Today marks a significant milestone for Villanova’s Digital Library: the 20,000th item scanned for the public was made available today!

The item, De duodecim abusionum gradibus, is available at:
http://digital.library.villanova.edu/Item/vudl:311975

De duodecim is a short work on the virtues of living a Christian life and in this edition has been attributed to St. Augustine. It has also in other early works been attributed to St. Cyprian, and is now believed to be the work of an anonymous author living in Ireland, around the year 650 CE. Widely referenced in other works even into the modern era, it was translated into English and appears in 1590 under the title: “A Looking Glass for England” as a call to faith. This particular edition was published in a private monastic community press in Nurnberg around the year 1480 and has rubricated initials; these show that even in the incunable era, printed works continued to present aspects of the older manuscript culture.

This item is part of the Contributions from Augustinian Theologians and Scholars collection which collects together works by members of the Augustinian Order, as well as resources by and about Saint Augustine of Hippo.

This week, we added our 10,000th item to the Digital Library! This is quite an exciting milestone!

The item in question is the Volume 18, No. 4 issue of The Villanovan, dated April 4, 1944. The Villanovan was scanned from microfilm by the Internet Archive and we have been steadily working on adding the individual issues to our Digital Library.

Volume 18, No. 4, April 4, 1944 issue of The Villanovan.

This issue features numerous articles related to World War II. The front page headlines are listed below:

* Easter Theme In ‘Bunny Hop’ Show And Dance Apr. 15
* Lt. W. Garrity Killed Piloting Bomber in Africa
* Augustinians In Philippines Safe
* Comdr. Milner Leaves for Active Sea Duty Again
* Guadalcanal and Tulagi Veterans in Marine V-12 Unit Describe Battles
* Plans Completed For Guild Party
* Financier’s Frolic Tickets On Sale Now

Not content with just 10,000, we are already edging past 10,100 as of this writing! The current item count is viewable here and it is updated in real time as we add new items.

Thursday, January 20th 2011,  was quite a day for the Digital Library: the incorporation of Digital Library data into VuFind – and this is not just the metadata but the full indexing of all OCR’ed content, pdf files from transcriptions and faculty publications.  This of course brings all of the functionality and power of VuFind to the Digital Library content including all of the social features and best of all – high quality searching.  In addition to this, the Google sitemaps to Digital Library content were published so all Digital Library content will again be findable – after a 3 year hiatus – directly from Google.  It also marks the final tweaking of the latest software back-end rewrite from David Lacy – we are back in full operation since a break in November for software deployment and testing.  Transcripts for handwritten materials that have been archived for over 4 years are finally being wedded to the images and of course it is all findable using VuFind.  These software deployments have been eagerly awaited for years!

So a hearty round of Kudos to Dave Lacy, Demian Katz, and Dave Uspal.   They have worked tirelessly to make these enhancements possible and have been excited about the developments too!  They are working hard to bring VuDL to birth and so share this robust toolset with the library and archives communities!  Indeed there are a large number of enhancements and tweaks that will increase the utility of the software that are in development.

Other items on Thursday of interest are: the highly positive news about a possible development / testing partner for VuDL;   a request from another maritime museum about possible partnership;  a request from a Princeton scholar for a Digital Library photograph for a new book on Irish nationalists to be published by Princeton in December 2011,  and of course, an article in the latest ACRL News about our La Salle partnership!

From last week we had some other fantastic news:  two new partnerships – the modest partnership with the Sisters of the Order of Saint Basil the Great, and dramatically the Philadelphia Ceili Group. We will be digitizing the audio and video of the Ceili Group’s meetings and performances of Irish Musicians from their historic archive – who knows what content and performers we will find on these tapes!  And we will also be working with the Library of Congress to obtain the master tapes for years that Villanova University currently does curate.   Stephen Spatz will be acting as our point person for this project due to his skill and interest in all things musical.

I am so very positive about our future progress and our outstanding staff that works so very well together!

This third week of March 2010 marks a new milestone, the 8,000th item was added to the Digital Library. In April 2008 the Digital Library uploaded the 4,000th item, so in less than two years the collection size has doubled.

The 8,000th title is from the Joseph McGarrity Book Collection, it is a newly purchased book from 1911: Standing rules and regulations for the government and guidance of the Royal Irish Constabulary, the Irish police force prior to Irish independence. This is a wonderful read for any interested in the historical organization of police forces, crime, horses, and reading and social prohibitions.

From page 272 of this work, Newspapers:

1203. Reading Unrestricted: Members of the Force are not restricted from the reading of such books or other publications as they may think fit, provided they are not offensive to morality, or loyalty, or subversive of discipline.

And from page 267, Mounted Men:

1178. Description. – Mounted Men are to be selected for their superior activity, general intelligence, and predilection for horses and the mounted service; and they are not to be dismounted without authority from the Inspector-General; they are not to be over twenty-six years of age, or five nine and a half inches in height; and are not to exceed 11 stone in weight.

The count of items in the entire Digital Library is updated as each item is added to the collection and is viewable.

This week marked the completion of the first fully transcribed collection available in the Digital Library. The Stokes Collection contains a small number of letters to and a speech by William Axton Stokes (1814 – 1877) who was a Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, attorney who contributed notes and references to an U.S. edition of Mathew Hale’s (1609-1676) Historia placitorum coronae (History of the pleas of the crown) published by R. H. Small of Philadelphia in 1847. Stokes later served as a major in the U.S. Infantry during the American Civil War, including a period in 1861 commanding at the 18th U.S. Infantry Headquarters, Camp Thomas, Franklin County, Ohio.

