Ball State’s Digital Media Repository Receives New Public Interface:

The Ball State Digital Media Repository (http://libx.bsu.edu), a project of the University Libraries, now has a new look. Students, faculty, and other researchers who use this online repository, which currently consists of 89 collections and almost 200,000 digital assets, will find many improvements, ranging from a new design to enhanced searching capabilities.

Some of the highlights to the new public interface for the DMR include these:

• Faceted and improved collection search options
• Improved navigation and browsing
• Implementation of Web 2.0 social networking tools
• An interactive media viewer on the homepage

One highly visible change is the use of cooliris media viewer to allow researchers new to the DMR to browse selected resources in an interactive environment. AddThis, a social bookmarking tool, lets users easily share DMR content on social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter. Users will be able to search content by subject, location, format, contributor, and individual collections directly from the browse pages in the new interface.

A DMR Public Interface working group has been evaluating and designing the new look since September 2009. The working group consists of Eric B. Fisher, Information Services Librarian; Amanda A. Hurford (co-chair), Digital Initiatives Multimedia Developer; Carolyn F. Runyon (co-chair), Archivist for Digital Development and University Records; Amy E. Trendler, Architecture Librarian; and Budi Wibowo, Head of Digital Libraries and Web Services.

The working group conducted user surveys, analyzed use statistics, and surveyed other repositories to identify and select effective ways to enhance the usability of the DMR through the public interface. The new interface will provide better ways for students and faculty to select and utilize the rich digital resources available in the DMR for teaching, learning, and research.

Watch for an article with more descriptive details about the new interface in next month’s newsletter. And visit the new and improved DMR soon.

University Libraries Collaborate to Make Friends Memorial Church Records Available in Digital Media Repository

When Muncie’s Friends Memorial Church celebrated their centennial in 2008 by removing the contents of a time capsule placed in the cornerstone of their building in 1908, they found an unpleasant surprise. Water had seeped in through a hole in the metal container holding the historical objects carefully placed there a hundred years before. Many of the items were damaged, mildewed, or moldy. Some seemed beyond repair or salvage.

Mrs. Pat Barnett and other members of the congregation contacted John Straw in the University Libraries’ Archives and Special Collections to see what might be done to preserve these valuable relics of the church’s past. John Straw and Maren L. Read, Archivist for Manuscript Collections, paid a visit to inspect the items and provide professional advice. The result was a collaborative project between the Friends Memorial Church and the University Libraries to digitize the contents of the time capsule and make them available in the Digital Media Repository (http://libx.bsu.edu). The same was done for other items in the church’s archives and for materials in the Libraries’ Archives and Special Collections about the history of the church.

The Friends Memorial Church Collection is now available online at the following address:
http://libx.bsu.edu/collection.php?CISOROOT=/FrndsMem. Items in the digital collection include photographs, a handwritten church roster from 1906, the building contract, histories, directories, reports, and issues of the Muncie Evening Press and the Muncie Evening Star with articles and photographs about the church. The water damage done to the items is apparent in several of the digital images.

The Friends congregation held their first meeting in 1876. The first meetings were in a private home north of the Courthouse Square and later in a public hall above retail rooms across from the old Delaware County Courthouse in the 100 block of North High Street. The first church building was erected at Mulberry and Seymour streets in 1903, and the current church was built in 1908.

The Libraries’ collaboration with the Friends Memorial Church will continue as more items from their archives are digitized and made available over time.
For more information on the Digital Media Repository, contact John B. Straw, Assistant Dean for Digital Initiatives and Special Collections, JStraw@bsu.edu, 765-285-5078.

Ball State University Libraries Offer New User Experiences in Second Life

Bracken Library now exists virtually as well as being a brick-and-mortar facility. The University Libraries’ collaboration with the Center for Middletown Studies and the Institute for Digital Intermedia Arts and Animation has resulted in the creation of Bracken Library in the virtual world of Second Life. Within this virtual world, archivists, historians, and virtual world modelers created the Middletown Studies Library and Archives.

Second Life is an online three-dimensional virtual world where users or “residents” use avatars to interact with one another. Ball State University Libraries Archivists Maren L. Read and Carolyn F. Runyon offer virtual reference services three times a week to support “in-world” researchers.

To chat with Em Ziplon, a.k.a. Archivist for Manuscript Collections Maren Read, visit Bracken Library in Second Life on Mondays and Fridays, from 10 a.m. – 12 p.m.

To chat with Carolyn Runyon, a.k.a. Archivist for Digital Development and University Records, visit Bracken Library in Second Life on Tuesdays, 8 a.m. – 11 a.m.

