About the Digital Program

History

The Utah State Archives has provided scanned images of sample records and documents online since at least 1999. With the widespread increase of all types of information online, it was clear that a more comprehensive program was needed. Former Governor Michael Leavitt provided one impetus upon leaving office in 2003, with his strong ideas of making large portions of the records from his administration available online for public viewing. Some funding was soon provided to enable almost immediate processing of some Leavitt records. Newly appointed division director Patricia Smith-Mansfield brought extensive experience with the CONTENTdm software and digital management system from work at the Utah State Historical Society. Test scans of press releases were posted with the University of Utah's Marriott Library Digital Collections (which also hosted the digital collections of the Historical Society) in 2004. During 2005, processing and some scanning continued as personnel time was made available. Equipment was tested (and sometimes rejected), and over 800 video tapes were recorded on DVDs (Digital Versatile Discs).

In the 2005 General Session of the Utah State Legislature, a one-time appropriation (HB 301) was approved for Preservation Services intended primarily for digitization. That funding was used for purchasing a microfilm roll scanner, a license for CONTENTdm, and server storage space. In other words, the tools to let us increase the volume of digitization and making the digital images available online more quickly. As things do, it took some time to finish planning such large purchases. The CONTENTdm system was made available in June 2006 and testing began immediately. We had planned all along to use the "compound object" feature to properly tie different levels of records together, such as documents inside of folders, or to make sure that Page 2 of a letter came right after Page 1. However, much correspondence with technical support made it clear that we were using this feature to its fullest extent and some trial and error was to be expected.

By the end of the year, approximately 40,000 images from Governor Leavitt's office and one or two other record series were online.

Coming Soon

While scanning and uploading of Leavitt material continues to some extent, the next project on the horizon includes using the microfilm roll scanner (in testing since its purchase in March 2006) for legislative records. As it turns out, the Working Bills of the House of Representatives and Senate had never been microfilmed due to extensive use of color-coded paper for various drafts. Since the Legislature has made Bill files available online for all those after 1990, it was decided that microfilming all the rest (1896-1989) and then immediately digitizing the microfilm would be an ideal project. The Utah State Archives Preservation section has already started filming from 1896 onwards and the first digital images are imminent.

In partnership with the Utah Genealogical Society, over 200,000 death certificates originally created by the Utah Office of Vital Records and Statistics were scanned and matched to an exisiting online index at the very end of 2006. A very popular service, it is currently being planned to bring the digital images into the CONTENTdm system to, among other things, allow searching by different index fields. The continuing partnership with UGS will provide still more digital images of records important to genealogists in the future.

Staff

Patricia Smith-Mansfield, Division Director

Management

Kenneth Williams, Patron Services Manager
Brian Carpenter, Preservation Manager
Elizabeth Perkes, Administration/Information Technology
Alan Barnett, Research Center

Coordination/Training

Gina Strack, Processing/Reference Archivist

Processors and Scanners

Rodney Swanner
Melody Yearsley
Mary Cook (2004-2005)
Michael J. Smith (2005-2006)