New Bedford Fishing Heritage Center Digital Library Project

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The New Bedford Fishing Heritage Center was recently awarded a $12,000 Cultural Heritage Grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH). The grant will support a project to digitize the cultural heritage of New Bedford’s fishing community.

The project is a collaboration involving the New Bedford Fishing Heritage Center (NBFHC), University Archives and Special Collections at the University of Massachusetts Boston, UMass Dartmouth Archives and Special Collections, MIT Sea Grant, the New Bedford Public Library, and New Bedford Whaling National Historical Park.

Commercial fishing is often a family activity with skills and knowledge passed from one generation to the next. Consequently, much of this history resides in the photo albums, documents, and artifacts of fishing families.  This project will digitize these materials through a day-long public event in combination with “house calls” to digitally document materials from individuals who are unable to attend the event.

Following the digitization event, UMass Boston will process images and metadata and will provide storage and public access through the University’s online repository. These materials will be included in the Digital Commonwealth and Digital Public Library of America.

In addition to UMass Boston’s online repository, the resulting digital collection will be publicly archived as part of digital collections at the UMass Dartmouth Archives and Special Collections, the New Bedford Public Library, and the Massachusetts Public Library Digital Initiative, and shared as part of digital exhibits on the NBFHC website (currently under development).

source: New Bedford Fishing Heritage Center