The Middletown Studies Collection Library and Archives features exhibits displaying the unique resources available from Ball State University Libraries’ Archives and Special Collections. Based on Robert and Helen Lynd’s sociological study of Muncie, Indiana, conducted in the 1920s, the exhibit features materials that revisit the six areas of life and culture studied by the Lynds:

1. Getting a Living
2. Making a Home
3. Training the Young
4. Using Leisure
5. Engaging in Religious Practices
6. Engaging in Community Activities

Materials exhibited include excerpts from oral histories and photographs, many of which are available from the Digital Media Repository, which is a digital resource available from the University Libraries at http://libx.bsu.edu. Additionally, the collection features the Bracken Library Theater that will play film footage available from Archives and Special Collections, including The Man Haters, a silent movie produced in Muncie, Indiana in 1915.

The new resources and services available from the Middletown Studies Collection Library and Archives in Second Life have been made possible through an Innovative Library Program Grant awarded to the Ball State University Libraries for 2008-2009. This grant is part of the Library Services and Technology Act (LSTA), which is administered by the Institute of Museum and Library Services and the Indiana State Library.

For more information, contact Maren L. Read, Archivist for Manuscript Collections, or Carolyn F. Runyon, Archivist for Digital Development and University Records, libarchives@bsu.edu, 765-285-5078.

New Archives and Special Collections Home Page Offers More Resources for Teaching, Learning, and Research

A new and improved home page for the Ball State University Libraries’ Archives and Special Collections now provides more information and resources for students, faculty, and researchers. Archivists Philip J. Deloria and Maren L. Read developed the webpages.

New Features
The new home page includes many new features. Archives and Special Collections is now featuring an Ask an Archivist service similar to the Ask a Librarian service offered from the University Libraries home page. The home page features a button at the bottom of the page that links to information about how to ask an archivist a reference question by email, phone, or in person.
The home page also features a New and Notable banner to create awareness about current exhibits, news stories, and upcoming events. Currently it is featuring the Bernarr MacFadden Physical Culture Exhibit, the upcoming Digitizing Oral History Conference, the archives blog, and news stories featuring Archives and Special Collections.
The new Homepage also takes advantage of features like a rollover menu and images that rotate upon refresh. All images on the page, including those in the banner at the bottom of the screen, link directly to the Digital Media Repository collections from which they are drawn.

New Content
The new homepage links to new secondary pages presenting information grouped according to the following categories: About Us, Collection Areas, Digital Collections, Conducting Research, Services and Forms, and Donating Materials.
The Digital Collections page, the Conducting Research page, and the Instructional Sessions and Tours page offer new avenues for students and faculty to access information as well as new content to facilitate the reader’s interaction with the Archives and Special Collections in more meaningful ways.
A new Alumni Portal is under development. It will provide access to resources of particular interest to alumni wishing to revisit their days at Ball State.
Visit the new home page either directly at www.bsu.edu/libraries/archives/index.html or navigate to it from the University Libraries home page by clicking on the About button, then on the link to Archives and Special Collections in the Collections category. I invite your comments and suggestions.
For more information, contact Philip James Deloria, Assistant Archivist for Digital Projects and University Records, PJDeloria@bsu.edu, (765) 285-5078.

Historic 1915 Film Available in University Libraries’ Digital Media Repository

Almost 15 years after it was discovered and restored, the historic film The Man Haters is now accessible online through the Ball State University Libraries Digital Media Repository.

This rare 1915 silent movie is one of the few surviving films documenting life in the World War I years, and it provides a rich resource for film and history students at Ball State University and researchers around the world.

The film was produced by Basil McHenry, a traveling film producer from Akron, Ohio. He financed the film with sponsorship by Muncie's Majestic Theater and The Muncie Evening Press newspaper.

Readers of the Press were asked to cast their votes for the leading actresses using coupons printed in the newspaper. Out of Muncie’s population of 34,000, there were over 22,000 votes cast in the contest.

Dora Grim, a 17-year-old telephone operator, won the starring role of Ruth and 16-year old Vernon Davis was cast as the male lead. Filming began in Muncie, Indiana on November 3, 1915. The movie opened at the Majestic Theater at 417 South Walnut on November 15, 1915.

The film contains rich documentation of the Muncie landscape and local life in the early 20th century. Basil McHenry also produced similar films in other towns in Indiana and Ohio.

Archives and Special Collections acquired the film from the Dora Grim-Vlaskamp family in 1994. The family found it in storage at a local car dealership. Nancy Turner, former director of Archives and Special Collections, and the late William (Bill) Barnett, former Director of Library Business Services, recognized the importance of the film and applied for a $3,000 grant from the Indiana Humanities Council to have the original 35mm nitrate film transferred to VHS and music, narration, and additional footage added. The film was shown at numerous screenings in Indiana and nationwide and a documentary on the film aired on the History Channel.

The Man Haters Collection contains the 10-minute original version and the longer documentary version of the film, newspaper clippings about the contest, still photographs from the film, and a booklet about the history of the film by Nancy Turner. The collection can be accessed in the Digital Media Repository, at http://libx.bsu.edu, under the “The Man Haters Film Collection.”

For more information, contact Maren L. Read, Assistant Archivist for Manuscript Collections, Ball State University Libraries, MLRead@bsu.edu, (765) 285-5078.