Exploring the new Manuscripts & Pictorial website - day 2

Each day this week I've promised to explore another aspect of the new Manuscripts & Pictorial website.

Today's post is about surfing through content by names and subjects. It's actually quite an obvious feature, but it's so enjoyable that I think it's worth highlighting here for those who might have missed it.

Starting from the home page, let's click Ephemera. You will see a number of images from the Ephemera collection:



Within each result, notice the section that says something like:

1 image, categorised under Ephemera and Photolithographs, related to Aviation mechanics (Persons) and Propellers


Clicking any of these words kicks off a completely new search based on that term, but you can always use your back button to come back to where you were.

These terms are from TAPUHI and have been applied consistently across all of the Manuscripts & Pictorial collections of the Alexander Turnbull Library. They include people, places, genres, subjects and other names.

I call this surfing through the content because it feels a little like the early days of the internet, when we "surfed the web", following links from one website to another, in a way that felt very novel and cool at the time. Just like in the good old days, you can begin on Manuscripts & Pictorial without a clear destination in mind, and your first search will bring back all kinds of prompts that tempt you to surf off in one direction or another.

Our example here reveals that there's a whole category of material related to Aviation mechanics (Persons) for instance, which is kind of bizarre and a little intriguing (to me).

Surfing down that link takes us to a page of results related to aviation mechanics, including an item related to the Awatere (Flying boat) which is pretty awesome.

From there, Tasman Empire Airways Ltd catches my attention, and takes us to more than 70 items related to TEAL, including cartoons, ephemera and photographs:


And so on and so on, until it's really time to stop.

It's important to understand that clicking one of these terms always starts a completely new search to show you everything related to that term. To get back to where you were, use your back button.

As always, if you get too many results, use the filters on the right hand side of the screen to narrow down your search.

One last example, to showcase the value of presenting our manuscripts and pictorial collections together like this:

If we were looking at all material related to the subject of Cornerstone laying - New Zealand - Manawatu-Wanganui Region, we might notice Bishop Charles John Abraham in the results, and find ourselves surfing over to see all the material related to Bishop Charles John Abraham, which includes six letters written by him to Sir Donald McLean, as well as portraits and other pictorial material:



Tune in tomorrow for further exploration in the land of Manuscripts & Pictorial.