The Montana Memory Project (MMP) is a free online source for digital collections relating to Montana's cultural heritage. The project began in 2010 and is still functioning today with new collections being added. Many Montana libraries, museums, archives, and cultural institutions add materials to this collection. Below is the list of the current contributors:
The MMP collections include digital newspapers, maps, copies of photographs, rare books, historic documents, diaries, oral histories, audio and video clips, paintings, illustrations and art.
The mission of the MMP is: “The Montana Memory Project encourages cultural institutions to digitize historic and contemporary resources reflecting Montana's rich cultural heritage and to make them freely available for lifelong learning.” I feel the MMP is working positively towards this mission. On their website not only do they have digitized collections which in and of itself aids in making them available to the public but they have numerous educational resources for teachers to use in their classrooms, including powerpoint and class activity ideas. They also have a form where teachers who are using MMP can share how they are utilizing the materials and share that information with fellow educators. Besides educational resources they also provide instructional videos for how to perform searches within the site and also an interactive collection map to narrow down collections to specific locations in Montana.
One of the interesting aspects to this collaboration project is that not only does it include cultural heritage institutions like libraries, museums, and archives but it also allows schools as well as individuals to become involved and contribute materials. They do recommend individuals gain some assistance from an institution to help them in the process.
Overall I would call this collaboration a success. The project is still actively growing and being utilized not only by Montana educators and students but are discoverable through WorldCat as well as made available through the Mountain West Digital Library and the Digital Public Library of America which provide a much broader exposure.
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