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The Society:
From Birth to Maturity
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2
Introduction
SAA Membership
SAA Leadership (Council & Officers)
Research and Publication
Annual Meeting Analysis
Financial Profile
Presidential Perspective
SAA in a Comparative Context
End Notes
SAA
Membership
(Click on
images to enlarge.)
Four years after its founding, the Society had fewer than 250 members; twenty-five
years later that number had increased three-and-a-half times, and by 1990 it
had grown by an almost identical percentage to nearly three thousand members.
In the fifty-year period from 1940 to 1990, the Society had increased nearly
twelve-fold. Since then our membership size has been relatively constant.3
During that same
period the composition of the membership became more diverse. In those early
years slightly less than 25 percent were women, a figure that had increased
by only 4 percent twenty-five years later. But by 1990, that figure had risen
dramatically to 54 percent.4
  
In 1940 the District
of Columbia accounted for the largest number of SAA members--nearly one hundred--reflecting
the early dominance of the National Archives. The next four states combined--New
York, Virginia, Michigan, and Illinois--equaled only about half of the members
from the District of Columbia. Ten states had no members. This pattern changed
only slightly over the next twenty-five years. In 1965, the District of Columbia
still represented the largest number of members, but the number had increased
only marginally. New York, however, had increased six-fold and Virginia by a
factor of five. Maryland displaced Illinois and Michigan for the next highest
number of members. A closer look at this suggests that a significant number
of the Maryland and Virginia members were, in fact, employed by the National
Archives. Four states were not represented in the Society. By 1990, the distribution
of members had shifted more substantially. New York had over three hundred members,
followed by California, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Illinois, Maryland, Texas,
Virginia, and the District of Columbia. All states were represented, and there
were a large number of members from Canada and European countries. The Society
had become a worldwide organization.5
  
While SAA membership
by state reflected strong East Coast representation in the early years, membership
by institutional affiliation even more strongly reflected the role of the National
Archives. In 1940, the National Archives had as many members in the Society
as the next two categories--colleges and universities, and historical societies--combined.
Corporate and religious archives were almost non-existent. Twenty-five years
later the National Archives and other federal agencies again accounted for the
largest portion of the membership, followed by colleges and universities, state
and local government archives, corporate archives, and historical societies.
Data for 1990 is easier to categorize because members reported their affiliation
in sections by institutional employer. By that time colleges and universities
constituted the largest group, followed by manuscript repositories, government,
religious institutions, business, and museums. In all but the government records
section, women represent a majority of members. The split was almost even among
colleges and universities. Overall, women represented 54 percent of the total
membership.6
  
Men from the
East Coast, especially from the National Archives, were the backbone of the
Society from its formative years well into the 1960s. By 1990, the membership
profile had shifted, reflecting three trends: (1) women constituted a majority,
(2) the largest growth occurred in the Midwest and California, and (3) college
and university archivists displaced government archivists as the largest group
within the Society. The formation in 1974 of the National Association of State
Archives and Records Administrators (NASARA, which was changed in 1984 to NAGARA)
either contributed to the loss of dominance of government archivists, or, perhaps,
reflected their loss of influence and their desire to establish a separate organization
that better met their needs. NAGARA is an institutionally based organization
representing the National Archives and Records Administration, nearly every
state in the Union, and approximately 250 local government units. Clearly the
incredible growth in the 1960s of higher education contributed to the emergence
and then prominence of college and university archivists in the Society. One
survey reflected that, by 1980, employees of colleges and universities constituted
nearly 40 percent of the membership.7
The sharp increase in women in the field may be accounted for by an increasing
number of new members entering the profession from a library science, rather
than a history background. Women are overwhelmingly represented in librarianship.8
More women than men are graduating from college, further increasing the pool
of potential female archivists.
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