KTR has always wanted to archive their print issues to preserve its rich history. Now, it’s possible with the help of UVA’s Director of Digital Strategies and Discovery, Jennifer Roper. Over the summer, KTR members will be working with the University of Virginia to archive our past print issues to make them available, for free, for future generations. After speaking with Ms. Roper, we got a snippet of how that process works.
When Dr. Kayser submitted a digitization request to UVA, they were interested in “further expanding the availability of digitized newspapers from this area,” Ms. Roper explained. Although UVA does not typically digitize materials outside of UVA, the small size of KTR “seemed like a good opportunity to lend our expertise to fellow Charlottesville community members,” Ms. Roper said. When asked why UVA decided to work with KTR instead of another local newspaper in the Cville area, they said that working with a larger newspaper like Cavalier Daily or the Daily Progress was a year-long project each and while they both have value, they decided that KTR’s archives “provided satisfaction in making content available and finishing a project in a shorter period.”
For starters, “in the library world, archiving has a specific meaning,” Ms. Roper said. The first step in digitizing a newspaper is to “define and evaluate the parameters of the project based on factors such as copyright status, relative value of providing access in digital format, discoverability, digitization quality desired, and an approach to long-term preservation.” While working with Dr. Kayser, KTR and UVA were able to get copyright clearance and create an outline on how the whole project would work.
Over the summer, the UVA preservation team will mend the print issues as needed when they are transported to UVA.. A small group of students will work with the UVA Digital Production Group and the Metadata & Discovery Services team on creating descriptions of the newspaper as a whole, as well as finalizing the digitizing process. Finally, the digital copies will be transferred to the State Library of Charlottesville to be added to the Virginia Chronicle database of Virginia Newspapers.
When all is said and done, you can view the archived print issues in the Virginia Chronicle database of Virginia newspapers. We will link to the title in that location from our Virgo catalog. This is an exciting summer project for KTR! We will let you know when it’s completed. Long live KTR!
