Thanks Heather! I’m going to scan our topographc map (reference) indexes to have on hand and see how we can use them down the road. Maybe incorporating them into our map collection research guide as a finding
aid and linking to our catalog in the future like you mention. Then they can decide if they want the physical map, or link to topoView in the cat record.
Best,
-Greg
Gregory H. March
Map & Government Information Librarian
Associate Professor
University of Tennessee
Hodges Library
Knoxville, TN 37996
865-974-3878
Research Guides – Anthropology,
Earth & Planetary Sciences,
Geography,
Maps,
Government
Tennessee Committee on Geographic Names
From: Ross, Heather <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Thursday, February 22, 2024 9:22 AM
To: [log in to unmask]; March, Greg <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Re: Relocating Map Collection to Future Offsite Storage Facility
Hi,
We have been working on finding or making index maps for all of our sets for over 10 years. Since all of our maps at the annex are individually barcoded we still have sheet level access to the
collection with or without an index. If you can't link your index directly to your catalog record (like Stanford and UC Berkley do), you can create a public webpage that links to your record and to the scanned index. This is our page.
Only some of the indexes are linked, but we are working on it. It's pretty old school, but the process of finding or making index maps was important. Uploading the indexes and
adding to our catalog records will come in time.
We keep the indexes in our Maps collection for reference, but have also scanned them all.
In some of our records you can request a scan of the items directly from the catalog. We are working with our Annex partners to add that link to their holdings so that external patrons can seamlessly
request their scans for a fee.
Also, I like the idea of adding the TopoView links to the catalog records. I'm going to work on that.
Regards,
Heather Ross
Map Specialist
Penn State
From: Maps-L: Map Librarians, etc. <[log in to unmask]> on behalf of March, Greg <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Thursday, February 22, 2024 8:40 AM
To: [log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Re: Relocating Map Collection to Future Offsite Storage Facility
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Wangyal,
Good to hear from you. I’ll be using our topo indexes as the main finding aid for our topo sets – one in main library and one over at the future storage facility. We have enough original indexes (for each
state) that we’ve used for years so that will work for us.
Scanning could be an option for other maps and using the spreadsheet with sequence number makes sense. Thanks for suggesting that. Having the scanned maps on a server that our cataloger can access sounds like
an efficient way for future cataloging. I’ll talk to others in the library about copyright restrictions/fair use and that we’d need to remain aware of that if/when the digitized maps is needed for research/use. Can I email you if we have any further cataloging
questions?
-Greg
Gregory H. March
Map & Government Information Librarian
Associate Professor
University of Tennessee
Hodges Library
Knoxville, TN 37996
865-974-3878
Research Guides – Anthropology,
Earth & Planetary Sciences,
Geography,
Maps,
Government
Tennessee Committee on Geographic Names
From: Tsering Wangyal Shawa <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Wednesday, February 21, 2024 11:22 PM
To: [log in to unmask]; March, Greg <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Re: Relocating Map Collection to Future Offsite Storage Facility
Hi Greg,
We have to move some of our maps from the main floor to other locations (one in the basement and another in the offsite storage). What we have done was to move all map sets to
other locations and but kept the single sheet maps in the main floor. All the map sets were marked on the index map, and if we didn't have an index map, we created one. All the index maps were kept in one drawer on the main floor so that our users can find
out what maps we have in our collection. If a person needs a particular map marked on the index map, then we know how to access that map.
Regarding the single sheet maps, I would suggest you ask your administrator to purchase a large format scanner, if you don't have one already and start a project to scan all
single sheet maps whether the map is copyrighted or not. Create a simple spreadsheet file where you enter map title, call number (if you have one), and unique sequential scan image number in the spreadsheet. You should scan the maps in call number order so
that the scan file numbers will be in some order. Save your spreadsheet and scanned images in a secure cloud storage, if you don't have library data server. The cost of purchasing a large cloud storage is very reasonable. When you move your collection to offsite
storage, you can still continue with your scanning project. Bring your maps from offsite storage based on call number or the way your maps are filed. This will help you convert your paper maps to digital, and in the future, if you want to catalog, you do not
need to bring your maps physically to your cataloger, you can use the scanned maps for cataloging. For your information, we have been scanning all flat city maps whether they are copyrighted or not. The copyrighted maps are not accessible to the public. However,
we make the maps accessible to the public when they run out of copyright. I know all the maps cannot be scanned because some of them are too big or fragile, etc. but this may encourage you or your administrators to convert paper maps to digital. The digital
maps will give you more options in the future and also, they will be easier for your researchers to use.
During the pandemic, we scanned many maps and saved them on our server. Our map cataloger can remotely connect her computer to our server and access the scanned maps for cataloging.
It worked really well.
Thanks,
-Wangyal
Tsering Wangyal Shawa
GIS and Map Librarian
Head, Map and Geospatial Information Center
Peter B. Lewis Library
Washington Road & Ivy Lane
Princeton University, Princeton, NJ 08544
Telephone: 609-258-6804
From: Maps-L: Map Librarians, etc. <[log in to unmask]> on behalf of March, Greg <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Wednesday, February 21, 2024 12:14 PM
To: [log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Relocating Map Collection to Future Offsite Storage Facility
Hello,
We’re needing to relocate our map collection to offsite storage in the next year or so, and we have some collections that are not cataloged at the item level. Once the maps are relocated offsite, they’ll no longer be browsable
by campus and public. Have any of you had to relocate your uncataloged map collections offsite, and if so, how did you make the maps discoverable by public that aren’t cataloged individually? We don’t have the resources to catalog/barcode every map at the
item level, so are trying to learn about alternative ways to make the maps discoverable by patrons via the catalog and research guides, and by our storage staff for retrieval at the future offsite storage facility. I have some ideas to help enable discovery,
but would appreciate any ideas /suggestions from the map community.
Best,
-Greg
Gregory H. March
Map & Government Information Librarian
Associate Professor
University of Tennessee
Hodges Library
Knoxville, TN 37996
865-974-3878
Research Guides – Anthropology,
Earth & Planetary Sciences,
Geography,
Maps,
Government
Tennessee Committee on Geographic Names