His stirring speech, at the Union Convention of Westmoreland County, PA in 1861, was delivered in support of the united American Republic and in favor of the war to crush rebellion. He denies the rebel cause by systematically positing that the rebel states have no right of secession, no grounds for revolution, and no justifiable argument against Abraham Lincoln’s election to the presidency. [Images ]

In 1874, Stokes was part of a committee appointed to report upon the operations of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company. [Images Transcription]

In addition to the Villanova University Collection, a small collection of Stokes documents can also be found in the Special Collections Department at the University of Delaware Library.

Over the last month both Susan Ottignon and Ward Barnes worked on deciphering the letters to Stokes. Seven manuscript letters are included in the collection spanning the years from 1839 to 1870. Some of these letters are to his wife Mary and relate to the death of a friend in the Western Pennsylvania Hospital for the Insane. While others ask for assistance about military duty in the Civil War.

The longest letter, which is also authored by Stokes, describes in detail the courtship, and his proposal of marriage, to Mary. This is a serial letter written over a number of days and may very well have not been mailed. It thus shows the inner dialog of Stokes as he deals with Mary’s rejection of his initial proposal:

But am I mistaken? Can I love? – I should think not, and yet how am I to account for this repulse and its manners so cold and so indignant – Could any woman who loved as one should in her situation should, could any such one do as she did? I do not know – Lost in a sea of conjecture, without knowledge [or] skill, I am tossed about by doubts and fears of this most painful nature.

I know that she would not voluntarily deceive me. Can she deceive herself? But for this one single sentence and its manner I should at once repudiate such an idea. But how else am I to answer for this?

Perhaps she may know enough, (although not very experienced) to think that an occassional repulse will … to increase the exhibition of my feelings. She forgets that this is a very dangerous scheme in its self and besides it is a game at which two can play. I will do it. I will be as reserved as she is and as she wants me to be more dignified I will give enough dignity to make her tired of it forever.

Due to technical difficulties surrounding storage of the Digital Library web files. no new content had been displayed on the Digital Library since June 2008. Our students and staff continued to scan during this period, saving the image files to portable hard drives. Over the span of 8 months this has amounted to over 2 tetrabytes of locally stored files. With the space issue resolved in January we have been adding to the Digital Library both content currently being scanned as well as items scanned during the hiatus.

There are many very exciting titles and new collections to look at and examine, with more in store in the coming weeks. Future essays on the Blue Electrode will cover some of these in detail. For now here is a small sample of some of the newly available digital content:

In the Catholica Collection:

Conewago, a collection of Catholic local history gathered from the fields of Catholic missionary labor within our reach an humble effort to preserve some remembrance of those who have gone before, and by their lives, their labors and their sacrifices, secured for succeeding generations the enjoyment of happy homes, and all the blessing of our holy Catholic religion. Martinsburg, W. Va.: Herald Print, 1885. [Link]

This is an early illustrated history of the Catholic Church in the Conewago Valley of Pennsylvania and Maryland.

In the Contributions from Augustinian Theologians and Scholars Collection:

Vita gloriosissima: e miracoli eccelsi del beato confessore Nicola di Tolentino. Milano: Appresso l’herede del quon. P. Pontio, & G. B. Piccaglia compagni, 1603. [Link]

This is an illustrated life of Saint Nicholas of Tolentine, O.S.A.

Fasti et triumphi Rom. a Romulo rege usque ad Carolum V. Caes. Aug.,
sive, Epitome regum, consulum, dictatorum, magistror. equitum, tribunorum militum consulari potestate, censorum, impp. & aliorum magistratuum Roman. cum orientalium tum occidentalium, :ex antiquitatum monumentis maxima cum fide ac diligentia desumpta. Onuphrio Panuinio Veronensi F. Augustiniano authore. ; Additæ sunt suis locis impp. & orientalium, & occidentalium uerissimae icones, ex vetustissimis numismatis quam fidelissime delineatae. Ex musaeo Iacobi Stradæ Mantuani, ciuis Romani, antiquarii. Venetiis: Impensis Iacobi Stradae Mantuani, 1577. [Link]

Also richly illustrated is this exacting history of the Roman magistrates and emperors by the remarkable classicist Onofrio Panvinio, O.S.A.

In the Joseph McGarrity Collection:

A geographicall description of ye kingdom of Ireland Collected from ye actual survey made by Sr. William Petty, corrected & amended by the advice & assistance of severall able artists, late inhabitants of that kingdom. London: F. Lamb, 1689. [Link]

An early atlas of Ireland with detailed maps of the country.

From the Americana Collection:

S. A. Lane Manuscript. [Link]

This contains the autobiographical manuscript of Samuel Alanson Lane (1815-1905). From January in 1835 until May of the same year, Lane travels around the U.S., looking for work in numerous cities including, New Orleans, Cincinnati, Columbus, Cleveland until finally settling in what would become his hometown, Akron, OH on June 29, 1835. S. A. Lane was a dedicated follower and professional lecturer of the American temperance movement as well as an avid supporter and political participant for th Republican Party, formed in 1854. Perhaps one of Lane’s most interesting and daring pursuits, was his active participation in the mass emigration to California in search of fortune like many other easterners during the California Gold Rush which kept Lane from his home and family in Akron for over two years. This manuscript covers his life and contains many depictions of 19th century American frontier life.

Today Friday April 25th 2008, the 4,000th item was added to the Digital Library. From the Joseph McGarrity Papers Collection, it is a sketchbook of pencil drawings done by Joseph McGarrity. The drawings include Mcgarrity family members, friends and McGarrity himself.

The count of items in the entire Digital Library is updated as each item is added to the collection and is viewable.

Today Friday the 16th 2007, the 2,500th item was added to the Digital Library. From the Sherman-Thackara Collection, it is a letter written from Ellie Sherman to her mother Ellen Ewing Sherman in 1885.

The count of items in the entire Digital Library is updated as each item is added to the collection and is viewable.