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 Experience Digital Development Success in Past Year and Plan for Initiatives in New Year

Arthur W. Hafner, Dean of University Libraries, outlined the Libraries’ strategic goals in the June 2008 issue of this newsletter. One of those five goals was to expand the Libraries’ digital initiatives and facilitate development of emerging media opportunities for learning, research, and classroom enhancement.

The beginning of a new year provides us an opportunity to review progress on this goal and to look ahead and make plans for further achieving our goals.

The Ball State University Libraries have made many exciting advancements toward accomplishing digital initiatives in the past year, including:

Increasing the number of digital objects in the Digital Media Repository (DMR) to over 112,000 items to support research, learning, and teaching
- Designing a new DMR public interface with enhanced features, new content, expanded menus, and improved navigability
- Implementing Zoomify in DMR collections to allow users to view, zoom, and pan detailed images in a quick and efficient manner
- Enhancing DMR collections by creating Google interactive maps for selected collections, such as Muncie Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps and the Man Haters Film Collection
- Developing the Cardinal Scholar Institutional Repository to provide global access to Ball State’s student and faculty work

In total, 14 new digital collections have been made available for global access in the Digital Media Repository (http://libx.bsu.edu), bringing the total to 72.

Here are a few digital developments to watch for in 2009:
- An emerging media project to create educational applications using Digital Media Repository collections and other University Libraries’ digital resources through Microsoft Surface™ that will allow for data and digital asset manipulation by students for class projects
- A partnership to create a digital collection of Delaware County aerial plat maps that illustrate property changes between 1976 and 2006, including land development and use, zoning changes, and urban sprawl
- Collaborative grant projects with other institutions for the University Libraries to provide digitization services and host their digital collections
- New enhancements to Digital Media Repository collections, including a portal to U.S. Veterans digital resources
- New collections in the Digital Media Repository, including digital audio and video interviews with United States military veterans, Ball State University monographs, early issues of the Ball State Daily News (then called the Easterner), Indiana archeological surveys, and rare books from Archives and Special Collections
- The opening of the Helen B. and Martin D. Schwartz Special Collections and Global Digital Complex on the first floor of Bracken Library

For more information, contact John B. Straw, Assistant Dean for Digital Initiatives and Special Collections, JStraw@bsu.edu, 765-285-5078.

Oral Histories with Muncie Labor Leaders Available Online through the University Libraries’ Digital Media Repository

Students and scholars can now access oral history interviews that document the history of organized labor in Muncie, Indiana through the Ball State University Libraries’ Digital Media Repository. The Muncie Labor Oral History Project Collection includes 15 interviews with prominent labor leaders from the Libraries’ Archives and Special Collections’ Muncie Labor Archives.

Inspired by former Indiana state legislator and union leader Hurley Goodall, these interviews were conducted as part of the Center for Middletown Studies’ effort to document recent economic changes and the history of labor unions in Muncie. Participants from all the major unions in Muncie were interviewed by C. Warren Vander Hill between December 2005 and February 2006.

The digital collection consists of recordings, transcripts, and photographs. Representatives from major employers, such as Chevrolet-Muncie, the Ball Corporation, and the Borg Warner Corporation were interviewed. Topics discussed include union activities, the importance of unions in the lives of workers, and the future of unions.

The collection can be accessed in the Digital Media Repository, http://libx.bsu.edu/, under the “Middletown Digital Oral History Collections.”

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

Historic Anti-Klan Newspaper to be Available in the Ball State University Digital Media Repository, a Project of Ball State University Libraries

The announcement that the Ball State University Libraries have received a Library Services and Technology Act digitization mini-grant for 2007-2008 for $23,041 means that a historically significant newspaper will soon be available globally for research, learning, and teaching. The grant funds will be used to digitize The Muncie Post-Democrat and provide access to it through the Ball State University Digital Media Repository, a project of the University Libraries.

