Natasha Smith
Head, Digital Publishing Group
Carolina Digital Library and Archives
University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
Richard Szary
Director, Louis Round Wilson Library
and Associate University Librarian for Special Collections
University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
Scott Eldredge
Digital Initiatives Program Manager
Brigham Young University
Spatial and Temporal History of North Carolina: Using GIS Technology in Digital Library Collections (Smith & Szary)
Carolina Digital Library and Archives (CDLA) and Documenting the American South (DocSouth) are a digital library laboratory that creates, develops, and maintains online digital collections regarding the history of the American South drawn primarily from the outstanding archival holdings of the University of North Carolina (UNC) library. Our recent experimental work with GIS technology helps with better understanding about how the use of digital technologies changes the way we do research in humanities. In this historiographic experiment, collaborators endeavor to use digital technologies in a variety of innovative ways to collect, organize, and display data and materials that illuminate temporal and spatial unfolding of historic events.
The wide array of issues (digitizing and geo-referencing of Sanborn and other historic maps; use of Google’s open-source map API for zooming and hotspot addition; layering and geo-tagging scholarly content) will be presented based on several completed and in progress collections built in close collaboration with UNC scholars: “Going to the Show” documents and illuminates the experience of movies and movie-going in North Carolina between the introduction of projected motion pictures (1896) and the end of the silent film era (1930). “North Carolina Maps” is a comprehensive, online collection of historic maps of the Tar Heel State, with options to view selected maps as Historic Overlay Maps, layered directly on top of current road maps or satellite images. “Main Street, Carolina” (private funding and NEH SUG) is a unique map-based digital history resource and framework that will allow a wide range of local organizations to preserve, document, interpret, display, and share the history of their downtowns. “Driving through Time: The Digital Blue Ridge Parkway in North Carolina” will present an innovative visually and spatially based model for illustrating North Carolina’s key role in creating the Parkway, representing the twentieth-century history of a seventeen-county section of the North Carolina mountains, and for understanding crucial elements of the development of the American National Park system.
http://cdla.unc.edu/index.html
http://www.lib.unc.edu/dc/ncmaps/
Process and Application for Geocoding and Presenting Digital Resources in an Academic Environment (Eldredge)
This project, based at Brigham Young University, focuses on processes and an application for locating and viewing digital objects from the institution’s CONTENTdm collections. The application, currently named MappifY, geographically arranges a variety of items from the digital collections including photographs, historical maps, and travel diaries. The photographs and diary pages are accurately pinpointed on Google™ maps and are found by navigating the map, browsing by geographical location or chronological order, or by performing simple keyword searches based on harvested metadata. Historical maps are overlaid on top of their corresponding locations in Google™ maps. This presentation will demonstrate the MappifY application, outline the process for integrating digital objects, review the lessons learned, and highlight a range of philosophical issues arising from the process.