Pennsylvania's Historical & Museum Commission (PHMC) is looking to the future with the completion of its new state archives building.

 
Today, the commission celebrated the building's grand opening with a ribbon cutting. The new facility will house over 250 million archive items. Temperature and humidity controls, improved organization, and public spaces for citizens to access archives in comfort are some new improvements.
 
It boasts 34 miles of shelving stacked into the halls and rooms, which are only half full. The archives should have space to store the next hundred years of history, especially as more items are digitized.
 
Construction started in June of 2020, and by project end the cost equaled $75 million. Department of General Services Secretary Reggie McNeil said roughly 30% of that went to the small business community.
 
When asked how a new archives building in Harrisburg benefited citizens in the farther corners of the state, Governor Josh Shapiro pointed to improved online services made possible by the new facilities.
 
"There are so many more tools for people to experience this awesomeness from home, or from their classroom, or their college, or wherever they are," said Shapiro. "By making it more accessible, it's not just more accessible for people who walk in the front door here. It's more accessible for people who are experiencing this online."
 
Andrea Lowery, PHMC Executive Director, shared more specifics.
 
"We do see several thousand people a year at the state archives, but we serve 4-6 million visitors online each year," said Lowery.. "There are several rooms upstairs we are dedicating completely to that process of digitizing records."
 
The building officially opens to the public on Wednesday, December 13th.