Recollection Wisconsin
Recollection Wisconsin is a program and collection that brings together digital cultural heritage resources from more than 250 Wisconsin libraries, archives, museums, and historical societies and shares them with the world in partnership with the Digital Public Library of America. Recollection Wisconsin staff provide guidance, training, and consulting for the many facets of digital history projects, including planning, selection, reformatting, metadata application, online access, and preservation.
Recollection Wisconsin is administered by WiLS and managed by six Governing Partners: Wisconsin Historical Society, Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Milwaukee Public Library, and Marquette University.
WiLS provides the following services to Recollection Wisconsin:
- Fiscal agency
- Governance support
- Meeting management
- Strategic planning
- Project management
- Expertise
- Research
- Grantwriting
- Building relationships
Recent or Current Projects
Recollection Wisconsin has enhanced and expanded its Digital Readiness Toolkit to incorporate guidance and best practices on digitizing and sharing audiovisual content. These enhancements, a result of valuable contributions from the Community Archiving Workshop, include a comprehensive digital readiness self-assessment tool for your organization, a framework for prioritizing A/V materials for digitization, and in-depth guidance tailored specifically to managing audiovisual collections. We’ve also updated and expanded the Digital Project Planning Worksheet, added support for choosing a Collection Management System and recommendations for digitization equipment, and incorporated requests for resources and information that practitioners have requested.
Recollection Wisconsin, in partnership with the Wisconsin Center for Film and Theater Research, can loan a Film Inspection Kit for examining 8mm or 16mm film and a Wolverine Film Scanner for reformatting 8mm and Super8 film. Funding for the kits was provided by a grant to AMIA from the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS). Kits are available to lend to any organization within the state of Wisconsin that is either 1) an affiliate of the Wisconsin Historical Society; 2) a WiLS general member; or 3) a Recollection Wisconsin content partner. The kits are free to borrow for up to two months, or longer if another organization has not requested to borrow the kit. Read more or fill out an interest form.
Recollection Wisconsin Helps Bring Local History to Students: In September 2022, Recollection Wisconsin launched a refreshed website with new themes for educators teaching state and local history in K12. The Travel Back in Time series was also added to highlight historical photos of communities all across the state.
Presentations and Publications
Getting Started with Digitization Projects. Wisconsin Historical Society Local History and Historic Preservation Conference 2023
Recollection Wisconsin for Social Studies Educators: Primary Sources for Inquiry, Wisconsin Council for the Social Studies 2023
Building and Maintaining Community Relationships. Sunshine State Digital Network 2022
The Past Through Tomorrow – Empowering Digital History at the Library, Wisconsin Library Association Annual Conference 2021
Follow Recollection Wisconsin on Facebook for glimpses into Wisconsin’s past, including in the #MainStreetMonday series!
