A Bountiful Harvest of Metadata Mini-Grant Collections

It’s finally Fall and time to harvest the rewards of a summer’s worth of hard work for our seven (seven!) new contributors and additions to the collections of seven (yes, seven more!) current contributors to Ohio Digital Network and the Digital Public Library of America.

Inspiration to Youth award winners, Courtesy King Arts Complex

You might remember hearing about the launch of our Metadata Mini-Grant program at the end of 2020, and we’re so happy to share these great new collections with you now! With grant funding from the State Library of Ohio and the Institute for Museum and Library Services, these libraries and archives were able to digitize valued items and add metadata to their collections, all to make them ready for the viewing public and to add to DPLA. In total, over 9,000 items were added to DPLA from institutions in Ohio – wow!

Case Western Reserve University’s collection of Cleveland Play House photographs, Cleveland State University’s William Wynne Photographic Collection, Community Library’s Local History Archive, Kent Historical Society and Museum’s Oral History Collection, The King Arts Complex’s Photograph Collection, Marietta College’s Thomas Dwight Biscoe Collection, and Wright State University’s Wright Brothers Collection Photographs are now available as part of the Digital Public Library of America and will be easily accessed by students, historians, and genealogists far and wide.

First airplane flight in Texas history, courtesy Wright State University

In addition to these brand new contributors, we’ve also got additions from Cincinnati and Hamilton County Public Library, Dayton Metro Library, Kent State University, Ohio University Libraries, Toledo Lucas County Public Library, Wilmington College, and Worthington Libraries. Yes, these librarians have been busy!

It’s truly inspiring to think of the wide range and depth of these collections shared today, and that they are just part of the millions of items on DPLA that are also preserving the links to millions of our own local and personal histories.