Acquisition of Microfilm Reader/Printer/Scanner

The Lyon County Historical Society and the Prairieland Genealogical Society wanted a system that was easy to use for staff, volunteers, and museum visitors. The ST ViewScan III System has achieved the easy to use expectation. It is easy to show people how to operate it, print from it, email from it, and so forth. The most received compliment of the system is the size of the monitor that came with it.

The microfilm system was installed at the end of January, 2015. We had an open house for the Prairieland Genealogical Society in April, 2015. From April, 2015 to December, 2015, we have been keeping track of staff and volunteer hours using the microfilm system and visitors' use of the microfilm system. Our goal for staff and volunteer use was set at 30 hours a month. On average, the use came out to be around 22 hours a month. Our goal for visitors' use of the microfilm reader was 20 hours a month. On average, the use by visitors was only around 5 hours a month.

One of our initiatives of acquiring the microfilm system was for visitors to use the system for their own research. We feel we need to market/advertise by getting the word out more that we have the microfilm reader system in our research center and that it is available for public use. Overall, the microfilm system has been a great asset for the Lyon County Museum for research requests and research for exhibits.