The Muncie Post-Democrat was published by former Muncie mayor George Dale from 1921 through 1936, and continued after his death until 1950. During Dale’s tenure, the newspaper was a strong voice against the Ku Klux Klan in Indiana, especially the Muncie Klan. Dale was nationally prominent for his fight against the Klan. He was beaten, shot, and even spent time in prison because of his strong anti-Klan position.

Dale used the newspaper as a weapon against the Klan and its many prominent local members, including Muncie’s mayor, chief of police, lawyers, judges, and other politicians. The newspaper is a unique historical artifact that is extremely valuable for researchers on the Klan in Indiana during the 1920s and 1930s.

After Dale’s death, the newspaper continued, although the battle with the Klan was basically over. The later issues provide a pro-Democratic Party, pro-labor viewpoint. While the anti-Klan years may be of the greatest historical interest to researchers, the entire run of the newspaper has educational and research value.

The newspaper is used by students, faculty, historians, and the general public. Digitizing this rich resource will make it available 24/7/365 to a vastly increased number of users globally through the Internet.

The digitization of the Muncie Post-Democrat will also serve as a key element in another project. Ball State University’s Center for Middletown Studies, in collaboration with Archives and Special Collections, has begun to work to develop an online teaching archive to explore the impact of the Great Depression on Muncie, the site of the seminal Middletown research.

Writing in support of the grant application, Dr. James J. Connolly, Director of the Center for Middletown Studies, said that the digital archive will permit students, researchers, and the general public to investigate the ways the Great Depression changed (or did not change) the experiences of Middletown residents in the six areas identified by sociologists Robert and Helen Lynd in their original 1920s study.

The original newspapers are quickly deteriorating. A vast majority of them are very fragile, brittle, and virtually falling apart when handled. For the project, the paper copies will be encapsulated so that they can be scanned without harming them. Digitizing them will help preserve the originals as well as make the newspaper more accessible. Optical Character Recognition will be done to make the text of the newspapers searchable.

The grant project begins in July, with 1,198 issues and 4,924 pages to be digitized and made available through the Digital Media Repository by mid-2008.

For more information, contact John B. Straw, Ball State University Libraries’ Director for Archives and Special Collections, JStraw@bsu.edu, (765) 285-5078.

This newsletter article first appeared in The Library Insider 5(5): 5; May 2007.

Ball State University Libraries Identify 2006-2007 Accomplishments

In late April 2007, the University Libraries’ assistant deans and directors prepared a listing of their unit’s most significant accomplishments achieved over the academic year, view www.bsu.edu/library/article/0,,43179--,00.html.

The 25-page listing chronicles many of the University Libraries’ significant accomplishments. The listing is organized under ten categories and by performing unit. This listing illustrates the success of our professional and paraprofessional personnel at improving and expanding our libraries’ role in the academic life of the university.

Listed also is a University Libraries also has posted a copy of its 20-page report, Selective Listing of the University Libraries’ Services, Programs, and Collections 2006-2007. This listing is also organized by performing unit. The value of this listing is to inform members of the academic community about what all goes on inside an academic library.

A small selection of our 2006-2007 accomplishments includes:
· Developing Cardinal Scholar, the University’s institutional repository for faculty and student digital media
· Developing the Libraries’ Digital Commons for media
· Exceeding last year’s turnstile count by 3.3% for persons entering the University Libraries
· Hosting the Libraries’ Fourth Annual Copyright Conference
· Initiating free laptop printing as a student service
· Opening of the Bookmark Café @ Bracken Library
· Remodeling the Architecture Library, including a new circulation desk, carpet, and more
For more information, contact Arthur W. Hafner Ph.D., M.B.A., Ball State University’s Dean of University Libraries, AHafner@bsu.edu, (765) 285-5277.

This newsletter article first appeared in The Library Insider: 5(5): 13; May 2007.

Ball State University Libraries Staff Collaborate to Make Middletown Digital Oral History Collection Searchable

Researchers can now search 42 oral history interviews in the Middletown Digital Oral History Collection, at http://libx.bsu.edu/MidOrHist/midorhist.php.

