Lauren Blog 8 - Newton Owen Postcard Collection

The Newton Owen Postcard Collection, found online at the University of Louisville, represents nearly a century in the life and travels of an extended Kentucky family. The 781 cards include souvenier travel cards and greeting cards. Some of the items date back to the late 19th century and stretch into the 1980s, but the bulk of the collection is from 1900-1940.

Collection Principles

Of the 781 items in the collection, 579 have been digitized. The About section reveals that items were left out due to copyright constraints, though as an educational institution it seems U of L could argue fair use. Another interesting note from the About section of the website states that the collection contains stereotypes of Dutch and African American people that may be offensive to many viewers. While the University does not endorse these depictions, the curators write that "the cultural record would be incomplete -- and we would not be honest with ourselves and our past -- if these images were omitted." I think this is the correct stance and is very well explained.

Object Characteristics

Lots of lovely metadata lets the visitor know that the images were selected and scanned by Caroline Daniels in 2006-2007 on a Epson Expression 1680 flatbed scanner as a 600 dpi TIFF image in 24-bit RGB color. "Daniels converted the images to JPEGs of 'maximum' quality and resized them to 600 pixels in the longest dimension using PhotoShop versions 7 and CS2. The images were then uploaded into CONTENTdm (versions 4.1 and 4.2)." This means that the postcards show up on my screen looking slightly larger than life size and showing excellent detail. The database looks like ContentDM and can be searched easily and favorite images can be saved. The collection also features a mapping feature that shows some of the Louisville images on a GoogleMap. I was really excited about this feature, until I realized it was only for 11 images, but this would be a really great tool for exploration if expanded.

Metadata

The metadata here is great. Each record has a lot of information about the physical object and its digital surrogate. The "About" section of the site also provides a lot of background on how the items were digitized.

Intended Audience

The postcards are largely from Kentucky, Indiana and the Southeastern U.S., so they would be of interest to people studying the changing landscape and architecture of that area. However, the cards also give a great deal of insight into the family life and popular culture of the era. Unfortunately, features like the Googlemap of Louisville narrow the audience that might be interested in the collection.