Digitally Archiving Historical Sites?

Black_Macrame asks: "I have recently moved from 10 years of working with the net in various capacities (read all) to a slightly more analog field. I am now the curator of a Historical Site in Texas which is essentially, a relatively isolated, old (1875) family home. It once was a school, and is now currently a tax shelter for the family, and a fertile wildlife sanctuary. No-one has opened many of the drawers of the furniture here since they were last shut. There are letters of love, war, death, and all the usual human experiences, plus alot of antiques and many old books. It's a big historical database and I want to archive -everything- digitally: letters, furniture, books, 360 VRML of the rooms and even old 78 rpm records. Does anyone out there have any experience with similar projects? Any suggestions for tracking the antiques (books, furniture, knick-knacks) online? Suggestions for archiving the 78's? Anything in general?"

Comments

archiving the homestead

[digitalmuse]

Having just finished moving my parents out of the house they have lived in for 20+ years (how many people do that anymore, last I heard, the average american family relocates every 2-3 years...) I spent a fair amount of time documenting the house itself, it's contents and it's history. The homestead (as I like to refer to it...) was built in the early 1800's by the same person who built the structure which is now the town's Historical Society property. This allowed us to cross-reference the floor-plans and construction styles between our house which had undergone many renovations over the years, and a house that had been left more-or-less intact.
I also went through the house and took pictures of each room including each of the walls, and any other unique structures (ie: the beehive oven in the basement, the hand-carved mouldings in the parlor, the original fan-light over the front door, etc...) or additions (the safe we hid in a wall durring reconstruction of two rooms). These pictures were all taken with a consumer-grade digital camera (Canon A20) so I do not have high hopes for them insofar as reconstructing QTVR or anything like that. However I think that combined with the detailed floor-plans, I have more than enough information to build a rough 3D model at some point in the future if I ever decide to embark on that little adventure.
We have archived all this information with the local historical society for public use (minus any private details... such as the safe) and I guess our involvement in the house is at an end. But I like to think that if my children ever want to know what the house I grew up in looked like, I can give them a good idea of what it was, and what made it so unique.
As far as the methodology for storing any information you collect in the process of documenting the household you are responsible for, please try and keep to open formats, and if possible, only touch the originals once. If you are willing to put the time and effort into archiving all the paperwork yourself, I would have to suggest investing in (or building yourself) a basic copy-stand. Such a rig will allow you to capture images (digital or film, tho' I would suggest digital, simply based on the per-image cost of handling film development) with a minimum of external variables, which may be increasingly important if you are working with color subjects.
I would also suggest that you be prepared to spend a fair ammount of time creating a multi-layer catalog for all the information you produce. Once you have removed the subjects from the physical realm and transfered them to digital representations, you lose the physical orientation and placement that helps keep them referenced to each other. Each item should be given a unique ID and a full record made of where it was originally located, what it was bundled with, any clues or physical cues that lead you to assume it's age, origin, provenance, etc... If you wish to make this information 'useful' to the next person who wishes to search through it, you must provide as much information as possible.
I would suggest getting in touch with your local historical society, or even looking farther afield to a profesional archivist for suggestions or assistance in planing the process before anything is disturbed.
As always, keep multiple backups in separate locations and be prepared to learn more than you ever thought you could ever find out about the people who's lives passed through those doors.
Best of luck to you, and don't forget to use acid-free paper (and CD's...)