Question: Has anyone used Google maps or any other mapping tools?
A lot of what is happening with the pandemic is on Facebook. That’s a challenge for the future archivists! How do you document what you see on Facebook? It’s not a medium that’s downloadable.
- At Somers, a project that was just going to be the High School , and they're talking about how to do a district-wide project on documenting. How can we share that when it’s done? The faculty approached them, looking for something to do.
- Jen suggests not to worry so much about sharing yet; just collect for now.
- A lot of people are creating Google forms for questions and files. Lots of Examples in this Google Doc.
- You can archive items from Facebook via hashtags. Just check facebook briefly -- you can click a hashtag and have it open to a page of people / pages that have used it. It’s not a terribly accurate reflection of what’s going on, people tend to only post positive stories, not everything that’s going on.
- How do we display the information and what will be the students’ expectations?
What are people doing with online historical resources?
- Capturing the moment - we all missed the anniversary of Earth Day. Warwick had a lot of events and digital resources meant to highlight the anniversary. It was possible to share a bit of that message, but it can be a bit of a challenge during the pandemic. http://guides.rcls.org/environment
- Moose E. McMooseface -- a stuffed moose that has become the unofficial mascot (Elting Memorial). One way to promote historical collection. They have been using photos on NYH and badly photoshopped the stuffed moose into photos. Sent an email from the moose. It’s a way to bring some levity and fun into promoting historical resources.
- The moose could be used as an avatar / mascot to help explain what we are going through.
- Elting Memorial Library is on Facebook and Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/eltinglibrary/?hl=en) if you want to take a look at Moose E. and #mooseontheloose
- One library is doing contests, puzzles, videos, and quizzes to engage people on facebook. Every week they try different events. There have also been some handmade prizes given to contest winners. Used some scavenger hunts from DPLA. (Given questions, had to do some research to figure out the correct answer.)
- Any ideas? One intern is in need of some relevant work. It can be a challenge when everything has to be virtual.
- Transcription work - can be useful work to do from home. They can really highlight and benefit the collection.
- Scanning
- Take photos of images, documents and send to student for transcription or other work on the object.
- Mining content areas that haven’t been addressed yet: facebook, other social media, LOC digital, other repositories.
- Somers created a series called “Somers history at Home” on zoom. This is every Sunday at 3 pm. People who have something to say about history share information. This Sunday they are doing a tour of a county farm park, Muscoot Farm.
- A link to the series: https://shsinternadventures.blogspot.com/# Sunday Series (An article about the series: https://www.tapinto.net/towns/somers/sections/community/articles/somers-historical-society-launches-history-at-home)
- Montpelier Museum has a “digital doorway” (essentially a blog). They regularly post images of collections and include some context on everything. https://digitaldoorway.montpelier.org/
- Historic Red Hook is on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter www.facebook.com/historicredhook
- Huguenot Street: taking advantage of social media as a free and easy way to share information. Twice a week (tuesday and thursdays) they are having their collections assistant write social posts. Every Monday, they are doing a storytime and highlighting books that are in the museum shop. (Books are available at a 10% discount.) Also doing instagram stories making recipes from historic cookbooks. They’ve also used some recipes from their archives. Some of the staff have dogs - share these online (very popular on social media!) They have also been creating some exhibitions in Omeka: https://omeka.hrvh.org/exhibits/show/ruthlyndadeyo/
- National Pet Week is May 3-9 and Elting will be highlighting librarians pets! People LOVE animal content on social media
- Times Herald-Record is seeking info on historic homes in Orange County for her “The and Now” series. Here’s link to her piece on the “William A. Lawrence Home - Chester” on the NewsLocker site: https://www.newslocker.com/en-us/crypto/new-newton/william-a-lawrence-home-chester-new-jersey-herald/view/
- Museum Association of New York has been doing Friday afternoon virtual meetings- last week’s was about digital initiatives and may be on their website recorded
- Irvington has been creating a series of (offline) challenges, most aimed at kids and families, over on our instagram. https://www.instagram.com/irvingtonpubliclibrary/
- How do you access your collections remotely?
- External drive (off-site back-up). Was able to access images that way. These drives can be really helpful when you don’t have off-site access set up.
- Google suite - one library has all their images located there. It’s an easy way to share items easily.
- Cloud storage.
- Zack might have some ideas!
- Canva is a great way to generate content. You can also create a team to share things with colleagues. There is a special non-profit version you can apply for.
- Three of the NYH Newburgh contributors have been working on a project with the Urban Archive. Urban Archive is a mapping platform that displays historic images at specific locations. They are up for a webby award! You can vote for them here: https://vote.webbyawards.com/PublicVoting#/2020/apps-mobile-and-voice/apps-mobile-sites-general/art-culture-and-events
- The Newburgh content on Urban Archive are available here: https://www.urbanarchive.org/cities/newburgh
- Newburgh became the "6th" borough in Urban archives - it has been very cool and they grab our content right from HRVH, We are starting to work on tours, etc. Thanks to Jen for all her help and the plug -- Please vote for Urban Archive!!
- Some helpful Facebook groups that focus on using social media for libraries and other cultural institutions. Provides some great ideas for content. Some useful groups:
- Is it easier to convert from print to digital than from microfilm to digital?
- Jen shared this link: New City Library Local History videos: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL8zzY12dHOP7nM9JKSd7nDaRRp8YJf-E
Stats for NYH are through the roof! We are already over a million views for April. Facebook drives significant traffic to NYH.