Blog love - letters of note

In an attempt to give this blog some love, I'm going to start sharing some of the cool archive related blogs that I've got bookmarked each week.

This week its Letters of Note, a lovely blog that provides images of original letters along with their transcripts for those letters that the editor Shaun Usher believes deserves a wider audience.  More information about the blog and the idea behind it is available here and here.

So if you're an archivist with a letter, telegram, note or postcard that you'd like to share get in touch as the site welcomes submissions.

Ghostsigns

Interesting article from the Guardian here about the History of Advertising Trust's project to create a Ghostsign Archive.  This aims to collect image to create "a permanent photographic record of advertising painted directly onto brickwork within the UK."


There seems to have already been in existence a Ghostsigns project that set up a Flickr group called ghostsigns to collect images.  This group has nearly 4,000 images at the moment and 415 members which is pretty impressive.


More information about the whole thing is available from their blog and on their website.


Its got me thinking about the ghostsigns I pass every day.

Listening

A video by the Rauch Brothers who have animated the story of 86-year-old World War II veteran Joseph Robertson who fought at the Battle of the Bulge. Over 60 years later, he still can't forget one soldier he killed there.



Germans in the Woods from Rauch Brothers on Vimeo.


This story was captured as part of the Story Corps project.  Story Corps is an organisation working in the United States that aims "to honor and celebrate one another’s lives through listening."  It is one of the largest oral history project with over 50,000 people sharing their stories since 2003. 


I've been thinking about making use of some elements of the various oral history techniques in my work to capture at least some of the knowledge our staff and volunteers have about collections and the shipbuilding and engineering industries in Scotland.  As a result I've been reading a lot about oral history projects and techniques.


The Story Corps approach appealed to me and I thought I would include it here as I think it has several web 2.0 elements to it.  They encourage collaboration with others (for more information about the collaboration between Rauch Brothers and Story Corps see here), their make hundreds of the recordings available on their website to listen to and also have podcasts. 

The Interactive Archivist

Another great resource I've recently discovered is the Interactive Archivist webpages created by the Society of American Archivists.  This site has general information about Web 2.0 and how archivists can use it, as well as descriptions about the different technologies and a bibliography for further reading.

The best thing about this site is the case studies.  At the moment there are 10 case studies covering all the different types of web 2.0 tools and technologies.  I find it very inspirational to read in detail how other organisations are using web 2.0 technologies and its great to get some information on how useful the experiments have been for that organisation.

What I particularly like about this resource is that the Society of American Archivists recognised that there was a gap in the existing literature and did something to help plug this gap.

Christmas ideas using archives(ish)

I discovered this amazing site at the weekend.  It can take images from museums like the V&A and National Maritime Museum, photography collections and even Haynes Car Manuals and turn them into wall murals, prints or other custom options.

My favourite (so far) is the letter C from Edward Lear's 'A Children's Nonsense Alphabet' c.1880.

So, consider surface view if you're looking for something different this year.

Of course, gifts for the archivist in your life like a TNA shopper or pocket magnifier are available from the TNA shop.  Or you could go for a witty slogan on a hoodie to replace that storeroom cardigan.

ICA-Atom

A new option for those looking to use an open source alternative for archival description has been released.  The ICA-Atom is a project from the International Council on Archives which provides a software to help and encourage institutions to make their archival holdings available online.  Of course as an ICA project it is fully compatible with and based on ICA standards.

It is still in beta release at the moment but it is great to have another option, more information about the project is available here and it looks good so go check it out.

Scotland's Places

A new "mash-up" resource has been created by the National Archives of Scotland and the Royal Commission on Ancient and Historical Monuments.  It is called Scotland's Places and it allows you to search by a location and then bring up information about the said place from these resources:

• Maps and plans of cities, towns, villages, farms, roads, canals, harbours, churches, schools, public buildings, private houses, mines and quarries.
• Photographs of the built environment in The Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland.
• Archaeological reports on historic and prehistoric sites.
• Manuscript records and printed books from millions of pages in government and private records, including tax rolls, owners of land and heritages, and the annual reports of county Medical Officers of Health.

 This is one of those sites that you can lose hours in.