Letter: Marconi sale dismays world scholars

Sir: The disposal of the early archives of the Marconi company ("Marconi auction signals end of historic museum collection", 10 February) would be an act of vandalism.

The value of any archive of papers accumulated in the course of business depends on keeping it together: as a whole it can tell us vastly more than its parts individually, and in this case the proposal to sell it in a thousand lots means that much would vanish entirely from sight.

Happily it is not too late to work out a more enlightened strategy that would keep together not only the papers but also the associated objects - the whole is a collection of immense historical and scientific importance.

It seems that little has been done to explore possible means of keeping it together in this country. However, its export to a caring institution abroad would be infinitely preferable to its dispersal.

Professor P D A HARVEY

Chairman, British Records Association

Durham