D g tal Drive @ the Jewish General Hospital

Arch ves

Linda Lei, Archives Consultant

Presented to The Association of Jewish Libraries, Montreal Chapter, at the Harvesting the fruits of history: A user's guide to displaying, digitizing, and creating an online database for a

historical collection Conference, November 20, 2009&

at the School of Information Studies, McGill UniversityFebruary 17, 2010

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D g tal Drive @ the JGH Arch ves Before the digitization Sybil Cadloff

Librarian, Volunteer Archivist c. 1984 – c. 2003

Nature of the JGH Archives 1929 to beginning of the 21st century Holdings

30 feet of textual materials (A/R, minutes, correspondence, news clippings, legal documents, etc.)

Approx. 5 feet of photographs; 3 boxes from PA&C 2.5 inches of negatives 5 VHS tapes and 20 research tapes for the history book of JGH 2 boxes of 35mm slides, donated by PA&C 2 boxes of hospital brick pledges, donated by Foundation

Original finding tools 1 box of catalog cards 2-page section list compiled in the 1980s.

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D g tal Drive @ the JGH Arch ves Launch of Digitization (1/2)

Preliminary works, 2006 Inventory hierarchy

Project proposal

Back in the business, 2007 Submission of formal business plan

Planning and database selection, 2008 Prioritization: images first Digitization begins Database installation Resubmission of business plan

Major undertakings, 2009 75th anniversary – traveling exhibit Database-driven website in progress

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D g tal Drive @ the JGH Arch ves Launch of Digitization (2/2) - Timeline

2008 Apr. Jul. Oct. 2009 Apr. Jul. Oct. 2010

Event 1Scan of photos and brick cards

Event 2Database installation; Intropage design

Event 3Cataloging starts;Watermarking

Event 4Database Customiza-tion;French cataloging

Event 5Exhibit: photo selection

Event 7Exhibit: Graphic design; Liaisons

Event 6Exhibit: Text preparation;Display system design

Event 9Finding aids for smaller collections

Event 10French translation

Event 11Website design ongoing

Event 8JGH Legacy Lectures

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D g tal Drive @ the JGH Arch ves Digitization (1/3) – Scanning (1/2) Equipment

Flatbed scanner HP ScanJet 5590 with TMA for scanning 35mm negatives and slides Pros: easy to use, economic, searchable PDF output format Cons: slow when higher resolution is selected, limited working area

Objects: photo prints, 35mm negatives, slides, and brick cards Scanning specifications:

Resolution (Dots per inch (dpi)) : 300 dpi Default color depth (also called Bit Depth): 24 bit, millions of colors Default image size: original size. N.B. 6 X 4 inch for 35mm negatives and slides

Common output formats: Images

.tiff for archival storage .jpeg for web-deliverable images

Full-size images: portrait-oriented: 650 px on short side with a proportionally scaled long side; landscape-oriented: 1000 px on long side with a proportionally scaled short side

Midsize images (for individual record display) Thumbnails (for record group display)

Documents: searchable PDF for documents (Tribute book), more research is needed

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D g tal Drive @ the JGH Arch ves Digitization (1/3) – Scanning (2/2) Watermarking: Adobe Fireworks Storage media:

Hospital’s server, DVD-R, DVD-RW and external hard drive CD-R for delivery

Collaboration with other departments: A/V (photographing, VHS tape digital conversion, Photoshop retouch, etc. ) and Medical Records

Useful resources: Kalfatovic, Martin R., 1961-   Creating a winning online exhibition : a guide for libraries,

archives, and museums / Martin R. Kalfatovic.    Chicago :   American Library Association,   2002.

Stielow, Frederick J., 1946-   Building digital archives, descriptions, and displays : a how-to-do-it manual for archivists and librarians / Frederick Stielow.    New York ;   London :   Neal-Schuman Publishers,   c2003.

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D g tal Drive @ the JGH Arch ves Digitization (2/3) – Database (1/4) Database: Archives Online (AO)

Add-on application to the existing Inmagic CS/Textworks for archival accessions and descriptions

City of Richmond Archives, 1995, further enhanced and developed by Andornot

Customization with more French fields Demo of searching in AO

Special features: Inventory (images), Inventory (hierarchy) Thesauri for cataloging:

In use: Getty AAT and MeSH by NLM Others: LCSH and British Columbia Thesaurus

Useful resources: Review of archives management software by Council of Nova Scotia

Archives Archivist’s Toolkit by AABC

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D g tal Drive @ the JGH Arch ves Digitization (2/3) – Database (2/4)

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D g tal Drive @ the JGH Arch ves Digitization (2/3) – Database (3/4)

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D g tal Drive @ the JGH Arch ves Digitization (2/3) – Database (4/4)

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D g tal Drive @ the JGH Arch ves Digitization (3/3) – Website & Online search interface (in progress) Demo the JGH Archives

Intropage Keyword search Search by collection Finding aids: hierarchical display of finding aids for 3 collections

with series descriptions Electronic reference book: Your Tribute Everlasting

To integrate: intropage, online version of the traveling exhibit, links to other archives

Photograph reproduction e-Delivery: FTP solution Online shopping cart: TBD

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D g tal Drive @ the JGH Arch ves Lessons Learned Funding Time management

Delays caused by unforeseen circumstances Budget

Revision, revision and revision, until after the deadline of submission.

Staff recruitment

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D g tal Drive @ the JGH Arch vesAfter launching the JGH Archives website Continuing with larger collections Arrangement and preservation Digitization of textual materials and artefacts Themed displays More outreach

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D g tal Drive @ the JGH Arch ves Contact:

Linda (Da) Lei, MLISArchives Consultant

Jewish General Hospital 514-340-8222 Health Sciences Library Local: 3277 Pavilion A, room 200 dlei@jgh.mcgill.ca5750 Côte-des-Neiges Montréal, Québec H3T 1E2

www.jgh.ca