Week 11 Day 21 & 22 (July 22 & 23): Let the digitization begin

So last week was quite the experience. On Tuesday Dr. Scot French, Christine and I headed to the public library in downtown Orlando to begin scanning some of the photos and older documents from the Vanderpool family file as well as some xerox copies from a few discontinued newspapers and an original copy of a newspaper from Eatonville. Last week I mentioned the Melrose Center and sorry for the mistake but we were actually heading to the main building on the 4th floor.

So we arrive on the 4th floor and right by the elevator is this huge scanner. I mean this is no ordinary scanner but this clearly really expensive and high tech machine. It was pretty impressive to see it in action. About half an hour in, Laura Cepero joined us and got a pretty good idea of what we would be sending her way so all of these scans could be uploaded through RICHES. To make a very long morning and story short, it took us about an hour to understand how the scanner work and to get it to the correct settings. It took another 2 - 2 1/2 hours to finish scanning everything.

While the work clearly wasn't hard it was exhausting since we were trying to get every detail correct. I am really proud of the work we did and the staff at the library were incredibly helpful and really interested in the items we brought along with us. I really could not have done all of this by myself if it wasn't for the team effort. So a major thank you to everyone who was there with me.

Wednesday was a pretty short day due to a death in my family so for the short time I was there I spent it updating the spreadsheet attached to the images taken for the documents in the Vanderpool file.

Before I finish up, here are a few photos I took on Tuesday.

The Orlando Public Library

The scanner of all scanners

Dr. French and one of the staff members trying to help us figure out how to work the scanner (that's Christine in the background)

Dr. French saving all of our images

So that's all for now. By the way this is my last week interning at the MHM. I'm sure it will be bitter sweet saying goodbye. This internship really went by so quickly. 

-Ambar the History Student

Week 10 Day 19 & 20 (July 15 & 16): The accessioning begins

So on Tuesday Christine and I came up with a plan as to what we planned on digitizing. Don't think I've mentioned it yet but we will be digitizing some materials at the new Melrose Center at the Orange County Library in Orlando. They have this huge, brand new scanner that we are going to use on some of these older pictures and documents. Christine thought it would be a good idea if we cut it down to one family so I thought the Vanderpool family would be the best choice. First because they are super underrated (mentioned this last week) but also their group of photos is small enough to practice on but still big enough for me to properly digitize and accession.

Ahh yes speaking of accessioning...

Wednesday we began the process of accessioning. Actually Tuesday Christine came up with this brilliant little plan to organize the photos and original documents and then begin a small spreadsheet describing each picture and slip of paper. That way it would be easier to identify what pieces we were accessioning without confusing ourselves. After everything was organized we realized we should probably call in an expert on the subject of accessioning. Our expert aka Bethany was nice enough to come to the museum and give us a crash course on how accessioning works and how to produce a number. It was actually quite easy once she explained everything. We began with the pictures in the Vanderpool file and it was kind of fun creating the numbers and plugging them into our mini spreadsheet first. Afterwards we took each item and entered it into PastPerfect. PastPerfect was something that Christine and I played with a bit until we understood how it worked and how to upload any type of information on there.

I honestly thought adding all of our information and plugging it into PastPerfect would be quick but it took me about two hours to do. It isn't that it's hard to do but it is a bit tedious. Also I'm pretty sure my eyes started crossing after the first hour. The trick is to make sure everything is perfect since deleting and starting over will eventually cost you some time (it happened to me twice).

I managed to accession all of the Vanderpool documents (receipts, letters, etc.) on the mini spreadsheet but unlike the photos, I was not able to add it to PastPerfect. But that is okay since I'll be finishing up the rest of the documents tomorrow or Wednesday after everything has been digitized.

Happy Monday and I hope everyone had a lovely weekend.

-Ambar the History Student

Week 9 Day 17 & 18 (July 8 and 9): The finding aid is finally finished

This week's work was pretty solid and the schedule I made for myself went smoothly (this rarely happens by the way). I finally, FINALLY finished the Finding Aid. The only thing I have left is to write the biographies of each family and send the final copy to Christine. I'm honestly really happy I started and finished this so quickly. I'm also quite proud of myself because I really did start this completely from scratch. It really was rewarding to complete something I absolutely had no experience doing.

On Wednesday I was also invited by Christine to go to a meeting for the MHM that included the Maitland mayor, the vice mayor, Christine's boss Andrea and other really important people with really important titles. I don't think I've ever been to a meeting like that but I agreed with Christine when she said it was important to show myself at a time and place like this (plus I got to see how important Christine and the work she does really is on a larger scale). The meeting really opened my eyes to how important Maitland's Art and History Museums are to the community and the long term needs of said community. Honestly the meeting made me want to get more involved and reinforced my passion for what I'm doing at the MHM.

Anyways, that is all for now. Next week we will probably start photographing the pictures from the Founding Families Collection, starting with the Vanderpool family (they seem to be highly underrated in my humble opinion).

Have a great weekend everyone!

-Ambar the History Student

Week 8 Day 15 & 16 (July 1 and 2)

Sorry (for like the millionth time) for the late update. So as to be expected if I plan anything for the week something will come up and all of my plans have to get rearranged. This week was no exception. However the change of plans was nothing extreme.

On Tuesday, Christine and I went over the plan of accessioning items and then creating a finding aid. About an hour into the day we realized maybe this isn't the best use of our time. Change of plans we decided it would be better if we just got straight to the finding aid first and accession everything later. Creating the finding aid honestly felt much less frustrating for the moment and I honestly don't mind that we did things backwards. By the way that is one of the things I like the most as far as working with Christine and this internship in general. Sometimes you get to make your own rules. It can be quite refreshing and makes you feel like you have some type of control over this giant process.  

This finding aid is something completely new to the both of us so I was basically learning as I went and after playing around with the idea of it all for a bit I created a format that would work best for the way documents and boxes have been set up both in the collection and in the museum itself. In order to meet the deadline for the schedule Christine created, I had to quickly set up this finding aid and I have to finish it by next Wednesday which includes all of the founding families and the Maitland minutes. 

Not gonna lie it took me all of Tuesday just to do one box (which included two families) and I was worried since I had to do at least 6 or more boxes within the next three days. Thankfully after the first day I felt confident enough on Wednesday as to how the finding aid was looking and everything I had already included in it. At that point I was able to do four more boxes and give a detailed description of what materials were enclosed in the box. 

If I continue at this rate I should be totally done by Wednesday and the finding aid will be a 100% completed when I take it home and add a biographical narrative for each family throughout the end of next week. 

Hopefully everything goes as smoothly next week as it did this week. 

Hope everyone is having a great July 4th weekend.

-Ambar the History Student