How Do You Preserve Plants in an Archive?
This article first appeared in the Moscow-Pullman Daily News "Nearby History" column on October 24, 2026.
By Hayley Noble, Executive Director
Did you know that October is American Archives Month? This month we celebrate the invaluable resources housed in our archives and the professionals who steward these collections for future generations. Archives typically house photographs, manuscript collections, paper materials like documents and newspapers, and audio/visual recordings in all sorts of formats. Digital archiving is a growing field, working to preserve countless resources only available online or in digital formats. Some archives also work to collect and preserve artifacts or specimens that can be used by researchers. The Latah County Historical Society has all the items you’d typically find in an archive: photographs, documents, oral history recordings, ledgers and plat maps, but also the things you may not find in other archives like clothing, toys, advertising, and other artifact collections from across Latah County. These artifacts are oftentimes used in the McConnell Mansion or in other museum displays, but they also exist as a tangible record of the past, preserved in perpetuity as a primary source.
Occasionally, we’ll also stumble upon surprises in the archive that we do not expect. One such surprise was a bound notebook that belonged to Oscar Wells from Potlatch. It was an herbarium notebook from April and May 1912. An herbarium is like an archive, but specific to plants, fungi, and algae, with the term “herbarium” referring to a collection of preserved plant specimens with associated data. Those specimens and data are then used for scientific study. The associated data includes things like plant taxonomy, noting the date and location the specimen was collected, and sometimes more technical elements or illustrations. The most widespread practice of preserving plants is to dry the specimens, pressed between sheets of paper. Those herbarium specimens then provide a historical record of changes in ecosystems over time. That data can inform things like climate change, offer samples of extinct species, and a myriad of other applicable uses.
Oscar Wells’ herbarium contains plant specimens and their details from 114 years ago in and around Potlatch, all pressed between the pages of his notebook. The other herbarium in our collection belonged to Alma Lauder (married name Keeling). She used it to document plants around Moscow for a high school assignment in April 1911.
These are, of course, very small examples of herbarium collections, but other more science-focused institutions have their own collections. The Stillinger Herbarium on the University of Idaho campus is the largest herbarium in Idaho and was established shortly after the university opened its doors in 1892. To find out more about the Stillinger Herbarium, check out their open house on November 19th from 12pm to 7pm in the Mines Building on the UI campus. The open house is in partnership with the Coeur d’Alene tribe, where the Tribal Department of Natural Resources will share their history and relationships with the plants contained in the herbarium. These repositories, whether archival or herbaria, provide glimpses into the past and offer connection to the world around us. This Archives Month, I hope you’ll join me in celebrating the role that libraries, museums, historical societies, and science collections play in preserving our valuable resources for the future.
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