Archive Digitization and a Context-Based Database

Authors:

• Olivia Filialuna, Museology Graduate Program
• Chair: Jessica Luke
• David Giblin
• Tasia Johnson

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Abstract:

The Burke Museum of Natural History’s Herbarium contains 700,000 specimens of plants, fungi, and algae, as well as their associated collection and taxonomic notes. The main interface for the public to learn about these collections are a pair online databases, an image gallery and a specimen database, all of which are designed for taxonomic and floristic researchers and provide minimal historical context for other users despite the Herbarium’s extensive archival collection. The purpose of this project was to tailor a new website that allows for accessibility and visibility to fungarium archives as well as contextual information that educate users on the significance of the collection and its objects. Due to the bulk of the archival material having belonged to Daniel Stuntz, mycologist extraordinaire and UW curator of 40 years, the first exhibition tells his story and impact on mycology.

Poster:

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Project Deliverable:

History of Mycology Archives: Daniel Elliott Stuntz: A Mycological Life and Legacy

Video Presentation