for further information contact:

Jo-Ann Michalak, Director of Tisch Library

617-627-3345

Second Annual Berger Family Technology

Award

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Medford, MA, January 11, 1999- The second annual Tufts University Berger Family Technology Award was bestowed on The Electronic Bolles Archives on the History and Topography of London: Phase I submitted by an interdisciplinary team of Gregory Colati, Gregory Crane, Carol Flynn, Rob Jacobs and Holly Taylor. The award culminates a competitive proposal process and provides funding of $42,000.00. The Berger Family established the endowment to retrain library staff to function in the increasingly high technology digital library and also to prepare students and faculty to effectively use technology. It is believed that the endowment is the first of its kind to train library staff and faculty in new technology.

The Bolles collection is one of the outstanding holdings in the University's Special Collections used both in teaching and research. The Electronic Bolles Archives begins to digitize and electronically publish the Bolles collection on the Web so it will reach a much larger audience while reducing the wear and tear on the collection. The project will digitize the collection's London maps from 1762 through 1895 and link them to each other using Geographic Information Systems technology so that the user can virtually walk the streets of London seeing them as they were in different time periods. Edwin Bolles, a former Chaplain at Tufts, assembled a substantial collection of maps, books, pamphlets and images manually linked to a 3,000 page bibliography, Walter Thornbury's Old and new London, a narrative of its history, its people and its places (London, New York, Cassell, Peter & Galpin [1872]. The project will provide new teaching and research opportunities for a Tufts University interdisciplinary team made up of the following members:

Gregory Colati, the University Archivist who is also responsible for Special Collections, has implemented electronic processing of archival material to simultaneously create Web entries and internal online registers. He along with Greg Crane will be in charge of overseeing the day-to-day work on the project.

Gregory Crane, Professor of Classics and Winnick Family Professor of Technology and Entrepreneurship, has a long standing interest in the design of digital libraries for the humanities and the application of GIS. His Perseus project will provide much of the technical infrastructure for the project.

Carol Flynn, Professor of English, teaches courses that explore the relationship between the city of London and English literature of the 18th and 19th centuries. She is also writing a book on representations of eighteenth century London and the construction of early modern urban space. Carol and the other collaborators will provide advice and guidance throughout the project.

Rob Jacobs, Associate Professor in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, works on computer human interaction. He will design the initial project interface with a goal of relating the rich and complex data in a seamless fashion.

Holly Taylor, Assistant Professor Psychology, does research in the areas of text comprehension and spatial cognition. In this project, she will study the effect of linking geographic information to literary texts and of different interfaces into the geographic data.

The specific technology transfer goals of the Electronic Bolles Archive project are:

1. The Special Collections department will learn how to create TEI conformant SGML facsimile editions of its material. They will also learn how to utilize geographic information systems technology in general and the GIS Center is the Tisch Library in particular.
2. The project team will run a series of workshop/presentations on various aspects of the project. This will include technical issues (e.g., particulars of scanning and formatting) and broader topics (e.g., how the Bolles Electronic Archives supports teaching and research in humanities, social sciences and engineering. These workshops will be aimed at Tisch Library staff, the Tufts community and interested members of the Boston Library Consortium.

The Berger Family has been generous donors to Tufts University. Over the years, they have contributed to the renovations of Tisch Library and established an endowed professorship in the College of Engineering. Members of the Berger Family Technology Transfer Endowment Advisory Board are: Amy Friedlander, the representative of the Berger Family and Associate Director for Research, Center for Information Strategy and Policy in Washington, D.C.; Susan Martin, Director of the Lauringer Library, Georgetown University and member of the Libraries Board of Overseers, Tufts University; Mel Bernstein, Vice President, Arts, Sciences & Technology; Ioannis Miaoulsi, Dean of Engineering; Susan Ernst, Dean of Natural & Social Sciences; Leila Fawaz, Dean of Arts & Humanities; Klaus Miczek, Chair of the Library Committee; Vincent Manno, Co-Chair, Faculty Computing Committee; Jo-Ann Michalak, Director of Tisch Library.

A Berger website has been established. A celebratory dinner is also planned in November 1999 to honor the Electronic Bolles Archives team, who will report on the results of their project tot he Advisory Board. The result of all awarded projects will be submitted for publication to professional journals, as well as be highlighted in Tufts print and electronic publications.