Recording historians

One of the things that surprised me until ten or so years ago was the record of history departments and universities in ensuring that proper collections were made of the work of historians. Admittedly, plenty of collections of correspondence survive but there was much less material available in the form of audio recordings or film or video evidence. This always struck me as strange. I was reminded of this issue last week when I found a long forgotten letter from Hugh Trevor-Roper in 1967 in a file dealing with the affairs of the Providence Island Company in the years between 1629 and 1641. (How it had got there is still a puzzle.) It had some characteristically perceptive comments to make on the Parliamentary politics of the 1640s and some observations on how he thought John Pym's career might have evolved had he lived beyond late-1643. His ability to suggest new ideas to explore was unrivalled and what made him so stimulating a supervisor. It also differentiated him from some of the other leading historians in Oxford and elsewhere at that time. I am still grateful and have ensured that his letter has reached the Dacre archive in the library of Christ Church College, Oxford.