As local and regional historians we tend to have the luxury of being relatively close to the primary sources we need to do history. Each city or region is inevitably different and in turn will have different resources available to historians. Before a local or regional historian can dive into a project he or she needs to become familiar with the resources that are available in the area of study. In this post I will provide local researchers in the Inland Northwest with a variety of resources that could be valuable as you get to digging.
As Spokanites or Inland Northwesterners we are quite fortunate to have a robust traditional source base. We can access a number of local museums, archives, and libraries that have a wide variety of different primary and secondary sources that could be useful. Researchers can visit the Eastern Region Branch of the Washington State Archives, Northwest Museum of Arts and Culture/Eastern Washington State Historical Society, and the Ned Barnes Northwest Room just to name a few. All three of these institutions have engaged archivists that will be happy to help you with research questions over the phone or by email. But ultimately you will likely need to make a trip down to these locations in order to do the actual research. There will be times where this type of in-person research is necessary in order to find what you are looking for. However, in our increasingly digital environment, we can do much of the research we need from the comfort of our own homes, and pajamas.
Digital resources are very valuable but they are kept in a number of different repositories that have different websites, unique user interfaces, and varied levels of searchability. There are some efforts to aggregate all of these digital resources into a single digital public library. The project with the most traction is the Digital Public Library of America. In an article preceding its launch in 2013, historian and librarian Robert Darnton explains that the “DPLA will be a distributed system of electronic content that will make the holdings of public and research libraries, archives, museums, and historical societies available, effortlessly and free of charge, to readers located at every connecting point of the Web.” This a wonderful idea and if it is successful will provide a central point for historians to start their digital research.
It sounds great, but unfortunately it it is not an easy task. The DPLA faces some substantial legal challenges involving copyright. The original pioneer of a national public library, Google Books, was stopped in its tracks by copyright laws. Furthermore, the DPLA’s success relies entirely on the cooperation of local and regional institutions. As Darnton explain, “expansion, at the local or global level, depends on the ability of libraries and other institutions to develop their own digital databases—a long-term, uneven process that requires infusions of money and energy.” The DPLA has made huge strides in the past few years but it will still be some time until the DPLA’s search engine is our key to all digital resources.
In the meantime, we will have to continue to work with each individual institution or repository’s digital collection and this requires that we be flexible and willing to learn. I will give a brief introduction to the three digital resources that I find to be most useful for local historians working in Spokane, Washington.
Google News Archive: This is the gold standard for digital newspaper research in Spokane. Google has digitized long runs of all of the major newspapers and many of the smaller papers that were printed in Spokane. You can find articles as old as 1883 and as recent as 2007. You can browse each individual newspaper by day or you can search using keywords. The problem with Google News is that the user interface is awful at best. The search function is miserably underpowered and cannot search within a particular newspaper but only within the entire newspaper database. This means that if you intend to do a search for segregation in Spokane, you must put the words “Spokane segregation” into the search. If you only put “segregation” you will get results from all newspapers in the database. This can make finding articles on certain topics in your geographic location challenging. Nonetheless Google News Archive is still the most robust online newspaper resource for Spokane. You just need to get comfortable navigating it.
Washington State Digital Archives: This is the most valuable resource for locating and viewing government documents created by government agencies within Washington State. This includes records created by cities, counties, and the state. As historians we often want to find “official” records like birth, death, marriage, and naturalization records. These help us to ground the sources we have found in newspapers or elsewhere. The Washington State Digital Archives also holds a variety of other resources like photographs and oral histories. The problem with the site is very similar to my criticism of Google News. It is a little cumbersome and challenging to navigate and search the site. But once you are comfortable with it, you will drive rather smoothly through the interface.
Northwest Museum of Arts and Culture, Online Collections: This digital collection is just getting started. The museum began digitizing its photograph collection over a year ago and has made considerable headway on the efforts. The museum’s photograph collection is likely the largest in town, second only to the Spokesman-Review, and now you can search the majority of it online. Unfortunately the photos are not in the public domain so you cannot use them freely as you wish. However, the museum has a reasonable rights and reproduction policy for students and scholars when you need permission to publish. Even though the photos are not in the public domain, they can still be useful for research purposes.
This was just a few of the many resources available to local and regional historians in Spokane but as you can see, doing history in your pajamas is as real a possibility as it ever has been in the past.
I like your introduction to the resources you like best. I also find the Google News Archive frustrating. I always start with the Library of Congress for my newspaper needs. I agree we are lucky to have so many resources available to us. I recently looked at an article “250+ Killer Digital Libraries and Archives” and while it wasn’t an all-inclusive list there were some states, like Mississippi, that only had one listing. So maybe they don’t have many to choose from and maybe those they have aren’t awesome. But here we are in a digitally rich environment, and that’s pretty cool.
Good stuff! You’re right that we’re in a good place to be doing local history. I think the DPLA is different from Google Books in some important ways that address copyright problems, but it’s a problem, for sure. I’m glad to see the MAC’s online collections growing, but as you said, their materials are not in the public domain, which puts a damper on how much they can really be part of the movement for open access.