I just spent two days at the US National Archives at College Park, MD. It is a truly wonderful place to work as a researcher. Sunlight streams through the windows in the wide open reading room on the second floor where researchers sit at well spaced workstations with their happily plugged in laptops and work a box at a time from a trolley full of boxes delivered to them during the several archive “pull times” throughout the day. One corner of the second floor is filled with copy machines and a long “research assistance” room behind the workspace area is staffed by often elderly looking archivists who command the range of obscure knowledge required to guide you in requesting the materials most likely to be useful for your research.
To get to the National Archives complex (Archives II) I simply hopped on the Green Line of the Metro and took it to Greenbelt, where I took the R3 bus that goes into the archive campus and will drop you off near the entrance (you can probably get off at one of the earlier Metro stops and take the bus from there as R3 passes several Green Line stops).
There are a few rules and procedures a researcher has to go through to get to their materials but on the whole I found the whole process very smooth and everyone respectful and helpful along the way. When you enter the building you have to put your luggage through an X-Ray machine and go through a regular airport check-in-like screening. If it is your first visit, you then turn right and enter the orientation room where they make you view a computer slide presentation summarizing the important rules and fill out an on-screen form to register yourself as a researcher. After this you are issued a photo ID “researcher card” on the spot which is valid for one year. There are lockers in the basement to store most your possessions. All I brought in with me was my laptop, power cable, headphones, and a few stapled sheets of paper with some notes listing what archival documents I wanted to look at. No bags or pens are allowed inside (they provide pencils, note cards, and paper once you get in), papers brought in have to be approved/stamped, and laptops, scanners, and other equipment need to be registered. When you exit the protected area you have to check the serial number of your equipment against the registration receipt, open laptops to show that no documents are hidden within, and any photocopies you make while on the inside have “Secret” or “Confidential” etc. blacked out if this is written on them, get stamped “Declassified” and identified as copies.
Whenever you enter and leave the protected area they swipe your card. Whenever you enter a room to work in, they swipe your card, and check your materials when you leave. I never felt this process to be that annoying however, and the archivists were incredibly friendly everywhere I went. I left my belongings and microfilms at my workstation whenever I went downstairs and outside the protected area to visit their nice cafe or the convenience store for a snack.
I was impressed by the huge variety of people doing research here.
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