i used to work in the county archives. archives can be more about now than yesterday in that they can directly help someone do family history (aka genealogy). not only is the information invaluable, for example veterans’ records, maps, census records, etc. but just knowing that the document, map, book, before you, that you are touching, may be the same book, document, map that your ancestor touched, stood before (think of ellis island) decades or centuries ago. that brings the past to the present in a way that microfilming or google does not. the archives are literally living history.