Handling of the glass negatives and lantern slides requires the assistance of an
archivist. Access to the nitrate and safety film negatives is restricted; researchers must
use digital access copies. There are no other access restrictions on the materials, and
the collection is open to all members of the public in accordance with state law.
The researcher assumes full responsibility for conforming with the laws of libel,
privacy, and copyright which may be involved in the use of this collection (Wisconsin
Statutes 19.21-19.39).
The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee acquired the collection in January 1979 through the
assistance of Polanki, the Polish Women's Club of Milwaukee; and Roman Kwasniewski's
daughter, Adele, and her husband, John Kaczmarowski (unnumbered accession). Representative
Walter Kunicki and Senator John Plewa secured state funding for processing the collection.
The collection was formally opened for research on May 3, 1991 during a program at the
Golda Meir Library.
Barbara Nelson donated additional negatives, prints, and an accounting ledger to the
Archives in December 2007 (accession 2007-027).
William C. Mona and James P. Kusik led a team of students, including Kevin Corbitt, Linda
Crippen, Michael Keane, Christel Maass, and Bob Mink, who processed the collection at the
Archives between 1989 and 1991. Around 1998 Kathy Koch added assigned job numbers to
prints that did not have an assigned number. Christel Maass finished processing the
documents and revised the finding aid in 2007. Christel Maass added accession 2007-027 to
the collection (as boxes 302-303) and updated the database in April 2008.
From July 2010 through mid-January 2011, Bob Jaeger led a project to prepare the
collection for digitization. Nitrate and safety film negatives were moved to a location
with like materials. Cracked and broken glass negatives were moved to boxes 304-309. Copy
negatives were separated from the collection and placed in the case file. A full report is
in the case file.
In February 2014, Dan Hauck removed 33 poorly developed, nitrate negatives.
