Showing posts with label ingestion. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ingestion. Show all posts

Tuesday, December 18, 2018

MWDL's Year in Review!



What a year it's been! We started the year off big in January by welcoming Teresa K. Hebron as our fantastic new Metadata Librarian. Over the next several months we bade farewell to Avalon Snell and Jon Wiggins, and said hello to Arash Tadjiki and Keegan Dohm who became the new Web Software Developer and Metadata Assistant. We have formed taskforces, hosted conferences, traveled the world, seen usage globally, transferred to the new website, welcomed new members, and ingested thousands and thousands of new records.

On that last note, we are proud to announce...


MWDL Went Platinum this Year! 


That’s right, we crossed the 1 million record threshold. With the recent completion of DPLA's November harvest, we also have a 1 million-plus item representation in DPLA as well! 


The illustrious platinum record fictitiously awarded to MWDL after reaching 1 million records.

We’d like to thank our institutional members for their strong support and diverse content, and all our new and old team members who have striven to make Mountain West Digital Library the best it could be. We'd also like to give a special shout-out to all the people using MWDL! Check out their most popular searches for 2018 in the wordcloud below.


This wordcloud shows the top 25 search terms on mwdl.org during 2018.

With so much new content (and exciting outreach programs in the works), the 2019 wordcloud may take on a totally different shape.


We had a huge meeting over the internet!


Just last week, on Dec 14th, we held the MWDL Winter Hubs meeting. The meeting minutes are located here. Some highlights include info on the recent DPLA updates and Changes, lightning quick institutional updates, and status updates from Bulk Digitization (Specifications and metadata), Outreach, MAP revision, and Digital Preservation taskforces. For those interested, a Zoom recording is available as well.  

And a real-world conference in July!


J. Willard Marriott Library at University of Utah hosted the MWDL Summer Conference on July 10-11. It was wonderful seeing so many people from members and the general community for two packed days of presentations, updates, bingo, library tours and networking. 

In case you weren't able to join us, the proceedings will be online soon and we look forward to seeing you at the next meeting!


Shiny new promotional materials!


The front (left) and back (right) of MWDL's newest postcard.


Keegan Dohm, our Metadata Assistant, recently designed a striking new postcard for our promotional materials. With the new design and added features like space for writing, we think it turned out great! Of course, we've also added the new features to the backs of our old post cards. Feel free to let us know what you think and if you want to use this or other media, you can find them at the bottom of our get involved page.


Starting Off 2019 in Style!


Our student employees Arash Tadjiki and Keegan Dohm are working to set up a new MWDL Blog and Publishing site to be unveiled in 2019. The publishing portion of the site will host the publications presented at this year's summer conference and the blog section will replace this one. So get ready for a sleeker blog site with a totally new slate of posts and outreach!

Tuesday, April 3, 2018

22 New Collections from the Utah State Archives!


The Mountain West team is happy to say that we have just harvested quite a few new collections from the Utah State Archives. Some of the highlights include:

This collection contains two books compiled by the school district to document and commemorate the erection of the School Children's Constitution and Flag Monument which was funded in part through donations made by school children with local children acting as models for the sculpture. Sealed within the sculpture is a list of every child from every school in the city in 1936 along with what they wanted to be when they grew up.

School Children's Flag Pole and Constitution Monument Located at the City and County Building



These records include communications of all sorts pertaining to investigations surrounding radioactive fallout from the Nevada Test Site and its contributing role in the heavy losses of sheep and other livestock in 1953 among herds that were wintered in areas downwind of the site. This collection is comprised of materials from the Utah Department of Health for which the Utah State Archives is a custodian. 

Photo of horses with beta burns in a dotted pattern across their backs.




This collection contains a series of drawings and blueprints detailing the building plans for the Utah State Capitol Building.

A detailed diagram of a metal door mechanism in the Utah Capitol Building.





Also among the collections we've added from the Utah State Archives are a number related to genealogy, criminal data from Utah courts, and the construction of the Utah State Capitol Building.


Collections Related to Genealogy:


The following collections may be of note for those interested in family history and genealogy research. Perhaps most notable is the Utah Soundex Birth Certificate index which contains a host of useful information in the form of phonetic indices compiled by the Works Projects Administration in the 1930s.

Weber County (Utah) Court Clerk 1850 Census Population Schedule
Second District Court Weber County Index to Civil Actions


The Capitol Commission Collections:


The records in these collections form a comprehensive documentation of the commissioning of the Utah Capitol Building.  Included is a collection of renderings from the original competition to design the capitol building, photographs of the building's construction (including a commemorative photo album produced by Shipler Commercial Photographers of Salt Lake City), blueprints, meeting minutes, as well as press and public relations materials.

Capitol Commission Capitol Design Competition Renderings




Thank you to Utah State Archives for their new additions!

Thursday, March 29, 2018

New Collections from Boise State University



We recently added several great collections from Boise State University!
From historic music manuscripts to photos from 1950s Kabul, here are some of the highlights:


Peter Beemer Music Manuscript
In the 1860s Pete Beemer created handwritten musical scores of songs performed by him and his band in the mining camp of Warren, Idaho. This collection contains a digitization of his manuscript along with video of modern performances of several songs.

Vivian and Phil Williams performing the intro to a traditional square dancing tune.



Doc Roach Fire Collection
The Doc Roach Fire Collection contains images captured by Doc Roach working with the Boise Fire Department. Doc worked with BFD from the time before they switched to motorized equipment through to introduction of gasoline powered pump trucks.


This collection contains slides from Lyman D. Wilbur's travels in Afghanistan from 1958-59. Lyman D. Wilbur worked as a prominent engineer with Morrison-Knudsen company throughout the 20th century.

A street scene in Kabul, Afghanistan. Horses pull two-wheeled carriages, or tangas, along a road lined with markets.

Other recently added collections from Boise State:










Edward F. Rhodenbaugh

A big thank you to Boise State University for the new content!