To house the history section, the City Council bought and restored the Casa de l’Ardiaca, which in 1922 opened its doors as home of the new Historical Archives of the City, headed by Duran i Sanpere himself. We are commemorating these one hundred years in the life of the centre with a dossier.
One century of city memory
The country’s archives were just as or even more vulnerable to the events of war than were human lives at the begining of the Spanish Civil War. Many were destroyed, particularly if they were of a religious or bourgeois nature and in the event that paper pulp was required for the printing of newspapers.
Duran i Sanpere left a written testimony of the operation, whose reading allows us to grasp the enormous dimensions of his work.
The new archive facility will become a first-rate civic and cultural information centre, with the development of a city-wide programme of activities and close working relationships with neighbourhood study centres and workshops.
Alongside the Historical Archive of Barcelona (AHCB), civil society organisations have also done invaluable work to preserve the historical memory of the city.