Water Resource Collections and Archives

Goals

To collect, preserve, and make available current and historic water resources research and information specific to California and the Western states, as well as nationally and internationally.

To develop and maintain a collaborative statewide network encompassing the resources of the WRCA and the Water Resources Institute (WRI) to effectively enhance water research and support the academic program needs of faculty, staff and students within the University of California and the California State University systems.

To foster development of collaborative opportunities and partnerships that will engender broad information access via the network to public agencies, private sector organizations, and the people of the State engaged in research to support California’s water management and planning needs.

History

In January 2011, the Water Resources Collections and Archives (WRCA) was relocated from the UC Berkeley campus to the University of California, Riverside (UCR) campus in collaboration with the California State University, San Bernardino (CSUSB) campus. The two universities will jointly manage WRCA’s collections in order to build a state-wide network to promote and provide access to water-related research. The network will increase support for the water research agendas of UC, CSU, and external clientele.

WRCA was established in 1958 as part of the University of California's Water Resources Center. The Center was founded in 1957 when the California Legislature passed a Senate Bill authorizing funds to the University of California. The Center was established to function as a University-wide organized research unit dealing with California’s water resources issues. In 1958, WRCA (then known as the Water Resources Center Archives) was established as part of the Center’s research mission. WRCA was designed as both a library and archives with a mission to preserve and make accessible unique technical information about all aspects of water in the West, nationally and internationally.

Gerry Giefer, the first librarian, was hired in 1959 and served as director until 1991. In the early years, Mr. Giefer traveled the state visiting engineering firms, water districts, federal, state and local agencies, consultants and individuals to explain WRCA’s mission. Unique technical reports started to arrive along with unpublished papers of renowned hydrologists, engineers and public officials who had worked throughout the West. In recent decades, the reports of non-governmental organizations have been added along with pertinent information about economics and public policy.

Today, the collection consists of more than 200,000 technical reports, 1,500 specialized newsletters, over 5,000 archival maps and hundreds of videos. In addition, WRCA manages over 200 archival collections, and has over 45,000 historic photographs and aerial photographs that document the history of water development in the West.

WRCA Article on Wikipedia