PRESERVING THE HISTORY OF U. S. AGRICULTURE AND RURAL LIFE
AN N.E.H. FUNDED GRANT AT THE UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA
FINAL report
June 2001
I. INTRODUCTION:
The University of Florida has participated in the USAIN
grant, in two distinct stages, since July of 1996. The first stage, production of a comprehensive bibliography
for Florida agriculture and rural life, 1820-1945, was completed in June of
1998. The second stage,
preservation quality microfilming of certain volumes from the bibliography, was
completed in April of 2001. Both
stages were eventful and ultimately successful.
In the end, almost two thousand volumes of agricultural literature
specific to Florida, covering topics such as cattle ranching, sugar production
and orange growing have been preserved for posterity.
Three hundred and fifty reels of film containing almost 1,400 distinct
titles are now available for consultation and research by scholars across the US
and the world. This contribution to
the preservation of agricultural knowledge will be of benefit to researchers for
hundreds of years to come.
II.
PHASE ONE (BIBLIOGRAPHY)
As final and supplemental reports for Phase One have
previously been submitted, (April 1997 and August 1998) I will only briefly
touch on the bibliography phase in this report. The document was compiled by Dr. Vernon Kisling, with
significant input from expert scholars in the field of Florida agriculture.
Titles in the categories of monographs, serials and dissertations were
identified and ranked on a scale of 1 to 4, with one being the most significant
and 4 the least. Instrumental in the production of the document were staff
members from the Marston Science Library and Special Collections Department.
Both paper and electronic versions of the document were developed.
III.
PHASE TWO (FILMING)
Phase Two, the filming stage, began in July of 1998. The project had many smaller, distinct sub-phases, including initial gathering of the volumes, cataloging of the titles, the filming itself, quality control of the resultant reels and all follow up procedures. While the process was not always fuss free and we did need two no-cost extensions, the University of Florida exceeded its goals of filming 583 titles in 1,749 volumes by a substantial margin. Please see the table in Appendix One for further details.
A.
GATHERING
The first step UF Preservation staff undertook after
receiving an electronic copy of the bibliography and converting it into an
Access database, was gathering the volumes ranked 1 and 2 on the bibliography.
The vast majority of the volumes were physically held in the Marston
Science Library. Other volumes were
located in the P.K. Yonge Library of Florida History in the Special Collections
Department and various IFAS experiment stations across the state, especially the
one located in Lake Alfred. Occasionally,
a volume on the list was not owned by a UF affiliated institution. In this case, we made use of the InterLibrary Loan system.
Unfortunately, many of the volumes we requested had been placed in the
loaning library’s Special Collection Department due to age and condition and
were not allowed to circulate. This
occurred at insitutions such as the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill,
the Jacksonville (Fla.) Public Library and the University of Miami, Otto J.
Richter Library. Our success with gathering volumes outside of the University of
Florida environment was limited. Finally,
a big thanks to Dan Lech at the National Agriculture Library for helping us fill
in some of the larger gaps in our serial runs.
Another factor that contributed to difficulties we had
gathering physical volumes concerned the use of the bibliography prepared in
Phase One. As noted by Jean
Gilbertson in her May 1999 USAIN final report from Wisconsin (p. 3), the
bibliography stage could be seen as having two possible outcomes. One, to create a list of all volumes relating to agriculture
published in a given state, or two, to create a list of ‘filmables’ for the
preservation filming phase of the grant. Gilbertson
and her team decided to create a bibliography that fulfilled the second possible
purpose, a list of titles available for filming.
The bibliography for Florida tended more toward the first outcome.
Consequently, some of the volumes ranked 1 and 2 were not available for
filming. Therefore, we chose to
mine the bibliography deeper, occasionally using volumes ranked 3.
While gathering volumes took longer than anticipated, ultimately enough
were gathered for filming.
B. CATALOGING
The importance of the cataloging process to the success of
this project cannot be underestimated. By
upgrading internal NOTIS records to AACR2, adding holdings to OCLC and noting
the availability of the film, the cataloging process increased the access
scholars have to the information in this collection immeasurably.
Staff in the Resource Services Department originally intended to fit in
USAIN work amongst their daily duties, handing over to student support staff
some of their regular responsibilities, allowing them to concentrate on the
agricultural documents. However, this approach did not satisfactorily keep up with
the level of cataloging productivity needed and in January of 2000, a cataloger
was hired to concentrate full time on the USAIN documents.
Another personnel issue that impacted heavily on the cataloging process
was the lack of a serials cataloger within the Resource Services Department for
over 18 months. With no serials cataloger on staff, work initially focused on
monographs, pamphlets and theses/dissertations. A serials cataloger was hired in February of 2000 and work on
the complex problems of serials and their numerous title changes commenced in
earnest at that time.
