As an archivist, Emma Prince often finds herself in dusty storage rooms in museums and sometimes in moldy attics.

She and her almost entirely female team of genealogists and historians build archives for museums, schools and other organizations through their St. Louis-based company. residue.

Through her work organizing catalogs and tracking down lost ancestors, Prince also challenges common notions about who does this kind of research.

“I think people picture old men in tweed jackets,” Prince said. “That’s definitely not our people. (It’s) kind of fun to go to the meetings, be a little more modern and kind of move the profession forward.”

Since founding Backlog in 2021, Prince’s clients have included the City Museum, the Walt Disney Hometown Museum, and St. Louis University High. Backlog historians also connect with people virtually by Webinars about archiving digital works or decrypting old documents. Prince said the company’s specialized services often come into play when individuals are stuck.

“We do a lot of ‘wall research,’ like, ‘Hi, my family is from St. Louis, (and) we can’t connect to this other generation. Can you help us?’ So archival work is more about organizing things, and genealogy work is sometimes about researching with those things.”

To learn more about the retrospective and forward-looking nature of Emma Prince’s archival work and how detective skills are part of her process, listen to the full St. Louis on the radio Conversation about Apple Podcast, Spotify And YouTubeor click the play button below.

“St. Louis on the radio” tells the stories of St. Louis and the people who live, work and create in our region. The show is produced by Ulaa Kuziez, Miya Norfleet, Emily Woodbury, Danny Wicentowski, Elaine Cha And Alex HeuerThe sound engineer is Aaron Doerr.