The Essex Society for
Archaeology and History is launching an ambitious project to digitise the whole
of its back catalogue of publications beginning with the indexes of its
earliest series of Transactions.
Founded in 1852 as the Essex
Archaeological Society, the countywide organisation has produced thousands of
articles of historical, social and archaeological interest in its
Transactions. Although these are available
to view in larger libraries and archive centres they have had, to quote
Reverend Cox back in 1908, “only limited circulation among the members of that
excellent association”.
Digitisation opens the
opportunity to republish items which could not have been imagined forty years
ago when the Society decided to edit paper copies of indexes in order to save
the expense of printing.
Digitisation has several
advantages. It reduces our need to
retain a vast storeroom of books for sale.
It perhaps allows individuals to hold copies of items which they cannot accommodate
in their already over bulging bookshelves.
It makes available our publications at low cost. It reduces administration. It promotes the Society’s aims. It enables online publication of our
work.
This will be a long-term
project.
Elected members of the Society’s
Council have agreed a budget of £100 to begin by producing one back catalogue
item each month. These will be made
available in pdf format to members only initially.
The pace of the project will then
be stepped up when the new website becomes available allowing files to be
loaded onto the Internet. Many of our
kindred organisations are published selected back-catalogue items online.
There are a number of ‘quick
wins’ which could be achieved at an extraordinarily low cost. One is to provide a complete index for the
‘old’ and ‘new’ series of Transactions. These
cover all the articles produced by the Society between 1858 and 1960. The index volumes in paper format comprise of
twelve booklets which could be produced sequentially as a single digitised document.
Using a searchable pdf has clear
advantages. Publication online early
will almost certainly attract the attention of both the amateur and
professional historian.
In addition to the
Transactions, since 1973 the Society has produced a members’ magazine (its
Newsletter) which contains articles of equal importance to its annual
publication. No paper copies remain in
our storeroom for sale. Producing the sequence
of Newsletters from 1973 to 1999 (Nos. 41 to 130) is a further priority.
Our Society’s association with
the Colchester Museum is a long one. To
mark the reopening of the Castle to the public, and reinterpretation of
Colchester’s history, we aim to digitise the back numbers of the annual report.
Occasional papers and ‘Feet of
Fines’ are other ESAH publications which warrant digitisation.
The quantity of material inevitably
makes this a long term project. I hope that members will support this
initiative by signing up to receive publications as they become available.
Andrew Smith
Hon Deputy Librarian
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