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  • Home
  • News
  • Featured Books
    • All Featured Books
    • Book of the Month Series
  • User Stories
  • Campaigns
    • Fossil Stories
    • Garden Stories
    • Monsters Are Real
    • Page Frights
    • Her Natural History
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Biodiversity Heritage Library - Program news and collection highlights from BHL

All posts tagged with transcription

Blog Reel, Featured Books

The Life and Work of Robert Alexander Gilbert: Empowering New Insights through Digitization and Transcription of Archival Materials

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Robert Alexander Gilbert (1870-1942) was a Black photographer interested in ornithology and chemistry who worked for ornithologist William Brewster from the mid 1890s until Brewster’s death in 1919 and at various tasks around the Museum of Comparative Zoology (MCZ) at Harvard University beyond 1919. He was an Associate of the American Ornithologists’ Union.

Gilbert was not officially recognized for his photographic work with William Brewster, although Brewster did not claim credit for all the images in his collection. It was assumed that Brewster took all the photographic prints bequeathed to the Ernst Mayr Library and Archives of the MCZ (EMLA) upon his death. However, while conducting research for a book, author John Hanson Mitchell, former editor of the Massachusetts Audubon Society’s (MAS) Sanctuary magazine, discovered over 2000 of Brewster’s glass plate negatives in the attic of a building owned by the MAS. One of the images in particular, a photograph of a young, well-attired Black man standing in front of a rustic cabin in the wilderness, captured his interest. Mitchell was curious as to the identity of this young man. Later, in the mid-1970s, Mitchell had a chance encounter with an Archives Assistant at the MCZ who suggested to him that all of Brewster’s photographs were, in fact, taken by Brewster’s assistant, a young Black man named Robert Gilbert. This piqued Mitchell’s interest and launched his journey to discover more about Gilbert.[1] The quest culminated with the publication in 2005 of Mitchell’s Looking for Mr. Gilbert: the Reimagined Life of an African American. In 2014 an e-book edition was published as well.

Mitchell’s publication helps provide new insight into Robert Gilbert’s life and work. Brewster’s journals and diaries, now digitally available on the Biodiversity Heritage Library (BHL), are also valuable records attesting to Gilbert’s contributions in a variety of areas. While only a handful of Brewster’s photographs in the MCZ collection can be positively attributed to Gilbert, it is clear that Gilbert was with Brewster for photo sessions during the years they worked together. The photographic relationship between Brewster and Gilbert is intriguing. There is new enthusiasm to examine Brewster’s journals and diaries more closely now that they are digitized and being transcribed, to clarify Gilbert’s role in photographic collaboration with Brewster. As a result of identifying connections between the collections in the Museum of American Bird Art at the Massachusetts Audubon Society and the EMLA, a cooperative research project is underway.

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February 23, 2021byJoseph deVeer and Constance Rinaldo
Blog Reel, Campaigns, Her Natural History

Transcribe Field Notes by Female Naturalists with the #HerNaturalHistory Transcription Challenge

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Looking for a challenge? The Smithsonian Institution Archives and the Smithsonian Transcription Center are teaming up for a #HerNaturalHistory-themed transcription challenge. Starting today (8 March), help a team of #volunpeers transcribe field notes from conservation biologist Devra Kleiman and botanist Cleofé Calderon. Dive into observations of golden lion tamarins with Kleiman, who worked at Smithsonian’s National Zoological Park from 1972 to 2001. And head to South America with Calderón to collect grasses for Smithsonian’s Department of Botany.

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March 8, 2019byGrace Costantino
Blog Reel, Featured Books

Notes from William Brewster: The Evolving Field of Zoology

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As a part of the Field Notes Project, the Ernst Mayr Library is digitizing the journals, correspondences and photographs of William Brewster (1851-1919), a self-trained ornithologist and specimen curator at Harvard’s Museum of Comparative Zoology (MCZ), the first president of the Massachusetts Audubon Society, and a co-founder and president of the American Ornithologists’ Union.  Brewster recorded a lifetime of observations on wildlife and plants, changing landscapes, and daily weather, making his notes a valuable resource for modern scientists studying ecological change.
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April 6, 2017byElizabeth Meyer
Blog Reel, Campaigns, Featured Books

Holmes, Shells, and the Intersection of Art & Science

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From November 28th through December 9th, BHL is joining the Smithsonian Libraries, Smithsonian Institution Archives, Smithsonian Field Book Project, and Smithsonian Transcription Center in hosting the #ManyHatsofHolmes transcription event. This event challenges volunteers around the world to help us transcribe William Henry Holmes’ archival materials. Learn more on the Smithsonian Libraries’ blog. As the hashtag implies, William Henry Holmes (1846-1933) studied a variety of topics throughout his distinguished career, including anthropology, archaeology, art, and geology.
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November 30, 2016byGrace Costantino
Blog Reel, Featured Books

Digging into the personal writings of a 19th century ornithologist

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Tuesday, June 12, 1866  A.M. pleasant P.M. cloudy. Studied part of P.M. Went to circus in evening & saw a hippopotamus for the first time. Got four warbling vireos before breakfast. The algebra is now rather hard.  (Diaries of William Brewster).  As a teen in Cambridge, Massachusetts during the 1860s, William Brewster (1851-1919) woke up early to collect birds before school, practiced taxidermy with friends, and carefully noted the dates when local plants flowered and produce ripened in the family garden. His early fascination for birds and his observant note-taking laid the groundwork for his career as a prominent amateur ornithologist.
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July 1, 2016byElizabeth Meyer
BHL News, Blog Reel

We Challenge You to #DigIntoDyar

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This post originally published on the Smithsonian Libraries blog Unbound.  Important entomological work. The Bahá’í faith. Secret tunnels under Washington, DC. What do all of these elements have in common? Curiously, Smithsonian scientist Harrison Gray Dyar, Jr.. Dyar, Honorary Custodian of Lepidoptera at the United States National Museum (now, National Museum of Natural History) for over 30 years, was a prolific entomologist – studying sawflies, moths, butterflies and mosquitos and publishing his findings. He described hundreds of species and genera and brought new ones to light.
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May 13, 2016byErin Rushing
Blog Reel, Campaigns, Fossil Stories

Finishing #FossilFossick with #FossilStories

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On October 9, we challenged Smithsonian Transcription volunteers to transcribe the field notes of Ladd, Ward, and G. Arthur Cooper. See the details of the challenge here. It took exactly three and a half days for volunteers to completely transcribe 9 sets of field notes totaling 252 pages. An average of 14 people contributed to each project. The range?
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October 16, 2015byMeghan Ferriter
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The Biodiversity Heritage Library (BHL) is the world’s largest open access digital library for biodiversity literature and archives. Headquartered at the Smithsonian Libraries and Archives in Washington, D.C., BHL operates as a worldwide consortium of natural history, botanical, research, and national libraries working together to digitize the natural history literature held in their collections and make it freely available for open access as part of a global “biodiversity community.”

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