For the Middletown Jewish Oral History Project I, Dr. Warren Vander Hill conducted interviews with Martin Schwartz and Mort Pazol, among others. The Black Muncie Oral History Project, conducted by Hurley C. Goodall and J. Paul Mitchell, includes interviews with Muncie, Indiana citizens such as Ray Buley and Lucille Williams.

Each oral history interview includes a streaming wma audio file and a transcript in PDF format. The inclusion of transcripts makes it possible for researchers to read along as they listen to the interviews or identify specific sections of the interview for listening. By providing the transcripts in PDF format, users can also print them for further study and analysis.

The transcripts provide students and faculty with several ways to search the collection. They can search each transcript for subjects, names, or places as well as search across all of the oral history interviews and the larger Ball State University Digital Media Repository, a project of the University Libraries.

Writing transcripts to accompany the oral history interviews has been a combined effort of people throughout the University Libraries, including staff and student assistants from various units within these groups:
· Access Services
· Acquisitions Services
· Archives and Special Collections Research Center
· Cataloging and Metadata Services
· Center for Middletown Studies
· Geospatial Center and Map Collections
· Metadata and Digital Initiatives

These personnel have spent many hours listening to the interviews to ensure that the transcripts are accurate. The transcripts are then checked and rechecked at least twice by Archives and Special Collections Research Center and Collection Resources Management personnel for accuracy.

In our training for this project, we selected the Baylor University Institute for Oral History Transcribing Style Guide. This document guided us in transcribing the words, speech patterns, and thought patterns of the interviewees and interviewers in a way that is easy to read and uniform in structure. Copies of this guide were given to each project participant, and the guide has helped to answer many questions, such as when to include and when not to include crutch words, like ‘hm,’ ‘uh-hm,’ and ‘unh-uh.’

Metadata and Digital Initiatives personnel also created an Oral Histories Wiki which assisted in ongoing training,www.bsu.edu/libraries/wiki/index.php?title=Oral_Histories.

Using the Wiki, we share any areas not covered in the style guide with the personnel working on the project. For example, we have included “Common Capitalization and Spelling Questions,” a list of specific terms that have come up in the interviews, such as words related to Jewish and Catholic religious practices.

The City Directories and several other manuscript collections in the Archives and Special Collections Research Center have been useful in checking the spellings of names and places in Muncie, Indiana, that are often mentioned in the interviews. We have also used collections already available in the Digital Media Repository e.g., The Muncie Times and the Other Side of Middletown photographs.

To facilitate locating oral histories, metadata records have been created for each interview using Dublin Core, a back-end standard used to describe digital content in a consistent way. We created user-friendly fields, such as Interviewee, Interviewer, Date Recorded, Duration, and Subject.

In addition to providing useful information about the oral histories, metadata records allow the collection to be searched within the larger Ball State University Digital Media Repository. For example, if you do an exact phrase search for Marion, Indiana, you will find digital objects from several collections including oral histories, audio newscasts, and newspaper issues.

Another tool implemented in this collection is controlled vocabulary. In this case, controlled vocabulary refers to a standard list of authorized terms like names, places, and subjects used to describe digital artifacts in metadata records. While the Digital Media Repository can be searched using natural language, inputting descriptors in this controlled way makes it easier for researchers to find all the information related to a specific topic. For example, when referring to the Black Muncie History Project’s interviewer Hurley C. Goodall, we enter Goodall, Hurley C. Clicking on this personal name will bring up all of his interviews in the collection.

For information on the process of transcribing and describing oral history interviews, contact Amanda A. Hurford, Digital Initiatives Multimedia Developer, AAHurford@bsu.edu, (765) 285-3349 or Maren L. Read, Assistant Archivist for Manuscript Collections, MLRead@bsu.edu, (765) 285-5078.

This newsletter article first appeared in The Library Insider 5(3): 9; March 2007.