Headquarters.
We now have 23 people working at AFU with various tasks and projects. Six of our staff are stationed at the main office. This is also the premise for AFU and UFO-Sweden board meetings and where guests are first introduced to the archive, our history and work.
AFU headquarters
AFU headquarters
Digitizing and clippings
Close to our headquarters we have the premise for digitizing, where also some of our staff work with the many and varied clippings collections, UFO, Fortean and paranormal clippings. We have so far digitized 140.000 clippings from the CFI collection (Charles Fort Institute), 27.000 Swedish clippings and many Swedish UFO magazines. Also thousands of letters from correspondence files.
Part of the digitizing premise
Clippings collections
Final storage premise
Some time ago we used this facility for the large CEI (Centro de Estudios Interplanetarios) donation from Barcelona. But now all the books from this collection have been catalogued and incorporated in the main UFO/Fortean library. Today we use most of this facility as a final storage premise.
Final storage premise
Magazines, personal and organizational files
Our magazines collection is growing with leaps and bounds as donations are coming in a steady stream from all over the world. We now have around 50.000 copies of magazines. Personal and organizational files are also growing fast. Ordering these documents is a time consuming enterprise.
Magazine archive
Organizational files
Incoming collections
This premise would give anyone a headache with shelves full of more or less unsorted collections donated to AFU. My collegue Anders Liljegren who often works in this premise has a truly stoic temperament and simply says: Well, you just take one thing at a time. Presently Anders is trying to put in order the very disorganized Flying Saucer Review archive.
Incoming collections
Incoming collections
The Hilary Evans Library
The basic part of this library consists of the enormous and valuable collection donated by Hilary Evans in 2010. Here you will find religion, philosophy, psychology, parapsychology, spiritualism, sects and cults, esoterica and folklore. Recently the shelf capacity has been increased as this library is also growing very fast.
The Hilary Evans Library
The Hilary Evans Library
The Hilary Evans Library
The UFO/Fortean library
This is our oldest library facility housing books on UFOs and Forteana. We try to collect three copies of every book published on these subjects, from all countries, languages and editions.
The UFO/Fortean library
The UFO/Fortean library
Finally we have two premises that actually belong to UFO-Sweden but are administered by the AFU staff. The UFO-Sweden magazines store and shop and close to this premise the UFO-Sweden book store and shop.
UFO-Sweden magazine store and shop
UFO-Sweden book store and shop
While touring the AFU premises today I felt both glad and proud that we after 40+ years have succeeded in building the largest UFO/Fortean archive/library in the world. But I also experienced frustration of not having enough time for all projects that should be implemented. Here are stored such vast quantities of intriguing material and data. Will there in the future be qualified scholars, cultural heretics and intellectual iconoclasts who will benefit from these collections for their research? There are many scientific and religious fundamentalists out there who already have the answers to the existential riddles and questions posed by the data in AFU. Let them read this daily prayer.
