Intellectual Access

Ohio University Archives and Special Collections will maintain a comprehensive website with introductory text written by subject experts, and organize the material into modules or broad subject categories. From our website, we will link directly to the database search interface, to individual items in context, and to the American Memory site, where users can also search for the Hocking Valley Coal Field items. Text will be OCRed or rekeyed depending on the clarity of the original. Access aids will employ LCSH and keywords in the DC subject field. Both the approach of a single URL to a multipart maps in tiled sections and single URLs to individual items will used, with the latter most frequently. When a user searches American Memory, the OhioLINK database, or a bibliographic utility, a persistent URL will make the link to the digital object.

Links from Access Aids to Digital Reproductions
Links will be URLs. In MARC records it will be from the 856 field, in DC from the identifier field, in EAD the digital archival object <dao>.

Intellectual Context
In-depth interpretative materials, prepared in HTML, will include timelines, bibliography categorized by grade level, and essays, and will be organized by broad subject area while linking to specific items. Materials will be divided into several basic subject areas encompassing mines and mining, related industry and technology, social life and culture. The contextual information will be aimed to be understandable by a broad audience and will be authored in conjunction with the project review board of skilled subject specialists and educators.

Access Through Bibliographic Utility
MARC records will be entered into our in-house OPAC, OhioLINK, and added to OCLC. All EAD formatted finding aids will be sent to RLG for incorporation into their new Archival Resources database.

Staff
Project Staff and Support Project staff for the proposal will include: George Bain, Project Director, who will contribute 5% of his time to the project; Janet Carleton, Reformatting Archivist, who will serve as Project Manager with 25% of her time on the technical management of the project; Professor of Geography Nancy Bain, Project Specialist, who will devote 15% of her time; and a half-time Project Technician who will have primary responsibility for doing the scanning, creating the text files and metadata. In addition, technical staff from the Libraries' Department of Automation and Bibliographic Control will provide cataloging support, and technical staff from OhioLINK will provide server and database support. George Bain will provide assistance with item selection and with writing and editing the end product text. He will also oversee the budget. Professor Nancy Bain will assist with selecting items for digitization and will be the primary writer for the narrative and for conceiving the intellectual structure that will tie the content with the pedagogical organization of the end product.

Dr. George Bain has both a doctorate in American history and a master's in library science. He has been active in local history in Athens County for nearly twenty-five years. This includes stints as president of the Athens County Historical Society and treasurer of the Ohio Association of Historical Societies & Museums. He served with the Ohio Historical Society as a Local Government Records archivist from 1977-1987 for the region that includes Athens, Hocking and Perry counties. He has served as head of Archives & Special Collections in the Ohio University Libraries for a decade, and is currently supervising the Scripps Reformatting Project. Dr. Nancy Bain is a geographer with an interest in land use planning and economic location and has publications based on studies from southeastern Ohio. With an avocational interest in local history, she has been doing research in the Columbus & Hocking Coal & Iron Company Collection for several years. Reformatting Archivist Janet Carleton, MLIS, is well qualified to serve as Project Manager. She assisted in researching and writing a successful 1996-1997 LC/Ameritech proposal for the Ohio Historical Society, and served as that project's scanning chief through spring 1998. Currently she is reformatting the E.W. Scripps Papers which will be available through OhioLINK and its Digital Media Center. In addition, she has presented over 20 workshops and presentations on digitization and the Web for librarians and archivists.