Marchant 3M Tape Archiving Project

A vintage reel to reel archiving project: In 2024 a dear family friend passed away. Her father - Reynolds Marchant - spent decades working for 3M in the magnetic audio tape division from the 1930s to the early 1970s. He left her hundreds of tapes dated from the 1940s through the 1960s. One of his roles in the audio tape division was to test out the tape and devices in various settings. I have the honor of being the caretaker of these recordings to help uncover her family history. I also have some recordings from her late husband of music and theater performances in the 1970s in Detroit, Michigan and opera from the 1980s and early 90s.

My intention is to explore these recordings and share them with youtube to help create a record of this body of work + get some help crowdsourcing information where there is little available with the recording.

In honor of Susan Britton, Don Britton, and Reynolds Marchant.