WGF Archivist Hilary Swett takes you inside the Archives.

One of the most professionally satisfying aspects of being an archivist is that I get to meet so many fascinating and accomplished people. Even if I don’t meet them in person, I get to know them though their work when they (or their family) donate to our library and archive. The WGF Archive is home to hundreds of collections donated over the years by writers or their families and these collections teach us so much about the writers behind the words.

When I “process” a collection, I organize script and project files, read business and personal letters, and summarize all of the unique material. I spend a long time with that one person and I recently had the pleasure of getting to know Jean Rouverol Butler. Her family donated her papers to the WGF in 2018 and the work on her collection is now finished. Jean and her husband Hugo were screenwriters who were backlisted in the 1950s. These papers are a reminder of that dark time in American history and show how a family perseveres in the face of adversity.