THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

A periodic report from

THE NATIONAL DIGITAL LIBRARY PROGRAM

MAY 1996 • NO. 8

Ameritech and Library combine

resources to bring more libraries into

the digital fold

Major U.S. communications firm gives $2 million

continued on page 2; see Ameritech

HOW DO YOU

DIGITIZE A BOOK?

IT’S NOT EASY. ❦

SEE PAGE 6.

Ameritech Corp. and its Ameritech Library Services subsidiary announced on April 18 a

partnership with the Library of Congress to

establish a grant program through which selected libraries across the United States can digitize their

unique American historical collections for incorporation

into the Library’s National Digital Library (NDL) Program.

The Ameritech Foundation is making a $2 million gift

to establish the Library of Congress/Ameritech National

Digital Library Competition. It will enable libraries across

the United States to make unique collections available

on-line via the Library of Congress to millions of children,

students and others.

The goal of the Library of Congress’s digital program

is to make freely available over the Internet approximately 5 million historical items by the year 2000, in collaboration with other institutions. Ameritech’s contribution will help the Library meet that goal by being the

first to provide funds to libraries and other institutions

to aid them in the critical, yet expensive, task of digitizing and making available on the World Wide Web their

collections.

“This grant program will vastly multiply the educational impact of bringing together important historical

documents on specific subjects formerly dispersed

among institutions across the country,” said Dr.

Billington. “We are grateful to Ameritech for helping to

make a reality the truly national nature of our digital library effort.”

Richard C. Notebaert,

Ameritech chairman

and chief executive officer, said, “The dream of

linking all people to information and creating

libraries with no limits is

now a giant leap closer

to reality. This is the

most significant and farreaching charitable campaign Ameritech has ever undertaken. Our efforts literally will bring thousands of American treasures from across the United States into libraries,

homes and schools everywhere for millions to enjoy and

cherish.”

Their remarks were delivered during an evening reception on April 18. Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich

(R-Ga.) also attended. “The National Digital Library Program is one that will play a major role in enlarging and

enriching the human race,” he said. “The National Digital Library is the library of the American people.”

“The Library of Congress/Ameritech National Digital Library Competition is a milestone in the drive to make

our nation’s treasures accessible to all Americans,” he

added. “This joint Library of Congress/Ameritech effort

is making American history come alive and literally places

it at the fingertips of children, students and adults everywhere.”
THE NATIONAL DIGITAL LIBRARY PROGRAM

2 MAY 1996

The Speaker also thanked Richard

Notebaert of Ameritech, saying, “Dick, I

really appreciate what you are doing.”

Rep. Ron Packard (R-Calif.) was acknowledged by the Speaker for his role

in Congress’s pledge of $15 million for

the NDL Program in fiscal years 1996–

2000.

Dr. Billington recognized the Speaker

as “one of the staunchest supporters of

this initiative.” He said, “This gift directly responds to [the Speaker’s] call for

a public-private funding of the National

Digital Library effort.”

Rep. William M. Thomas (R-Calif.), an

NDL Program supporter and a former

history professor, introduced another

educator attending the reception, Gwen

Harrison of the Hammond Middle

School in Alexandria, Va. “Dr. Billington

has done a superb job of getting the necessary private support that has kept the

National Digital Library going,” said

Rep. Thomas, who is vice chairman of the Joint

Committee on the Library.

 Ms. Harrison and her students are frequent

users of the Library’s digitized historical collections. An attendee who was especially interested in what Ms. Harrison said was Rep. James

P. Moran (D-Va.), in whose district Hammond

Middle School is located.

“When computers were first introduced in

Alexandria, I was very fearful of using them in

a room with my colleagues,” Ms. Harrison said.

“However, I did learn to use the computer, and

along came the Information Superhighway. This

was definitely not on my agenda. According to

my plans, I would be retired before the Highway came near me.”

