I wrote in November alerting readers to the Scottish Political Archive at the University of Stirling.  If you can’t be bother going looking at that link, don’t worry – I’m going to say most of the same stuff again here!  But it is timely – as you will see in a moment.

Anyway, once again, I’m trying to advertise it.  It’s kind of a service for political junkies (the kind of people who, say, read political blogs…) to show the evolution of Scottish politics through media, photography and campaigning over the last 60 or 70 years.  So use it – go and have a look through some of the photographs, look for your favourite politicians, keep an eye out on Facebook for updates to the site as well.

You can see the photographs on Flickr here or “like” the Scottish Political Archive on Facebook here (Facebook login required).  Alternatively, the Scottish Political Archive’s photo blog is here, which carries the same material in a slightly different format.

But I’m also looking for some material – but its not anything you wouldn’t perhaps already be doing.

The project that the Scottish Political Archive is currently working on is, rather unsurprisingly, the 2011 Scottish Parliamentary election.  As you can see from their Flickr album, they already have plenty of material.

What they are looking for is photographs of politicians at campaign stops or conferences (and of field posters, A-boards, polling stations on election day, the count itself… you get the idea) and election literature (leaflets, posters, newspapers, election addresses etc).  I suspect most activists are holding onto this kind of stuff, or taking photos to share on Facebook or Twitter, or other social networking sites… if so, they’d like you to get in touch!

The Scottish Political Archive would be delighted to take it, scan it, archive it online – and return it to you (unless you want rid of it!).  Alternatively, they are keen to take digital versions of stuff – so if you have something which you can easily scan, or photographs you wouldn’t mind archived, you can email them at scottishpoliticalarchive@stir.ac.uk.  If you have stuff you want to post to them, the address for that would be Scottish Political Archive, University of Stirling, Stirling, FK9 4LA.

You can probably tell from the Flickr pages that I’ve been giving them every election-related note that has come through my door in Edinburgh Central.  I’ve also gotten parents (and parents-in-law) to send on stuff from both Moray and Aberdeenshire East, not to mention my Gran (in Stirling) and a friend in Cunninghame South doing the same.

Anyway, if you can help, please do.  After the election is fine – since activists presumably don’t have a lot of time on their hands at the moment – but like I say, if you have stuff, they’d be delighted to hear from you.  Just let them know where the picture is from, a rough date and they can do the rest.

Thanks again all – and enjoy the old photographs of some of your favourite politicians looking slightly different from their 2011 selves!