C.
FILMING
By December 1999, enough volumes had been gathered and
cataloged to warrant hiring filmers dedicated exclusively to the project.
The filming was done in-house, using a Kodak MR-D2 camera and student
filmers. Processing and duplication
duties were performed by a local microfilm vendor who has worked with us for
years. The University of Florida
has used student labor to produce preservation quality film for many years, with
very good results. Extensive training procedures and complete online
documentation, along with close supervision by our full time microfilm
technician, allows University of Florida to produce high quality film at
relatively low costs. The only
drawback to this system can be scheduling difficulties pertaining to classes,
breaks and holidays.
Due to the 18 month vacancy in the serials cataloger
position, the early months of filming concentrated on the monographs, pamphlets
and dissertations that had completed the cataloging process.
Early months showed high volume and title counts in both the monograph
and pamphlet categories. We filmed our first serial in April of 2000.
Filming picked up steam in late summer and early fall, as between 30 and
40 reels of film were being produced each month.
Our goal of 583 filmed titles was passed in mid-June of 2000, while we
reached the volume count goal of 1,749 in March of 2001.
As we still had funds, time and cataloged volumes prepared, we continued
production until the end of April. We
surpassed our goal and ultimately filmed 1,941 volumes and 1,388 titles.
Statistically, serials proved problematic, as a long run of
thick periodicals that filled an entire truck may have only produced statistics
counts of one title and 20 to 25 volumes. A
prime example of this occurred in the month of September 2000.
That month, no titles were filmed, while only 71 serial volumes were
filmed on 33 reels of film. (Typically,
between 5 and 7 monographs will fill a reel of film.)
Since we were filming a long, thick serial run which had begun in August
and continued through the whole month of September, the title count of one for
approximately 2 months can be a misleading indicator of actual production.
It is my feeling that while title and volume count numbers are
meaningful, further information regarding reels produced and images filmed might
better inform actual production analyses. Again,
please see the table in Appendix One for a fuller accounting of the film
produced by the University of Florida for the USAIN grant.
D.
QUALITY CONTROL
The quality of the film produced for this grant was of utmost importance to us. As with all film produced here at the University of Florida, staff adhered to national standards set for microfilm production, bibliographic control, processing, duplication quality control and long term master negative storage promulgated by agencies such as ANSI, AIIM, and the Research Library Group (RLG).
E.
FOLLOW UP PROCEDURES
Though filming ceased in late April of 2001 and the grant
has officially ended, work will continue for several more months.
Updates to local and national databases based on information provided to
us by the duplication agent continue, as does physical processing of both
negative and positive film. Four
copies of each reel of film were produced, two negatives and two positives.
The camera master negatives will be sent to National Underground Storage
in Boyers, PA for long term storage, with responsibility resting with the
National Agriculture Library (NAL). The
print master negatives will be stored by the University of Florida at
Preservation Resources, of Bethlehem, PA. One
positive was created for use at NAL and the second will be stored here at the
University of Florida. Positives
copies of this film will be available to libraries via ILL. If a library would like to acquire a reel for their
collection on a permanent basis, Preservation Department staff can provide it on
a cost recovery basis.
F.
SUMMARY
The four and a half years devoted to the two stages of the
USAIN grant have been an exciting and fulfilling time for staff at the
University of Florida. From Special
Collections and Marston Science Library collection managers working on the
bibliography, through serials and monograph catalogers in Resource Services to
staff and students in the Preservation Department, the entire library pulled
together as a team to create a valuable new scholarly resource in the field of
agricultural history.
Respectfully submitted,
Cathleen L. Mook
Cathleen L. Mook
Head, Preservation Department
Primary Investigator
USAIN Microfilming Grant
University of Florida
Gainesville, FL 32611
APPENDIX ONE
United States Agricultural Information Network (USAIN)
National
Preservation Program for the History of Agriculture and Rural Life
University of
Florida
FINAL STATISTICS
June 2001
NEH grant funds, administered by Cornell, used to support all stages of grant, including:
$92,980.25
|
Type
of document filmed |
Titles |
Volumes |
|
Monograph |
416 |
423 |
|
Pamphlet |
791 |
791 |
|
Theses/dissertation |
156 |
156 |
|
Serial/periodical |
25 |
571 |
|
Grand
totals |
1388 |
1941 |
Total number of reels produced: 350
Total number of images produced: 187,558
Per title cost: $66.98
Per volume cost: $47.90
Per reel cost: $265.50
Per image cost: $0.49
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