Tuesday, January 29, 2008

Historical Markers, News, and Photographs

I haven't posted much in the past few days. This is due to two factors.

I've been playing around some over at the Historical Marker Database, which is interesting - you can even see a map of the markers I've added or contributed to - though I think I like the historic sites more than the markers. I am going to try to figure out how to map the historical markers within a mile or so of the National Road.

I discovered that the photograph collectionMaryland Department of the Enoch Pratt Free Library includes hundreds of photographs from the State Highway Administration. These images document the replacement of bridges, the straightening of roads to reduce dangerous curves, as well as images that simply show construction techniques. I spent the day today (I'm taking a little vacation time) going through the tens of thousands of photographs, to make sure I found everything that might be of interest. In addition to the Highway Administration, I found good photographs from the Historic American Buildings Survey, the Works Progress Administration, and some photographs from non-governmental sources which should be in the public domain. Thursday, I'll spend the day scanning them. After that, I'll start making them available as soon as I can.

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