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The University of Kentucky Libraries in partnership with the Kentucky Virtual Library is pleased to announce the availability of digital versions of a collection of rare and imperiled books on Kentuckiana. The project, entitled Beyond the Shelf: Serving Historic Kentuckiana Through Virtual Access, is funded with the support of a National Leadership grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS). The first 200 books of the 900 book project are available to the public from the project website at http://www.uky.edu/Libraries/BTS/.

Beyond the Shelf: Serving Historic Kentuckiana Through Virtual Access is creating a fully searchable digital page image archive of rare historic Kentuckiana books using a microfilm to digital methodology. Students, teachers and scholars will use this material to support their research and teaching. Microfilm ensures preservation and the digital images ensure easy access and wide distribution. This hybrid, standards based non-proprietary approach can serve as a model for cost effective access and preservation for published materials.

Titles for Beyond the Shelf were selected from J. Winston Coleman’s landmark compilation, A Bibliography of Kentucky History. Published in 1949 by the University Press of Kentucky, Coleman’s Bibliography includes 3,571 titles divided into 76 categories, including county histories; early explorations and settlements; military expeditions, battles and campaigns; reminiscences, recollections and memoirs; and speeches and debates. For researchers, Coleman’s work is the indispensable starting point.

Since 1992, the UK Libraries have participated in the NEH-funded SOLINET/ASERL Cooperative Preservation Microfilming Projects. 3,500 titles in 6,500 volumes from the Libraries’ comprehensive Kentuckiana collection have been filmed during this Project. The UK Libraries selected approximately 1,500 titles from Coleman’s Bibliography. This corpus of microfilmed titles will form the target collection for Beyond the Shelf.

More information on Beyond the Shelf can be obtained at the project website or by contacting Becky Ryder, Head of Preservation Services at 859-257-0500 ext. 2047 or Mary Molinaro, Director, William T. Young Library at 859-257-0500 ext. 2090.