptions of holdings for the other two repositories bring up any "exciting" histories of the respective cities. On the other hand, all three websites conspicuously emphasize the location and description of holdings that are useful for genealogical research, including "how-to" pages for finding documents for use when patrons visit the repository. All three websites are designed for a primary audience of genealogical researchers, people looking for information about buildings within the city, those who have donations to make to the archive, and the general citizenry. The Vancouver and Victoria archives both have special sections of their websites dedicated to records about historical use of land. Vancouver’s archive describes holdings that help researchers find out historical information about houses and buildings in town and the residents who lived there; Victoria’s site describes holdings that are interesting to researchers looking for environmental assessment and social geography purposes.

Useful Information at Each Website
All three websites are fantastically comprehensive and fun to browse and explore. All provide descriptions about their holdings detailed enough for the potential user to browse to determine what the repository’s holdings have to offer for their research purposes, as well as contact information for the archive, a brief history of the repository, and exhibit information. Each provides some information that the others do not. Vancouver’s archive offers annual reports about the functions and finances of the archive itself, as well as links to local community resources and organizations that citizens might find useful. Both New Orleans’ and Vancouver’s sites offer functionality that allows browsing users to search by keyword for potentially useful series and documents. In addition, the New Orleans and Vancouver sites provide not only a description of current exhibits and projects at the physical repository, but also hyperlinks to some of the more interesting photos and documents on display. Victoria’s site does not offer such links. In this category of useful information, the New Orleans repository is miles ahead of both Vancouver’s and Victoria’s. The site contains hyperlinked indexes created by archive staff members to extensive, detailed descriptions of document series as well as narrative descriptions that put the series into historical context. Furthermore, the site oftentimes provides photographs along with the text. The actual archival descriptions of the holdings are also much more detailed, providing the user with more information with which to start his/her search.

Missing Information
Though the New Orleans repository’s site has more detailed descriptions and was much flashier than either of the Canadian sites, what it does lack is a quality site map to use to jump around the site. The site is very complex and has a lot of pages; however, without a logical sitemap, I had to keep hitting the back button to return to the opening page's navigation bar. Both Vancouver and Victoria’s sites were laid out so that a user did not need to go back more than once to get to the sitemap on the first page. Also, a "How to use this archives when you get here" page like those on the Canadian sites would be helpful for the New Orleans site, and would probably save the archive staff time and energy getting researchers started on their searches.

New Orleans Public Library: City Archives and Louisiana Division Special Collections

City of Vancouver Archives

City of Victoria Archives