Building a collaborative public library web

[asimm22]

Whether documenting the indie music scene of the 1990s, researching the history of local abolitionists and formerly enslaved peoples in the 1840s, or helping patrons research the early LGBT movement in the area, I am frequently reminded of what was not saved or is not physically present in our collections. These gaps or silences often reflect subcultures in our community, stories that were not told on the pages of the local newspaper, or which might not be reflected in the websites of city government or local institutions. In my first sit down with a fellow staff member to talk about the prospects for a web archive, we brainstormed how we could more completely capture the digital record of today’s community. We discussed including lesser known elements like video of music shows in house basements, the blog of a small queer farm commune in the hills, the Instagram account of the kid who photographs local graffiti, etc. My colleague Heather whispered to me excitedly: “We could make it weird!” I knew immediately I had found my biggest ally in building our collections.

The Forbes Library was one of a few public libraries buy sales lead chosen nationwide for the Community Webs cohort, a group of public libraries organized by the Internet Archive and funded by the Institute of Museum and Library Services to expand web archiving in local history collections. As a librarian in a small city of 28,000 people, who works in a public library with no full-time archivists, the challenge of trying to build a web archive from scratch that truly reflected our rich, varied and “weird” cultural community, the arts and music scenes, and the rich tradition of activism in Western Massachusetts was a daunting but exciting project to embark on.

We knew we would have to leverage our working relationships with media organizations, nonprofits, city departments, the arts and music community, and our staff if we truly hoped to build something which reflected our community as it is. Our advantage was that we had such relationships, and could pitch the idea not only through traditional means like press releases and social media, but by chatting after meetings typically spent coordinating film screenings, gallery walks, and lawn concerts.