About the Project: Project Narrative
Charles Irons, Assistant Professor of History at Elon University, began “Other Souths” as a project for the Center for Teaching and Learning at Elon University (link- http://org.elon.edu/catl/) in fall 2006. Through the CATL Scholars program, the center has been the primary source of support for the project, in the form of course releases and a modest budget. The original goals, first enunciated in the application (link to file, which will be attached with the email) remain:
- To provide meaningful opportunities for students interested in independent study or in history internships.
- To forge meaningful relationships with community members engaged in the production of public history and to enhance Elon’s offerings in public history.
- To train Elon students to use technology from a disciplinary perspective.
- To assist in the digital preservation of archival material, thereby complementing our Special Collections Library’s modest holdings and multiplying institutional opportunities for archival work.
In developing “Other Souths,” Irons built on earlier efforts to make Alamance County history accessible electronically. In the 1990s, Carole Troxler, then Professor of History at Elon, digitized some county history sources that became the germ of this project. She and her students transcribed an early version of the 1860 population census, in addition to the 1850 and 1860 agricultural censuses, the 1869 tax list, and several other sources. Her work inspired confidence that an ambitious digitization effort was both possible and desirable. Irons, who trained at the University of Virginia with digital history pioneer Edward L. Ayers (link to http://valley.vcdh.virginia.edu/), determined to carry this project forward. In addition to working with students to transcribe new databases, making connections between the databases, and developing the site itself, he has also reviewed and elaborated on Troxler’s earlier transcriptions.
Several individuals have contributed significantly to the development of this project:
J. P. Lavoie, a Multimedia Developer, is responsible both for the website design and for the programming that makes the databases work.
Brian Baute, Assistant Director of Application Technologies for Web Technology, helped to develop the infrastructure of the site’s database.
Wayne Conley, while a Multimedia Developer for Instructional Design & Development, helped develop the initial web interface and database management.
Zach Usher, Sam McGuire, Joi Mayo, and Chelsea Detrick, students at Elon University, assisted in the transcription of thousands of records.
On February 9, 2008, Elon University will host a mini-conference on county history, featuring Troxler, Irons, William and Mary’s Scott Reynolds Nelson, and the University of Richmond’s Robert Kenzer. The event marks the completion of the first stage of the project and a substantive step towards the fulfillment of the project’s goals including the creation of meaningful relationships with community members engaged in the production of public history.
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