Series B: John Garner and Texas Architecture Survey Field Documentation and Photographic Material, circa 1964-1965 and undated

As Field Director, Garner created 35 mm slides and paper documentation of historical buildings to supplement additional slides created by Professor Alexander and others. All slides were reviewed by the Texas Architecture Survey and were later re-used in architecture lectures. Slides are hand-labeled with the county-city-building number abbreviation system used by Garner and the TAS. Descriptive labels were added later by Visual Resource Collection staff in the School of Architecture, following the bulk purchase of the original slide collection. Slides are stored in metal cabinets and are arranged alphabetically by Texas county. Within each county, slides are grouped by city. There are also a few slides from Mexico. Slides can be examined against information in the building description lists, although there is not perfect accordance between the two.

In his "student research report to Professor Kermacy" (1964) Garner states, Each structure surveyed is field photographed by the Field Director [Garner] as a recording measure ... An index-identification system for the slides was not developed until toward the close of field activities for District 1, when a conclusive system was adopted. The individual code as developed is made up of a series of letters and numbers that indicates the county, town or vicinity, and chronological order of a particular structure. Each county within a given district is accorded a code made up of the initial letter of the county name, written in upper case. Where several counties exhibit identical initial letters, then a second letter, written in lower case, is taken from the county name and added following the initial letter. Each town or vicinity within the county where photographs were made is also coded, again by a combination of initial and second letters, upper and lower case. ... Following the two combined alphabetized codes and separated by a dash mark is an Arabic numeral designating the numerical order of the particular structure photographed. This order, although arbitrary, usually follows the sequence observed in the Field Report, which closely approximates the order in which the structures were viewed in the field and serves only as a numbering sequence. Each transparency is thus coded and so noted on the Building Description List.

After being transferred to the School of Architecture in the late 1970's, the slides were duplicated on request. Red marks indicate slides duplicated for Professor Blake Alexander, yellow marks indicate duplicates for lecture series, and dark blue represents special requests by faculty. There is also a separate set of slides, with 271 duplicates made for the Amon Carter Museum.

Click to download the TAS slide index spreadsheet. The index details known information for each slide, with descriptions identifying the District, County, City, Building, Street Address, Date of Building, Item Count, View (Exterior, Interior), TAS Building Code, and Archivists' Notes.