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Last updated on Friday, July 8, 2016
(BEDFORD) - The 47 file drawers of photos, originally used by the Indiana Limestone Company for marketing purposes, were stored in the living room of a dilapidated house in Bedford.
They date from the early to mid-1900s and illustrate architectural styles and limestone use in crisp black and white imagery. After learning about the precarious state of the approximately 26,000 photos, the Indiana Geological Survey received seed funding from IU's Office of the Vice Provost for Research, removed the photos and began the process of cleaning, scanning, and creating digital copies and metadata. The photographs are now on permanent loan to the IGS and titled, Building a Nation: The Indiana Limestone Photograph Collection.
Together, the IGS and IU Libraries have since preserved and published 1,261 of the images, choosing to focus initially on those depicting Midwestern areas - specifically Indiana and Illinois. In its role as publisher, IU Libraries offers an open-access, online portal populated with rich details about each photo, transcribed from labels affixed to the back of each 7.5-by-9-inch original image by IGS staff and volunteers. These labels offer information such as location, date of construction, owner, builder, architect, and sometimes, quality or type of stone.
Grant support from the U.S. Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS), administered by the Indiana State Library (ISL), will now allow IU Libraries and the IGS to process an additional 4,500 photographs, and extend the digital archive with 3,000 new published images.
Michelle Dalmau, head of Digital Collections Services for IU Libraries, says the work is significant, "With the perseverance of the Indiana Geological Survey, this collection of photographs, once considered marketing ephemera, survived. We have quickly found evidence of its impact in teaching and research. Now, support from IMLS and ISL will significantly expand our digital archive."
News of the $15,158 grant comes when the photos are on display at the Monroe County History Center, 202 East 6th Street, Bloomington. Through July 30, the second-floor exhibit offers a curated selection of the historical photographs, focused on Indiana limestone quarries, mills, and limestone buildings from around the country.
According to the IGS, the Indiana Limestone Photograph Collection is uniquely characterized by documenting one type of building stone native to a small area in one state, but having far-reaching relevance to American history. Representing an extensive range of building types from skyscrapers to residences, cathedrals to schools, and banks to libraries, located in nearly all fifty states, the collection illustrates how Indiana limestone was embraced by both the private and public sectors, as well as across divisions of class.
Licia Weber, IGS, is the curator and archivist of the Indiana Limestone Photograph Collection. She said, "These images exemplify the urban transformation of our nation--the photographs document in great detail the widespread use of Indiana limestone for constructing buildings throughout the United States during the late nineteenth and early-- to mid--twentieth centuries. This project fosters a global view of Indiana and the profound impact this locally sourced building material had in defining the architectural history of the state and the nation."
Among the photographs are examples of famous, noteworthy edifices, buildings designed by leading architects, and homes of many of the wealthiest American families of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries--among them, the Vanderbilts and the Goulds. Equally represented are state capitols, city halls, and other municipal buildings, along with museums, monuments, and middle-class suburban homes. The collection provides historic portraits of cities like New York, Chicago, and Washington D.C., documenting the process of urbanization and the changing tastes and needs of an expanding nation.
Specifically, grant funds will be used to continue digitization in the areas of this 'global Indiana' collection with a focus on the Midwest, including images from Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan, Missouri, Minnesota, Ohio, and Wisconsin.
"These funds will not only allow us to fill a gap in the records of Indiana's limestone heritage, but will help to document the significance of the limestone industry in Indiana and its far--reaching impact across the United States," said Dalmau.
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