Ms. Harrison then recalled her experience

using the Library’s on-line collections. “The first

time I accessed the Library of Congress

homepage my excitement started to build. I had

illustrations I could enlarge with the click of the

mouse.

Ameritech, from page 1

continued on the next page

T he first time I

 accessed the

Library of Congress homepage my

excitement started

to build. I had

illustrations I

could enlarge with

the click of the

mouse. To me, the

most amazing

photographs were

the ones of the

slaves during the

Civil War. ... When

I looked at the

picture of African

American contrabands at leisure

outside their

quarters in

Culpeper, Va.,

chills ran down my

spine, for they

could have been

relatives of mine.

—Gwen Harrison

Hammond Middle

School educator

Alexandria, Va.

Gwen Harrison’s

Hammond

Middle School

students trade

Internet ideas

with the Librarian of Congress,

Dr. James H.

Billington.

Library of Congress

photo by Jim Higgins

“To me, the most amazing photographs were

the ones of the slaves during the Civil War
THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

MAY 1996 3

[from the Mathew Brady Collection]. My grandparents had recounted our oral history when I

was young. ... When I looked at the picture of

African American contrabands at leisure outside their quarters in Culpeper, Va., chills ran

down my spine, for they could have been relatives of mine.”

Also present was Reed Hundt, chairman of

the Federal Communications Commission. He

thanked Rep. Gingrich for his role in passage

of the Telecommunications Act, which was

signed by President Clinton in the Main Reading Room of the Library on Feb. 8 (see Issue

No. 6).

The bill “will help make it possible for every

child in this country to have telecommunications access. No other country has done this,”

he said.

Thirteen of the Library of Congress’s unique

American history collections are now available

from its homepage at http://www.loc.gov/. In

March, five collections were added, including

documents of the Continental Congress, African American pamphlets relating to slavery and

civil rights, and daguerreotypes of Abraham

Lincoln and Zachary Taylor, including the earliest known photographic images of the U.S.

Capitol and White House. These newly digitized collections join early motion pictures,

sound recordings of American political leaders

and selected notebooks from Walt Whitman and

other treasures that are already available.

The National Digital Library Program at the

Library of Congress is funded mostly by private donations, with support from the U.S. Congress. This public-private partnership is enabling the Library to share its rare American

treasures nationwide. So far, the Library has

raised more than $21 million in private funds,

and Congress has pledged $15 million for fiscal years 1996–2000.

T he dream of

 linking all

people to information and creating

libraries with no

limits is now a

giant leap closer

to reality. ... [The

joint Library of

Congress/

Ameritech effort]

will bring

thousands of

American treasures ... into

libraries, homes,

and schools

everywhere for

milions to enjoy

and cherish.

—Richard C.

Notebaert,

Chairman and CEO

Ameritech

tion. Complete details of the Library of

Congress/Ameritech National Digital

Library Competition and how libraries

and other institutions can apply for the

grants will be announced soon. Grants

will be awarded based on recommendations to the Library and Ameritech by

a panel chaired by Deanna Marcum,

president of the Commission on Preservation and Access and the Council on

Library Resources.

Ameritech, one of the world’s largest communications companies, helps

more than 13 million customers keep in

touch. The company provides a wide

array of local phone, data and video

services in Illinois, Indiana, Michigan,

Ohio and Wisconsin. Ameritech (http:/

/www.ameritech.com) is creating dozens of new information, entertainment

and interactive services for homes, businesses and governments around the

world. One of the world’s leading cellular companies, Ameritech serves almost 1.9 million cellular and 750,000

paging customers and has cellular interests in telephone companies in China,

Norway and Poland. Ameritech owns

interests in telephone companies in

New Zealand and Hungary and in business directories in Germany and other

countries. Nearly 1 million investors

hold Ameritech shares.

Ameritech Library Services develops

and distributes library management

systems and information access products worldwide. With headquarters in

Provo, Utah, an affiliate office in

Evanston, Ill., and offices in 18 countries, the company serves 3,500 client

libraries in 34 countries and is the

world’s leading provider of library automation software.

