Assignment 2: Collaboration

The Project
FRANKLIN is a digital repository and a virtual research room of the Roosevelt Library. It is a way for anyone, anywhere to access their collection for free online. It is a way for a person to be able to view the collections just like if they went to the actual library. It has important information such as documents and photographs in the 20thCentury. Which include primary sources coming from Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt’s experiences when they were in the office during the Great Depression and World War II. The Franklin Roosevelt's Papers, selected Eleanor’s correspondence, and the complete diaries of the Treasury Secretary, Henry Morgethau, Jr, are also in the collection.

There are over 800,000 pages of documents and 2,500 photographs in this collection. They are still working on digitally uploading the documents and photos. They will continue to post the materials to FRANKLIN, which is an ongoing process.

The examples of the documents included in the FRANKLIN, that people will be able to see are; The New Deal, wartime correspondence with world leaders, correspondence of government administers, and regular Americans. As for the photographs, they will be able to see the Roosevelts’ lives during the Great Depression, New Deal, and World War II.

One day soon, the documents will also be available to online users of the National Archives and Online Public Access (OPA).

There is an article that I recently found that explains that the online library has recently uploaded a file called Master Speech File. It contains over 46,000 pages of drafts, reading copies, and transcripts that were created throughout his political career. It also have…“The famous Fireside Chats, all four Inaugural Addresses, the Four Freedoms Speech, the "Day of Infamy" Pearl Harbor Speech, the D-Day Prayer, hundreds of other addresses to Congress, extemporaneous remarks, campaign speeches, and policy addresses…” [1]

Participants
The Roosevelt Library worked along with the National Archives, their parent agency, as well as the Roosevelt Institute and Marist College, whom has developed and implemented the database.

Barriers
Like I mention above, not everything is digitized. It will possibly take a while for the Library along with other partners to finally upload every single document and photograph. The other barrier that I can see is if someone does not have access to a computer or be able to access one, they would not be able to see the collections online. There is one other issue that I can think of, if someone does not have high-speed connection, it can take a while to open a big file.

Success or Failure?
I see this a big success. It is easy to use. The color scheme is great, easy on the eye and not too out there. The Finding Aids has a link of where they help online, which is great because we do not have to look around the website to just find a photo or a paper.

Conclusion
It seems like they were able to work together well. I am sure there were issues or arguments but it seems like it has not impacted the project at all. It is a slow going project, which is a huge project. It made since that they were not able to upload everything, but it seems like they will keep on it till it is finished.

References
FRANKLIN - THE WEBSITE
46,000 pages in the FDR archive digitized