The NASA Glenn Historic Preservation Office has worked with the Ohio State Historic Preservation Office and Glenn History Office to develop strategies, budgets, and work plans to record the history of these facilities. These projects consists of two facets—the documentation and preservation of the facility’s history and the interpretation and dissemination of that information to the public.
The documentation included the collection of documents and audio/visual materials from the Glenn Records holdings, the Glenn History Office archives, retirees, the NASA Technical Reports Server, newspaper databases, and other sources. It also includes the scanning of negatives, conducting interviews with former employees, and performing photographic surveys of the sites prior to their demolition.
The collected information is distilled into a variety of different products that are made available to the public and NASA staff. These have included books, documentary videos, websites, exhibits, interactive media, and Historic American Engineering Reports.
These efforts strive to create a permanent documentary record for the facility, offer lessons learned for the agency, increase public awareness of NASA Glenn contributions to society, and provide a collected body of materials for future researchers.
In accordance with the National Preservation Act, the center has also held community awareness meetings before each demolition. The attendees learn details about the proposed demolitions, the history of the facilities, efforts underway to document the facilities, and the results of the environmental impact studies conducted for the projects. The meetings give the attendees the opportunity to ask questions and voice any opposition to the projects.