Ameritech, from page 2

—Guy Lamolinara

Public Affairs Office

Photo by Jim Higgins

The $2 million grant is the largest single contribution ever made by the Ameritech Founda-
THE NATIONAL DIGITAL LIBRARY PROGRAM

4 MAY 1996

continued on the next page

For each Library of Congress collection

that is digitized and uploaded to the

World Wide Web, National Digital Library (NDL) Program staff must choreograph and carry out a complex “dance” involving numerous partners throughout the Library, said LeeEllen Friedland, senior digital

conversion specialist for the NDL Program.

“We dance delicately with a lot of partners

here. We’re happy to do it, but it makes our

work a little more complex than one might

imagine,” Ms. Friedland said.

From the very first step—selecting which

collections to put on-line—digitization is a joint

venture. Custodial divisions submit nominations to NDL staffers, who evaluate the relevant

subject, technical and conservation issues

against their own criteria.

The Conservation Division plays a critical

role in digital decision-making, since the Library of Congress’s mission—unlike that of

some libraries—includes preserving the artifacts in its collections. Digitization can expose

artifacts to heavy handling; in some instances,

scanning can be particularly damaging since it

may involve repeatedly inverting items onto a

scanning bed, said Mary Wootton, a rare-book

conservator. The Library is in the forefront of

efforts to find or develop scanning methods

that minimize damage to rare materials. (See

Issue No. 5 for a story about digitizing rare

maps.)

But, paradoxically, putting a collection online “can be a tremendous life-saver for rare

items, since researchers then have much less

The challenge of digitizing artifacts

Many heads, careful hands, and the best

equipment are needed for a delicate task

Two of the

many people

who will be

involved in the

digital

coversion of a

single item—in

this case a rare

book published in 1898.

Steve

McCollum, a

digital conversion specialist,

and LeeEllen

Friedland

discuss the

scanning of

Wild Animals I

Have Known,

by Ernest Seton

Thompson.

Library of Congress photo by Yusef El-Amin
THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

MAY 1996 5

Putting a

collection on-line

will actually

extend its life,

“since researchers

then have much

less need to

handle [the items]

directly,” says

Mary Wootton, a

Library of

Congress rarebook conservator.

need to handle them directly,” noted Ms.

Wootton.

Conservation staff physically assess each collection to weigh the benefits of Internet accessibility against the extra wear and tear it will

undergo to get there. Conservation and the custodial division discuss whether digitization is

viable, but in most cases Conservation staff

have final say.

Legal restrictions on the materials—copyright status, terms of gift or issues related to

publicity and privacy—are also critical in deciding whether to digitize. NDL works with the

Copyright Office and General Counsel to consider whether and how to resolve these issues.

Once a collection is chosen, NDL works with

other offices to create a customized plan for

digitization.

Early on, NDL works with Information Technology Services to determine where on the

Library’s computers the new files will be stored.

NDL also works closely with the collection’s

curatorial division. Curatorial staff help prepare

materials for scanning, make available any access aids that exist and help NDL design new

aids tailored to the electronic environment.

A few divisions use other models of relating

to NDL. Over the years some have developed

their own in-division digital expertise and may

conduct their digitization efforts more autonomously from NDL.

The Prints and Photographs Division (P&P),

for example, has long experimented with electronic technologies to make its treasures more

accessible to the public. P&P has had about five

staff members working full-time since the mid1980s to prepare almost 500,000 images—first

for the Optical Disk Pilot Program, then for

American Memory and now for NDL. Large

collections of fragile negatives, such as the Detroit Publishing Co. collection of 25,000 glass

negatives and transparencies, need electronic

reference copies just to make public viewing

feasible.

The World Wide Web projects spearheaded

by NDL have been a natural progression for

P&P, said Helena Zinkham, head of processing.

