Collaborative Digital Projects
PhillyHistory.org
The Library Company recently added several collections to the PhillyHistory.org website and is the first non-government organization to join the consortium. Run by the Philadelphia Department of Records, PhillyHistory.org is a unique website where users can search for photographs and maps by location, neighborhood, or keyword and also by maneuvering a map to see available images pinpointed by geographic location. Users can also purchase photographic reproductions through the website.
E-News article reviewing the Library Company’s collections on PhillyHistory.org
Award of Merit: PhillyHistory.org wins the American Association for State and Local History’s 2011
Sepiatown
On the Sepiatown website, individuals and institutions can share historical images from all over the world. The Library Company has selected a variety of prints and photographs depicting Philadelphia in various time periods spanning from the mid-19th century to the mid-20th century. Special features of Sepiatown include a then/now feature juxtaposing the recent Google street view with the historical image, often a stark contrast to the current view.
Philadelphia Architects & Buildings Project
Philadelphia Architects and Buildings database
The Philadelphia Architects and Buildings database provides authoritative information on three centuries of Philadelphia buildings and designers incorporating data and images from the collections of more than 25 Philadelphia-area repositories. The Library Company contributes records for and digital images of selected Library Company architectural and graphic materials. For comprehensive information on a particular place search by the “project / building” or “location.”
Luminous-Lint
Luminous-Lint is an online resource bringing together information on the history of photography from over 2,600 institutions, estates, photographers and private collections around the world. It contains information on over 7,000 photographers who have been significant in the history of the media. Over 50,000 carefully selected images are included to help establish trends and patterns with the subject. These are supported by many hundreds of online exhibitions and visual indexes that provide unexpected linkages between images coming from different sources. Over 1,000 themes have been created and each of them has its own history supported by footnotes and reading lists. The Library Company of Philadelphia is contributing information and images relating to important 19th century Philadelphia photographers.
Places in Time: Historical Documentation of Place in Greater Philadelphia
This website was developed to disseminate information about historical and architectural resources available at local institutions relating to the five-county Philadelphia region. Currently features several significant graphic collections from the Library Company’s collections documenting Philadelphia street scenes in the last half of the 19th century including watercolors by Benjamin Evans (fl. 1857-1891) and photographs by John Moran (1831-1903), Robert Newell (1822-1897) and Frederick de Bourg Richards (1822-1903). Inventories of the Library Company’s commercial street panoramas, the Brightbill postcard collection and the Aero Service Corporation aerial photographs are also available on this site.