the danish national archives’ project "the west indies – sources of history”
TRANSCRIPT
The Danish National Archives’ project"The West Indies – Sources of History”
Commemoration of Transfer Day
The website http://www.virgin-islands-history.org/en/ is the contribution of the Danish National Archives for commemorating the centennial of Transfer Day on March 31, 2017. On this date, the website will provide access to a total of approx. 5 million image files of the original sources for the history of the former Danish West Indies, now the U.S. Virgin Islands. The 5 million images represent no less than 4500 shelf feet of records from the local and central administration of the Danish West Indies, which the Danish National Archives are scanning during the period 2013-16.
Samples leading up to Transfer Day
http://www.virgin-islands-history.org/en/ will be updated continuously until 2017 with samples of records, facts and background information about the colonial era. The Danish National Archives have just launched an education site directed at Danish primary schools, which first tells the history of the Danish slave trade via an interactive timeline, with the original sources translated to modern Danish. The site will also be available in English at http://www.virgin-islands-history.org/en/ or http://www.sa.dk/tidslinjer in April 2015.
Crowdsourcing - Volunteer help needed
The goal for the Danish National Archives is to make the original sources available for as many people as possible. This will be accomplished by developing a search function that makes it easy for users to find the records they are looking for. From now on and until 2017 the Danish National Archives will need volunteers to tag names and places in the sources, as well as in records translated from Gothic handwriting and Danish. The Danish National Archives will also need volunteers who want to participate in user tests of the website's search function.
Co-operation
The Danish National Archives cooperate with other Danish cultural heritage institutions towards the centennial in 2017 and are currently investigating the possibilities for a cooperation with the National Archives in Washington and local archives in the U.S. Virgin Islands.
For further information please contact the Danish National Archives:
Special Consultant Senior Consultant Senior ResearcherChristian Schoennemann Poul Olsen Erik Goebel
Telephone +45 41 71 72 38 Telephone +45 41 71 72 38 Telephone +45 41 71 72 72
E-mail [email protected] E-mail [email protected] E-mail [email protected]