Donna Eschenbrenner says anyone can be a historian. Her own journey proves the point.

About two years into her master’s degree in English literature she realized that her real interest was history. While it was too late to switch her degree, Eschenbrenner knew then that she wanted to turn her passion for history into a career.

In 1999 she began volunteering at The History Center in Tompkins County. Just two years later she became the archivist. Now Eschenbrenner’s mission is to share that love of history and discovery with every person who visits The History Center.

“I believe all history is local,” Eschenbrenner said. “You can take national stories and look at them through the local lens and understand your past. I think that’s critical. If we don’t know where we’ve been, we have no idea where we’re going.”

As the Director of Archives and Research Services at The History Center, Eschenbrenner oversees all of the archival collections, manages the research library, and organizes educational programs.

While October is American Archives Month, Eschenbrenner’s work in the archives is year-round. The History Center’s collections include newspapers, scrapbooks, photographs and textiles among other materials that make up the history of Tompkins County.

When the Center is open to the public on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday, Eschenbrenner and her team of volunteers assist visitors with finding the best historical resources for their needs.

“Anyone can be a historian,” Eschenbrenner said. “We have users in there from age 8 to 80. We’ve taught children. I’ve worked with a class of sixth graders. Anybody can love this stuff. As soon as they get close enough, they can love it.”

Most visitors come for genealogy research, an activity Eschenbrenner said has become popular because it connects people with history in an intimate fashion.

“It’s not just some dry subject but it’s family history,” Eschenbrenner said. “It’s your roots.”

People from all across the nation visit The History Center for genealogy purposes. Eschenbrenner said one year there were visitors from 28 different states who all came to The History Center because they had some connection to Tompkins County.

As for the archival collections in the Center, Eschenbrenner said she surprised herself with how much she loved the historic photographs.

“The whole one picture’s worth a thousand words kind of thing,” Eschenbrenner said. “It’s true. Historic photographs are rich documents that teach a lot about the history of a people, a place, a culture. They tell you things you might not necessarily get from documentation.”

The History Center has more than 100,000 photographs in its collections with everything from family to business photographs.

Another one of the main resources is the newspaper collection.

“It’s fragile, it’s delicate, it’s still paper,” Eschenbrenner said.

While many newspaper collections have been microfilmed or digitized recently, The History Center hasn’t had the funding yet to do those processes, Eschenbrenner said.

“You look in and see a fading yellowing newspaper from 1835,” Eschenbrenner. “You see the different fonts, you see the different articles, the different kinds of things that were emphasized then almost 200 years ago. It’s fascinating.”

Eschenbrenner said her favorite part of being an archivist is seeing visitors, especially students, feel a sense connection and surprise as they look through historical documents for the first time.

“We’re not isolated creatures,” Eschenbrenner said. “We’re tied to a long thread of the past and hopefully we’ll be tied to a long thread into the future. And these documents and these things help us remember that.”