Vermont Folklife Center Archive Digital Collections Assessment

FAIN: PG-252823-17

Vermont Folklife Center (Middlebury, VT 05753-1425)
Andrew Kolovos (Project Director: May 2016 to June 2019)

The hiring of an audiovisual preservation consultant to conduct an assessment of 5,302 digitized audio field recordings of interviews and regional traditional music and associated still images and manuscripts from the 1940s to the present. This collection focuses on the cultural heritage and life experiences of residents of Vermont and the surrounding region. The materials were generated by staff folklorists conducting interviews and cultural documentation across the state as well as by other researchers, community scholars, documentarians, and journalists. Significant areas of study represented in the archive include farm and rural community life in Northern New England; social, economic, environmental and cultural history of distinct geographic regions such as Lake Champlain, the Northern Forest, and the Mad River Valley; ethnic cultures; and occupational traditions and labor history. One of the highlights of the archive is the Turner Family Collection, which includes an 80-hour interview with 100-year-old Daisy Turner, who recounted her family’s history as slaves during the Civil War to her time raising a family in Vermont.

Bertram Lyons of AVPreserve will assess the digital collections of the Vermont Folklife Center (VFC) Archive. The consultancy will focus on the following activities: 1) Lyons will visit VFC in Middlebury, VT and conduct an onsite assessment of the current digital storage and digital preservation practices employed by VFC; 2) Lyons will craft a report outlining ways for VFC to improve file management workflows and align our approaches with current best practices for the storage and preservation of digital cultural heritage materials. At the conclusion of the project VFC will have in hand a clearly articulated set of institutional needs in relation to our digital collections as well as an actionable plan for addressing these needs. The report produced by Lyons will be a vital tool for VFC in a planned, large scale, fund- raising initiative to ensure the preservation and accessibility of our multimedia holdings in perpetuity.