Craft Revival Project

Newsletter: February 2008

Interim Report

As many of you well remember, January was the month that the project team met with the project’s reviewers from the State Library. At that meeting we distributed an interim report that detailed our progress on the project. The Year III Interim Report, including individual reports by Home Team members, is posted on the Library Insider pages at http://library.wcu.edu/libraryinsider/craftrevivalgrant/index.htm.

Site Team Report

This month we received the evaluation from the State Library review team after their visit to Cullowhee in January. A summary of their recommendations is as follows:

Request funding for a project archivist in the final year.
Improve access to the larger view of an image.
Limit links in ContentDM to meaningful words.
Create and upload technical assistance page.
Include items not strictly from time period if they are appropriate to the story.
Include objects not owned by HPs if the appropriate clearances for use have been obtained.
Provide additional storage for HPs.
Establish policies and procedures to add relevant material after the grant period ends.
Address the ongoing sustainability of the website (both technology and procedural maintenance).
Clarify what support structure will be available to sustain appropriate contributions after the grant funding ends.

The full report has been posted to the Library Insider pages.

Year IV Grant Application

Gathering info and writing the project’s Year IV grant application has been the major focus of work during the month of February. In order to meet the grant deadline, we had to push quickly. Anna has been meeting with Dr. Dana Sally, the new Dean of Library Services, to acquaint him with the project and complete the grant application in time for submission. The application will be soon posted to the Library Insider pages.

Home Team activity

The Home Team has been plowing through a backlog of disks arriving at the Hunter Library. So happy to have so much coming in! We are almost finished posting all of those to the database. Ginny Daley has been finishing the remediation; Tim Carstens has been uploading new contributions. We have worked hard to refine the process of moving disks from our in-box to uploading, reviews, revisions, and processing disks for preservation storage. We now have a smoother work flow with differentiated responsibilities for each member of the team.

Target numbers and new entries

Thanks to the hard work of our Heritage Partners, we currently have 2,500 digital files in the Craft Revival database. In order to process Heritage Partner disks before the end of this year, plan to mail your Year III submissions by April 30th. Please take note of new additions to the database, including lots of photographs and information on dyeing and carving from the John C. Campbell Folk School; furniture by Jesse Stalcup and a Bea Hensley blacksmith interview from the Mountain Heritage Center; and brochures, photographs, and a solid run of annual meeting minutes from inception to 1945 from the Southern Highland Craft Guild.

New web uploads

Check out new web pages for:

Georg Bidstrup at http://craftrevival.wcu.edu/people/georgbidstrup.html
Marguerite Butler Bidstrup at http://craftrevival.wcu.edu/people/margueritebidstrup.html
Penland’s Craft Today at http://craftrevival.wcu.edu/story/penland_today.html
Lots of new Lesson Plans at http://craftrevival.wcu.edu/resources/index.html
Additions to the Press Room at http://craftrevival.wcu.edu/about/pressroom.html
Revisions to About the Project at http://craftrevival.wcu.edu/about/index.html

Outreach and the Revival in the news

The Smoky Mountain. News ran an article picturing our own Jason Woolf completing the installation of a borrowed exhibit that’s now up in the Hunter Library. (See “WCU Photo Exhibit” on the Press Room page) The exhibit on regional crafts has been at the Library for 3 months and comes down this month. HandMade in America has invited us to install a second exhibition at the I-26 Welcome Center. Anna and Jason are working with items from the Mountain Heritage Center to go along with an interpretive panel that illustrates a database page and metadata. The exhibit focuses on textiles and ironwork. The university’s alumni magazine ran an article about the Craft Revival’s partnership with HandMade, featuring Associate Director Jenny Moore’s addition to the project’s Advisory Board (see “Revival Meeting” on the Press Room page). Also this month, Anna gave a talk on the Craft Revival for a WCU Art and Society class.

Advisory/HP meeting

We are still working on setting a date for a spring Advisory/HP meeting to be held at the end of March or the first week in April. Jason Woolf will be contacting Advisors and Partners to check schedules.

Anna

Hunter Library | Library Insider | Last updated: 3/5/08 Melissa Young