The National Historical Publications and Records Commission (NHPRC) Digitizing Historical Records

• NHPRC Digitizing Historical Records Website
  

Deadline

7 June 

Objectives

The National Historical Publications and Records Commission seeks proposals that use cost-effective methods to digitize nationally significant historical record collections and make the digital versions freely available online. Projects must make use of existing holdings of historical repositories and consist of entire collections or series. The materials should already be available to the public at the archives and described so that projects can re-use existing information to serve as metadata for the digitized collection.

To make these projects as widely useful as possible for archives, historical repositories, and researchers, the applications must demonstrate:

1. The national significance of the collections or records series to be digitized;

2. An effective work flow that repurposes existing descriptive material, rather than creating new metadata about the records;

3. Reasonable costs and standards for the project as well as sustainable preservation plans for the resulting digital records;

4. Well-designed plans that evaluate the use of the digitized materials and the effectiveness of the methods employed in digitizing and displaying the materials.

Projects may not use grant funds to:

• create descriptive metadata

• create edited transcriptions of the digitized materials

• develop websites where people will have to pay a fee to view the images.

Eligible fields

Archives and other repositories of historical documents are eligible if they are part of:

• United States nonprofit organizations or institutions
• Colleges, universities, and other academic institutions
• State or local government agencies
• Federally-acknowledged or state-recognized Native American tribes or groups

Tenure

A grant normally is for 1 to 3 years and up to $150,000. The Commission expects to make up to 5 grants in this category, for a total of up to $400,000.

The Commission requires that grant recipients acknowledge NHPRC grant assistance in all products that result from its support. 

Cost sharing is required. It is the financial contribution the applicant pledges to the cost of a project. Cost sharing can include both direct and indirect expenses, in-kind contributions, non-Federal third-party contributions, and any income earned directly by the project. The NHPRC will provide up to 50 percent of the total project costs.

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