“We’re pleased to have our collections on the

Internet,” Ms. Zinkham said. “Although we

have our own digitization program, NDL provides the infrastructure to make our collections

available outside our reading room. Currently

they are helping us put our finding aids on-line,

and we are working on some collections we

wouldn’t have otherwise. It’s been a fruitful

give-and-take.”

P&P “has been our most active partner,” confirmed Ms. Friedland. “Our relationship with

them is an excellent example of how cooperation can not only help NDL further its mission,

but also be good for the custodial division.”

Close partnerships continue throughout the

digitizing process, including the design of a customized homepage for each collection.

“The curators help us develop the framework materials, but we then take the lead in

preparing them for the homepage,” explained

Ms. Friedland.

At last, “We assemble all the pieces, test and

refine everything and then—we release the collection to the public,” said Ms. Friedland.

NDL’s work still doesn’t end when a collection is on-line. Maintenance and updating in

the on-line environment will continue indefinitely, as long as the Internet serves up cultural

treasures to users worldwide.

 —Kristin Knauth

 Kristin Knauth is a free-lance writer

working in the Public Affairs Office. See focus box on the next page for

some of the specific details of the

digitization process.
THE NATIONAL DIGITAL LIBRARY PROGRAM

6 MAY 1996

I

ronically, a book—one of the most ancient forms of information transmission, dating back as far as the ninth

century B.C.—is among the most difficult

media to transpose to the cutting-edge technology of the

World Wide Web,

say staff members at the National Digital Library (NDL) Program.

“Digitizing

movies and audio are really unspectacular compared to digitizing a book,” said

Carl Fleischhauer, coordinator, NDL.

The challenge is two-pronged. Because

the Library of Congress, unlike many libraries, is charged with preserving its artifacts, NDL cannot dismantle a book for

digitizing and then discard it, as some libraries do, said LeeEllen Friedland, senior

digital conversion specialist at NDL.

 To further complicate matters, until

very recently the equipment for digitally

capturing bound materials “has been inadequate,” she added.

puter and digital images would appear

by magic,” she commented. “That would

be nice—but in reality we’re forced to

confront the lowest-level technological issue: the

book as a

vulnerable

physical artifact. Conservation

and preservation,

ironically,

are really

our main

challenges

here.”

Fortunately, a

new generation of

“overhead

capture devices” is allowing libraries to safely scan

delicate materials. Rather than flattening

a book face-down on a glass surface, as

many scanners require, overhead capture

devices allow a book to be placed in a Vshaped cradle that doesn’t stress the

binding—a big plus for preservation.

Scanning is just the first step, however.

Most books accessible from the Library’s

Web pages can be viewed in two formats:

as graphic images and as machine-readable text files, which allow keyword

searching and other blessings of the digi-

“One might imagine that a book could

simply be vacuumed up into the comPreservation and digitization—

balancing the two responsibilities

continued on the next page

The Library’s

book treasures

will be read in

near-perfect

facsimile,

around the

globe and

around the

clock.

Decorative book ornaments used in this issue are from John Leighton’s 1,100 Designs and Motifs from Historic Sources.
THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

MAY 1996 7

tal realm. (The exception to this rule is

handwritten manuscripts, which are presented as graphic images only.)

Scanned images provide World Wide

Web users with the opportunity to view

images of a book’s actual pages on-line.

“There’s a tremendous advantage in being able to see the original page image,”

said Ms. Friedland. “Users know what

they are seeing is entirely accurate. And

the image provides scholars with important contextual information: handwritten

annotations, typographical design and so

forth.” Also, access to these scanned images can help reduce the amount of handling inflicted on the original artifacts.

To produce the machine-readable

copy, NDL turns over the scanned images

to outside contractors, who re-key the text

and encode it in SGML (Standard Generalized Markup Language).

