Chicopee Public Library adds collections to Digital Commonwealth

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Two of the three collections in the new Chicopee Public Library’s Chicopee Archives Online, 427 records in total, have been harvested into the Digital Commonwealth’s Omeka repository: Chicopee Weekly Journal and Soldiers Record.

Amber Clooney, Electronic Reference Services Librarian at Chicopee Public Library, provided the following information about the archive’s collections and future plans:

Chicopee Archives Online was developed to enhance access to some of the city’s unique historical items. The site was initially developed to host the Soldiers Record, which is a handwritten ledger that contains the personal stories of over 500 local men who served in the Civil War. The stories contained in the Soldiers Record seem to be primarily based on interviews with the soldiers themselves, or based on contemporary records and accounts from friends and relatives if a particular soldier died during the war.

According to an article in New England Magazine from 1898, most of the records were compiled by George Dexter Robinson, who lived in Chicopee after the Civil War, before he became Governor of Massachusetts (Robinson is also famous for being Lizzie Borden’s defense attorney). Transcription of each page is an ongoing volunteer project. There is a full description of the Soldiers Record here: http://www.chicopeepubliclibrary.org/archives/soldiers_record

In addition to the Soldiers Record, the site includes scanned copies of a partial run of the Chicopee Weekly Journal from the mid 1860s; and a year long run of The Olive Leaf from 1849, a literary newspaper for local factory girls.

In near future, we will be adding scans of the local City Directories. The Directories are the most used items in the local history room, and are showing a lot of wear and tear as a result. When the Directories are added to the site, patrons will be directed to use the digital copies so the print copies can be preserved. We also plan to add a photo collection from the 1920s , and we hope to add some items from the collections of the Chicopee Historical Society.

For further questions, contact Amber Clooney at Chicopee Public Library.

April 2013 Newsletter

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All the latest news from the Digital Commonwealth of Massachusetts!

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Updates for April, 2013

The annual conference is taking place May 1! Don’t forget to register!
ConfLogoDC2013 Featured at this year’s conference is the Keynote presentation by Amy Rudersdorf, Assistant Director for Content for the Digital Public  Library of America.

 Amy’s talk will provide an introduction to DPLA and its mission and goals and make a case for opening up our nation’s library, archives, and  museum data to the world. We should also hear about how the DPLA intend to use Digital Commonwealth content in their plans.

 Besides Amy, the conference will also feature a second Keynote by Butch Lazorchak, Digital Archivist from the Library of Congress. Butch  will talk about Digital Stewardship and Digital Storytelling that includes crowdfunding, citizen archiving, personal digital archiving, and  digital mapping.  For anyone who follows the Signal Blog, as all of us should, you are well aware of Butch’s good work.

In addition the conference will offer nine breakout sessions covering digital collection preparation, continuing education opportunities,  digitizing newspapers, dealing with vendors, and two sessions introducing the new BPL repository for its first public debut display! (explained in more detail below)

For a full list and descriptions of the all the conference events including the nine breakout sessions please visit the Digital Commonwealth member’s site @ http://members.digitalcommonwealth.org.  Also available in this PDF document.

New BPL Repository to Debut at Digital Commonwealth Conference May 1

The late afternoon breakout session, “Digital Commonwealth 2.0: Creating Online Digital Collections with the Redesigned Repository System,” will provide the first full public introduction to the new Digital Commonwealth repository. The presentation will be provided by the repository’s two developers, Steven Anderson and Eben English.
An earlier afternoon session, “Digital Commonwealth 2.0 and Metadata: Make Morph, Manipulate, Master,” will demonstrate the process of creating, editing, and uploading descriptive records using the new repository system.
For the latest update on the development schedule, check out this blog post from Eben.

Digital Public Library of America harvests 20,400 records from Digital Commonwealth 

For it’s Initial Release on April 18, the DPLA gathered content from seven partner repositories, one of which was the Digital Commonwealth. 20,400 records were harvested from the Digital Commonwealth’s Omeka repository by the DPLA. That accounts for over 90% of the content available. The DPLA’s public launch will be celebrated at a two-day event at the Boston Public Library on April 18 and 19.  

Digital Commonwealth Images Featured in the DPLA  Public Release Promotion
Several images from the Digital Commonwealth will be highlighted in special exhibits, displays, and promotions for the upcoming Digital Public Library of America public release. Items from Watertown, Southbridge, and Williamsburg Public Libraries will be included in a special DPLA exhibit celebrating National Library Month. And if you are driving into Boston on rt. 90, be sure to look up at the WGBH digital mural for a massive display of selected images from Digital Commonwealth members! 
 
2012 Digitization Training Sessions Wrap-up Report
During 2012, Digital Commonwealth of Massachusetts offered 8 digitization training sessions for staff from libraries, archives, and cultural institutions who were interested in issues relating to the creation and enhancement of digital collections. A recent LSTA grant awarded to the Boston Public Library (BPL) by the Massachusetts Board of Library Commissioners (MBLC) allowed the Digital Commonwealth to work with staff of the Northeast Document Conservation Center (NEDCC) on the training sessions. The topics covered in the sessions included digital project planning, selecting and preparing materials for digitization, and file format and metadata issues. Read more on the Digital Commonwealth blog.


Free Workshop: Developing Lesson Plans with Digital Content from Digital Commonwealth
Are you a teacher (4th to 12th grade) who is interested in developing lesson plans featuring digital content? Here is an opportunity for a FREE workshop offered by Digital Commonwealth at Framingham State University on June 24, 2013. Full details are available in this blog post and registration is available at http://members.digitalcommonwealth.org/events.
Sincerely, Digital Commonwealth
Copyright © 2013 Digital Commonwealth. All rights reserved.
Contact email: digitalcommonwealth@gmail.com

Latest Update on the new Digital Commonwealth Repository developments at the BPL

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Here is the latest update from Eben English, Web Services Developer at the BPL, who is helping develop the new Fedora/Hydra repository for the Digital Commonwealth:

The initial development phase for the new digital object management system to store and provide access to digital collections from Digital Commonwealth members is currently underway and will soon be complete. Items and metadata from the existing DSpace repository (http://repository.digitalcommonwealth.org) have begun to be migrated into the new system, and functionality for the item ingest forms as well as the end-user search interface is in the process of being implemented. It is anticipated that all basic objects from the DSpace repository will be ingested by the end of April, and support for (and ingest of) more complex digital objects (items with multiple images, books, oral histories, etc.) will be added by the end of May.

The new repository will be debuted at the Digital Commonwealth annual conference on May 1 – the 3:00 breakout session, “Digital Commonwealth 2.0: Creating Online Digital Collections with the Redesigned Repository System,” includes a full demonstration of the application, while a related session at 1:45, “Digital Commonwealth 2.0 and Metadata,” will demonstrate how to create metadata for digital objects using the new system.

For a full schedule of the conference and program descriptions, view this PDF document.