KSC Wins Prestigious Grant for Citizen Archivist Initiative
There’s a unique thrill from being among the few to delve into original historical documents and artifacts. You’re not reading about history, you’re reading history. A grant from the National Archives offers local middle and high school students, Keene State undergrads, and participants in the Cheshire Academy for Lifelong Learning (CALL) a chance to experience this thrill as they learn to transcribe some of New Hampshire’s important historical documents.
The National Historical Publications and Records Commission Grant awarded the College $44,601, under the Literacy and Engagement of Historical Records category, to fund a project in which Keene State, the Historical Society of Cheshire County (HSCC), Keene High School, the New Hampshire State Library (NHSL), and the NH State Archives (NHSA) will collaborate to create a curriculum that will allow effective training of “citizen archivists” who will understand how to interpret and transcribe archival materials. And as a result, these archivists will put several fragile, handwritten documents into a digital format so they can be available to a wide audience of researchers and interested parties via Keene State College’s digital repository, KSCommons.
Dr. Margaret Orelup, associate professor of History, and Associate Professor Rodney Obien, College archivist, will lead the project, with key assistance from Dr. John Lund, lecturer in History, and Jennifer Carroll, director of education for the Historical Society of Cheshire County. “The NHPRC grant is one of the most competitive and prestigious in the library and archive field,” Prof. Obien explained.
The project team are developing a curriculum and lesson plans that emphasize the importance of primary sources, archives, and preservation and teach the citizen archivists the knowledge and skills to read, interpret, and transcribe 18th- and 19th-century handwriting. The students will also learn to put the documents in historical context; to read 18th- and 19th-century handwriting; to read common terms and abbreviations used in wills, deeds, military papers, and other historical documents; and what to do when you are not sure of your interpretation.
The collections selected include the papers of the New Hampshire civil war soldier Charles Wilcox (HSCC), a Union soldier from Keene who was captured and imprisoned in Andersonville, Georgia from 1864–1865; the Meshech Weare Papers (NHSA) of the prominent lawyer and farmer from Hampton Falls, NH, and first President of New Hampshire (1776‐1785); and the Dudley Leavitt Papers (NHSL). Leavitt (1772–1851) was a mathematician, astronomer, farmer, and teacher who filled notebooks and papers with problems, examples, and drawings illustrating principles and axioms for his students and as a guide to his own further studies. He also published Leavitt’s Almanac, which rivaled the Farmers Almanac. These collections are not currently easy for researchers and the public at large to access.
“We supported the project as there is no other way that the State Library could possibly make this collection accessible to the public other than the original documents because we don’t have a digital platform like the KSCommons,” said Janet Eklund, administrator of Library Operations for the State Library. “We participated because of the success of the Templeton project. The State Library will be a direct beneficiary of the grant activities, of course. By all means, it will benefit the state of New Hampshire. Leavitt is a prominent figure in the state’s history. Because KSC is the grantee, they have the capacity to make it available worldwide through their digital commons as they did with the Templeton letters. It is a very challenging collection as it is difficult to read and handle. Having it transcribed will provide more context to Leavitt’s role in the scientific field in general.”
