New CMU Libraries Digital Collections Website Now Available

We are excited to announce that our new digital document interface is up and running. For the past eight months, staff members from the Clarke Historical Library, the CMU Libraries, and DL Consulting in New Zealand have been working to convert all of the digitized documents found in the CMU Online Digital Object Repository (CONDOR) to a new interface. This new interface, powered by Veridian collection management software, separates the digital collections found in CONDOR into four broad groups:

• Digital Michigan Newspapers
• Documents related to the history of Central Michigan University
• Scholarly and Creative works of the CMU Community, including dissertations and theses
• Selected documents from the Clarke's collections pertaining to Michigan history and children's literature

The CMU Libraries Digital Collection (digitalcollections.cmich.edu) gives you access to over 30,000 documents - that's nearly 450,000 digitized pages! If you were used to getting to digital documents by typing "condor.cmich.edu" into your web browser, you can continue to do so and you will be automatically redirected to the new site. While "condor.cmich.edu" will still work, other links will be affected. If you have saved links to specific documents or titles in CONDOR, you will have until the end of December to update them to the new Veridian interface. After December, the links to documents in CONDOR will no longer be available.

We are pleased to bring you this exciting new website. We invite you to jump in and explore. For users and for staff at the CMU Libraries, there may be some stumbling blocks with our new setup. Please let us know if you are having any trouble, any technical issues, or you have any comments. We will address them as soon as we can.

Highlights of the New Interface 

 

Click on the image for a larger view

Some of the highlights of the new Veridian interface include the opportunity to customize your experience with several options available at the top of the page (see number 1 in the image above). You can also register your own account, which will allow to save your searches for future reference (number 2). Also, because computers are not perfect when it comes to interpreting typed words on a digital page (called text recognition or optical character recognition), you can correct the errors made by computers when you are registered. Statistics about the number of text corrections made by individual users are logged and displayed on the front page of the Veridian interface via a Text Corrector Leaderboard (number 6).

The Veridian interface also uses a standard library search bar that many users are familiar with in order to do keyword searches of the full text (number 3) or you can select the Advanced Search function to limit by date or title as well. And now, searches for phrases can be wrapped in "quotation marks" to search for that exact phrase. If you are interested in seeing a random document in the holdings, take a look at the random item for the collection (number 4). For the Digital Michigan Newspapers, this random document is actually a newspaper from this day in history. Finally, if you have an idea of a title or date range of interest to you, but you don't want to search for keywords, you can browse the entirety of the collections by date or title (number 5).

When viewing a document, the Veridian interface lays out the pages in order horizontally, allowing you to view the document by scrolling to the right, or virtually turning to the next page. You can also search for a specific keyword within a document and you can view the transcript of the recognized text to the left of the reading pane (which allows you to correct the text if you are registered and logged in).

The Entire Run of Central's Student Newspaper is On-line

by Bryan Whitledge

For several years now, the Clarke Historical Library has been working to digitize documents relevant to the study of Central Michigan University history. The Board of Trustee Minutes (1964-99), the entire run of Chippewa Yearbooks (1910-2003), and historical materials from the Student Government Association (2003-09) are just three examples of digital documents that are freely available to anyone in the world via the CMU Online Digital Object Repository (CONDOR) website. We are always adding to these great resources and currently, we are in the process of digitizing each and every Bulletin - undergraduate, graduate, Global Campus, and even the early Bulletins from Central Normal, as the University used to be known. As of this posting, Undergraduate Bulletins from 1986 to 2011 can be accessed via CONDOR.

Among all of these digital records is a major resource for studying Central's history - the CMU student newspaper. We are happy to announce that we have recently completed the digitization of the entire run of Central Michigan Life (and its previous incarnations - Central State Life and Central Normal Life). All of the issues from 1919 until 1999 are now available on the CM Life page of the CONDOR website. For over two years, our Preservation Microfilming unit, led by Kim Hagerty, has digitally scanned the microfilm of CM Life, cleaned up the images, used computer software that "reads" the text, attributed identifying information to the files, and finally uploaded the completed issues to CONDOR.

The result is a full searchable collection of 80 years of newspapers chronicling the major and minor events in Central's history. There are first hand accounts of the fire that burned the Old Main building and CMU's Division II National Championship in football, which led to the ascension to Division I status as well as campus reaction to national and World events, such as the Exxon Valdez Oil Spill (pp. 3,4) and the Kent State shootings.

This source now enables researchers far and wide to dig into CMU history from the comfort of their own computer. Whether it is CMU news, Mt. Pleasant News, or the local reaction to global news, the Clarke Historical Library and CONDOR are the home of the historical Central Michigan University student newspapers.

CMU History Minute: Flag Rush

By Susan Powers

Image from the 1924 Flag Rush, Central Normal Life

Back when CMU was Central Normal School, the student council organized events that set one class against another in fierce competition. The student council hoped these events would encourage school spirit and inter-class rivalry. One such competition was known as the Flag Rush.

In the early 1920s, the Flag Rush took place in the fall, with freshman and sophomore men battling for the possession of a small flag that had been secured to a pole. The student council each year would supply a telephone pole for the event, which would be set into the ground in a field. The “defenders,” usually the sophomores, would place their flag up on the pole at a height of no more than fifteen feet. The “defenders” would then arrange themselves around the pole, while the “attackers,” usually the freshmen, had fifteen minutes to do all that they could do to steal the flag from the pole. Bleachers were set up around the spectacle for the cheering fans.

During this time, freshman males at Central had to wear green caps called “pots” on their head all year. Freshman females had to wear green ribbons. According to early Flag Rush tradition, if the freshman men won the competition they would no longer have to wear their green “pots,” so winning the Flag Rush held a great reward for them. The Frosh would paint their faces green in preparation for the battle.

The student council published the rule for the contest in the October 8, 1924 edition of Central Normal Life. Some of the rules included:

1.    Flag rush to be held annually during the fall term.
   (a)    Sophomores to have the choice of defense or attack if they are outnumbered by ten men or more. In any other case the student council shall decide.
   (b)    Pole to be provided by the student council and to be a telephone pole not less than six inches in diameter.
   (c)    If either class interferes in any way with the pole before the rush they shall be declared losers.
   (d)    Defenders of the pole shall provide the flag.
      1.    It may be of any description but shall at least measure 18” by 24”.
      2.    The flag [is] to be fastened on the outside of the pole at a point not more than fifteen feet from the ground.
      3.    The flag shall be fastened to the pole in such a way that a pull of ten pounds shall remove it.
…
5.    Time –
   (a)    Rush to be continued for fifteen minutes
6.    Winner –
   (a)    The winner shall be declared as follows:
      1.    If the defenders are successful in the defense (protection) of the flag for fifteen minutes they shall be declared winners.
      2.    If the attackers succeed in taking the flag down during the fifteen minutes they shall be declared winners.

The first annual student council Flag Rush took place in 1923, with the sophomores winning.

In 1924, the freshman outnumbered the sophomores two to one, and won the competition. The picture shown here captured the frenzy of that year’s event.

Clarke Historical Library serves as the archives for Central Michigan University. Thousands of items are available for patrons to use for researching CMU’s history. To see what is available in the Clarke, search the Libraries’ online catalog Centra.