Vermont's role in our national story: providing digital access to our collections [VHS is asking for additional relief funding from NEH to support the creation of digital catalog records to make…

The Vermont Historical Society, Inc. received a $199,889 Project Grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities' Promotion of the Humanities Division of Preservation and Access program (CFDA 45.149). The grant will fund nine staff positions to conduct collection description, preservation, and digitization activities from October 2021 through June 2022. Specifically, staff will inventory and maintain collections, create catalog records, and write collection descriptions to be added to the Society's online public access catalog and Digital Vermont exhibit website. This work will significantly increase access to the Society's historic materials for researchers, K-12 students and teachers, and the general public. The grant will have the intended outcome of vastly accelerating the process of making the Society's collections discoverable and usable online. No subawards are planned under this Project Grant award.

Activities

  staff plan & nbsp; to inventory & nbsp; and maintain & nbsp; collections,?create catalog records,  and & nbsp; write & nbsp; collection descriptions.  collection description & nbsp; activities include:  finding oclc records for newly acquired materials and long-held materials (retrospective conversion); loading new records in & nbsp; their & nbsp; online public access catalog (opac)  where researchers can access them; reviewing retrospective records to make them consistent with & nbsp; their & nbsp; opac, creating original cataloging records for new and old library and museum acquisitions; creating and reviewing finding aids of manuscript collections; and creating and reviewing machine readable cataloging (marc) records for manuscript collections, before uploading them into oclc and & nbsp; their & nbsp; opac.  they will also add & nbsp; existing catalog entries in their opac and & nbsp; catalogit & nbsp; databases.  collections & nbsp; maintenance activities include: unpacking objects from when VHS moved to its current location in 2000, rehousing objects for easier accessibility and better preventative conservation, and evaluating objects? Relevance to the VHS?s mission. For library collections, collections maintenance involves housing books, manuscripts, maps, photographs, and printed ephemera in appropriately sized archival boxes, folders, sleeves, and shelving.  finalized records will be added & nbsp; to digital vermont, VHS?s website & nbsp; and & nbsp; the online museum catalog.&nbsp

Expected outcomes

?the & nbsp; expected outcomes are:  vastly speeding up the process of entering items into the historical society's opac & nbsp; and digital vermont exhibit website.?this digital cataloging work would make collection materials more accessible to researchers and the general public.&nbsp

Intended beneficiaries

The & nbsp; audiences that will benefit & nbsp; from increased access to the VHS?s historic materials & nbsp; include:  academic researchers, k-12 & nbsp; students and teachers, and those interested in the state's role in the foundational years of the american republic, as well as the general public & nbsp; for whom IT would be easier to locate collections.&nbsp

Subrecipient activities

?the recipient has no plans to subaward.? ]