Digital Collections Inventory Report

By Patricia A. McClung
February 1996

A Linear version of this text, suitable for printing is available (128 Kilobytes)

Introduction: Context; CPA/CLR Inventory; The Data; Finding out about Digitized Collections

Preliminary Results of the CPA/CLR Digital Collections Inventory

conducted by
Patricia A. McClung
August 1995
(Updated, December 1995)

For discussion purposes, and in an attempt to find coherence in what is still a very chaotic and fluid information environment, the survey results are grouped as follows:

I. Very large projects featuring national literature, history, and/or politics
II. Examples of broad subject areas with significant activity
(e.g. law; literature, history, and culture; and science and technology)
III. Examples of special, archival, and manuscript collections
IV. Infrastructure projects and “List of Lists”

Admittedly, these categories are arbitrary. Several other groupings could have been made (and, in fact, were before settling on these). The important thing was to find a logical framework, arbitrary or not, to give a sense of the types and scale of activities that are increasingly available to scholars at all levels and in all fields.

In general, the focus is on the conversion of library collections. Occasionally, commercial projects are mentioned when their content features existing library collections. CD-ROM publications and videodisk projects were not included. Examples of other types of initiatives–e.g. electronic text and image database projects–are mentioned in a few instances, in order to highlight the range of activity underway. Projects are listed only once, even if they might logically fit under several headings.

The report concludes with a section that describes several significant projects aimed at defining and improving the existing infrastructure for on line access to information. It also mentions some noteworthy Websites that lead to digital collections online. The are intended to be illustrative of the hundreds of similar sources increasingly available on the Internet.

I. Very Large Projects Featuring National Literature, History, and/or Politics

National Digital Library Project (The Library of Congress)

Bibliotheque Nationale de France Mass Digitization Project

ARTFL: A Textual Database of French Literature, Philosophy, Arts, Sciences, 15th-20th Centuries

Australian Cooperative Digitisation Project (1840-45)

Making of America (Cornell University and the University of Michigan)

Archivo General de Indias, Seville, Spain

II. Examples of Broad Subject Areas with Significant Activity

LAW: The law field has a long history of networked access to key resources, pioneered by the Westlaw and Lexis services. A number of law libraries have formed a Consortium for Optical Imaging in order to promote and coordinate scanning activities.¹⁰; International Relations Project: Chicago-Kent School of Law; Project Janus: Columbia University Law Library; Project DIANA: University of Cincinnati College of Law; United States Patent Office Project; Patent Express Jukebox; Studies in Scarlet: Research Libraries Group
LATIN AMERICAN and CARIBBEAN STUDIES: Brazilian Government Documents Project: Center for Research Libraries/Latin American Microfilm Project (LAMP); Caribbean Newspaper Project: University of Florida
CLASSICAL STUDIES: Ancient Near East and Classics Material: University of Chicago; Papyrus Archives: Duke University
LITERATURE, HISTORY, and CULTURE: Maine Folklife Center: University of Maine, Fogler Library; Melchior Center for Recent History: University of the Virgin Islands; Project Open Book: Yale University; Burney Collection Microfilm Digitisation: British Library; American Memory: Library of Congress; Steel Worker’s Organizing Committee (SWOC) Collection: Penn State; Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh Photographic Database; Heinz Electronic-Library Interactive Online System (HELIOS); Paul Laurence Dunbar: Wright State University; Electronic Beowulf: British Library; Bureau of American Ethnology Reports on Studies of Native Americans:; The Andre Sakharov Papers: Brandeis University
SCIENCE and TECHNOLOGY: CLASS Project: Cornell University; Networked Computer Science Technical Reports: Cornell University; U. S. Naval Research Laboratory Technical Reports: Ruth H. Hooker Library; DAISY (Dissertations Available on Internet Systems); Oppenheimer Papers: Library of Congress; The Pauling Collection: Oregon State University; Louis Agassiz Fuertes Papers: Cornell University
Agriculture: National Agricultural Library (NAL) Projects; National Agricultural Library (USDA), Special Collections Program; Pennsylvania Agricultural County Agent Reports Collection: Penn State University; Core Literature of the Agricultural Sciences, 1860-1950: Cornell University

III. Examples of Special, Archival, and Manuscript Collections

Projects that involve scanning of photographic or other pictorial materials are by far the most common. There are probably thousands of them. Kodak Photo CD and other scanning systems have enabled libraries, archives, and museums to experiment with the technology for improving access to these collections. Below is a sampling of the types of image scanning projects that are proliferating. There are still some major technical and legal hurdles in the way of large scale conversion and networked sharing of images. Until these issues are resolved, most of these projects are restricted to local use; however, some are designed to forge solutions to these problems. (See also the listings under Infrastructure Projects.)

Performing Arts Collection: University of Florida

Pacific Collection: University of Hawaii

Israeli Posters: Harvard University Library

Digital Image Access Project: Research Libraries Group

University of Georgia Rare Books and Manuscripts

The Huntington Library

Wright Brothers Photographs: Wright State University

Basel (Switzerland) Mission Archive

Project Delphi: California State University, Long Beach and San Jose State University

California Heritage Digital Access Project: University of Calffornia at Berkeley

Project Utopia: Cornell University

IV. Infrastructure Projects and “List of Lists”

There are a number of significant projects underway–some quite ambitious and well funded–to either resolve issues, establish standards, or build tools that will enhance the effectiveness of an international on line information infrastructure. Noteworthy among these are:

RLG/CPA Task Force on Digital Archiving; Online Books Evaluation Project: Columbia University; Integrated Library Multimedia System Project: New York University; Museum Educational Site Licensing Project (MESL): Geuy Art History; Encoded Archival Description (EAD) Project: University of California at Berkeley; National Digital Library Federation: Commission on Preservation; National Science Foundation; Cultural Heritage Information Online (CHIO): Consortium for the Interchange of Museum Information (CIMO)
Journal Conversion and Access: JSTOR: The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation (Hosted by the University of Michigan) Internet Library of Early Journals: Universities of Oxford, Manchester, Birmingham, and Leeds TULIP Prototype Digital Library: IBM and ISI
List of Lists: Selected World Wide Web Internet Addresses for Other Sources of Information about Digital Collections: Clearinghouse of Image Data bases; EJournal SiteGuide: a MetaSource
Examples of Online Resource Guides Accessible Via the Internet: There are innumerable Web-based resource guides available on the Internet. Most refer to at least some digitized collections. A few examples are included to illustrate the kinds of tools that students and scholars already have at their disposal. Any online guide to digital collections should link to sources such as these discipline-based ones.; Latin American Studies:; Medieval Studies:; Art:; Literature and Literary Studies:

Electronic Text Archives:

ALEX: A Catalog of Electronic Texts on the Internet:

Electronic Text Center: University of Virginia:

Center for Electronic Texts in the Humanities:

Carnegie Mellon Online Books:

APPENDICES

Appendix I
ALA Survey of Imaging Projects

Introduction

SURVEY OF IMAGING PROJECTS, AMERICAN LIBRARY ASSOCIATION, RLNS

Electronic Imaging Technologies Committee, Compiled May 1994 [Includes responses to an informal survey conducted by the RLMS Electronic Imaging Technologies Committee in March 1993 and May 1994]