NDL reviews the contractors’ work for

quality, performs or requests any needed

cleanup, then sends both the images and

SGML text files to the Library’s Information Technology Services division, which

places them on a computer server dedicated to housing NDL’s digital collections

and routing them to users.

Next, NDL’s resourcefulness comes

into play—by creating or coordinating

access aids for the newly digitized collection.

If the collection’s custodial division

has already developed finding aids and

bibliographic records, NDL makes use of

them and links them to the digital book.

But digitization is an opportunity to

create new access aids unique to the electronic environment, such as full-text indices that allow keyword searching, digital bibliographies, time lines or other aids

not found on the shelf.

“The whole of every digitized collection is greater than the sum of its parts,”

explained Ms. Friedland. “Digitization

provides an opportunity to reevaluate traditional access aids and think creatively

about how to re-use or adapt them to a

new environment.”

Finally, NDL staff incorporate all of the

digitized files into the “framing materials,” the customized World Wide Web

“homepages” developed for each collection.

After initial collaboration with curators, NDL staff design and produce the

Library’s homepages, adhering to general

Library guidelines for style and format.

NDL staff have to monitor fast-moving

developments in Web design and function

so that the Library’s homepages can reflect current trends, Ms. Friedland said.

Every digital collection also features an introduction and menu created specifically

for its Web form.

“Then we test and refine everything—

and release the collection,” said Ms.

Friedland.

Digitized, the Library’s book treasures

can be read in near-perfect facsimile,

around the globe and around the clock,

by anyone with Internet access.

—Kristin Knauth

Ironically, for

the hightechnology

digital library

project, the

Library “must

confront the

lowest-level

technological

issue: the

book as a

vulnerable

physical

artifact,” in

the words of

LeeEllen

Friedland,

senior digital

coversion

specialist.

continued from page 6
THE NATIONAL DIGITAL LIBRARY PROGRAM

8 MAY 1996

THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

A PERIODIC REPORT FROM

THE NATIONAL DIGITAL LIBRARY PROGRAM

Reports will be published about 12 times a

year, using gift funds. Comments and

suggestions are welcome.

Editorial Direction

Suzanne Thorin, Associate Librarian

Office of the Librarian

202/707-5220; SUTH@LOC.GOV

Laura Campbell, Director

National Digital Library Program

202/707-3300; LCAM@LOC.GOV

Managing Editor

Caroline Krewson

202/707-5220; CKRE@LOC.GOV

Associate Editor

Guy Lamolinara

202/707-9217; GLAM@LOC.GOV

* World Wide Web Access

URL: http://lcweb.loc.gov/ndl/per.html

ISSN 1083-3978

FIRST CLASS MAIL

POSTAGE & FEES PAID

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

WASHINGTON, D.C.

PERMIT No. G-103

THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

THE NATIONAL DIGITAL LIBRARY PROGRAM

WASHINGTON, D.C. 20540-5250

OFFICIAL BUSINESS

PENALTY FOR PRIVATE USE $300

Printed on recycled paper.

60 percent reclaimed products.

■ Produced by Nancy Brooks Publishing Services ■ Printed by Insty-Prints, Fairfax, VA

THIS REPORT

IS ON THE WEB*

IN

THIS

ISSUE

AMERITECH GIFT

ADVANCES

NATIONAL DIGITAL

LIBRARY GOALS

. . . . . . . . .PAGE 1

THE CHALLENGE

OF BRINGING

ARTIFACTS

TO DIGITAL

FORMATS

. . . . . . . . .PAGE 4

Sindy Benavides and

Greg Bilyk of

Hammond Middle School,

Alexandria, Va.,

demonstrate their Superhighway skills at the reception celebrating the Ameritech gift.

Second from left is

NDL Project Manager

Martha Dexter.

AMERITECH GIFT OF

$2 MILLION WILL WIDEN

ACCESS TO INTERNET

STORY BEGINS PAGE 1.

Library of Congress photo by Jim Higgins