The Henry Ford Digitization Project Hits a Milestone
The Henry Ford has announced a milestone in the massive effort to digitize its enormous collection of artifacts. Last week, the museum staff scanned its 100,000th artifact, a photograph of the 100,000th Fordson Tractor. To celebrate, The Henry Ford has been giving guests behind-the-scenes looks at the digitization process.“If you’ve visited our website, read a blog post, shared a social media story from our channels, or simply walked through the museum, you’ve encountered the work of our digitization team.” said Patricia Mooradian, president and CEO, The Henry Ford.
“Digitization has opened our doors to guests far beyond what we could have ever imagined. People can now view the Rosa Parks bus, the Wright Cycle Shop or Edison’s Menlo Park Laboratory from anywhere in the world at any time they choose.”The process is very detailed, requiring many steps such as cleaning, special handling, or the application of other extensive treatments before digitization. Artifacts are either photographed or scanned, while the curatorial team drafts a summary giving an overview of the item’s significance.
When completed, each is catalogued in the Digital Collections for viewing. With more than 26 million artifacts in the collection, expect many more milestones over the coming year