Regional Digitization
SELCO cooperated with the Minnesota Historical Society (MHS) to integrate a regional digitization project incorporating established standards and protocols MHS used to digitize newspapers for the Library of Congress website Chronicling Americaas part of the National Digital Newspaper Program (NDNP). Based on the investigation and research undertaken during FY2010 by the Legacy Digitization Committee, SELCO worked closely with libraries in the region to inventory local newspapers which would benefit from digitization. Based on the SELCO Legacy Digitization Committee's recommendation, the order of digitizing the public domain newspaper content will be based on the highest to smallest county census data from 1900. Newspapers from Freeborn and Wabasha counties became the focus of the project. The newspapers digitized include Freeborn County Standard from 1860–1922; The Freeborn County Eagle from 1858–1860; Southern Minnesota Star from 1857–1858; Wabasha County Herald from 1875–1922. On April 26, 2012, to celebrate National Preservation Week, a workshop entitled Pass It On: Celebrate Preservation Week Workshopwas held at SELCO and focused on preservation of physical and digital objects and funding opportunities for digitization projects. Presentations included identifying and preserving family photographs by Grace Keir from the Blue Earth County Historical Society, information about the Minnesota Digital Library, including digital preservation efforts and grant opportunities by Marian Rengel, and Minnesota Historical Society grant opportunities by Joe Hoover and David Grabitske. In addition to inviting all SELCO and SELS member libraries, a special invitation was extended to historical societies in the SELCO/SELS region who are not SELS members.
Expand the diversity of southeastern Minnesota digital resources through collaborations with local libraries, community organizations, Minitex, the Minnesota Digital Library and the Minnesota Historical Society. Facilitate the creation of new local history displays, exhibits, or conversations. SELCO will work with libraries, historical societies, and other local organizations to document these potential new uses of the digitized newspapers. SELCO will work with libraries, historical societies, and other local organizations to seek additional Legacy funds to create educational programs or curriculum using the digitized newspapers. Create a treasury of long-sought or unexpected information from digitizing newspapers from Southeastern Minnesota. To gauge the value of the digitized collection, SELCO will survey the members of the community with newspapers included in the digitized collection. In addition, anecdotes and stories will be collected from users of the digitized collection.
Eleven attendees of the Pass It On: Celebrate Preservation Week Workshopcompleted a short evaluation of the workshop. In addition to the evaluation, attendees were asked aloud if they felt that the workshop was worthwhile and nearly everyone said "yes." Some of the comments from the evaluation reflected what the group expressed aloud:“I liked the variety of speakers/topics and how they were related/built on each other yet had different perspectives.” “Please continue this program next year!” “Each segment was very well explained.” Additionally, within the short evaluation, attendees identified which tips they might be able to use to assist patrons in the future: information on how to identify date ranges for unknown photographs in their collection, careful inventorying of collection to help identify priorities for digitizing projects, and information shared by the Minnesota Digital Library and Minnesota Historical Society regarding grant opportunities. Digitized Newspapers: Freeborn County (30,000 pages) -- Freeborn County Standard (1860 – 1922); The Freeborn County Eagle (1858 – 1860); Southern Minnesota Star (1857 – 1858); Wabasha County (10,000 pages) -- Wabasha County Herald (1875 – 1922) Pass It On: Celebrate Preservation Week Workshop -- Fourteen attendees participated in this first-time workshop including two staff members from SELCO member libraries (public libraries); one staff member from a SELS member library (historical society); two SELCO staff members; and nine staff members from non-SELS member libraries (historical societies).
SELCO, Minnesota Historical Society, Minnesota Digital Library, Blue Earth County Historical Society