The workshops will be an opportunity to hear guest speakers discuss their experiences of digitisation and provide a glimpse of the vast potential of digitisation to enhance collections, reach out to education and community groups, as well as its use for exhibitions and marketing.

Attendees will also be given a copy of the Culturenet Cymru “toolkit” which contains modules on copyright, metadata, scanner preparation and scanning, web preparation and display, digital archiving and preservation.  The toolkit provides straightforward guidelines and step-by-step instructions as well as links to further information and guidance.

Culturenet Cymru and CyMAL staff will be on hand at the events to discuss any questions and provide practical advice on the various elements of digitisation, from where to get funding to how to display your contents on the Web and all the bits in-between!

Come and see us at:

2 March – Galeri, Caernarfon

3 March – Media Centre, Llandrindod Wells

4 March – Dylan Thomas Centre, Swansea

The events will be between 10-1.30 with a light lunch served at each.  To book your place please contact cymal@wales.gsi.gov.uk

Over the past few weeks, the people of the Gwendraeth Valley have been invited to bring their treasured possessions and cherished memories to Pontyberem in order to create a digital record of their communities’ history.

A successful day was had in Pontyberem Hall with local people calling in to share their stories of the Gwendraeth Valley.  Contributions were varied with items relating to the Rebecca Riots, the campaign to save Llangyndeyrn from drowning, the coal-mining history of the Valley, and the birth of Menter Cwm Gwendraeth.

The activity co-incides with the opening of The National Library of Wales exhibition in the hall. The exhibition of items relating to the Gwendraeth Valley will last until Thursday, 11 November, and entrance is free of charge.

The evening was well-attended by members of the nearby communities and, as well as an interview with Emyr Wyn, presentations were given by The National Library, Carmarthen Public Library and Culturenet Cymru.

Family photographs that Emyr Wyn had brought with him to the event were digitised by Culturenet. We’ll be returning to the Gwendraeth Valley on 31 October, when a digitisation day will be held at Pontyberem Memorial Hall between 10 and 4.

Culturenet Cymru has held the first of four digitisation training pilots held between now and the end of March. The staff of Anglesey museum, archive and library came together to Llangefni for the training day on 20 October.

As an increasing number of Culturenet Cymru partners embark on their own digitisation programmes, we are keen to discover how we may assist them by sharing our knowledge and experience in this field. The training is presented as a way of enabling them to contribute directly to the new People’s Collection website once it has been launched.

Over the part three months, Culturenet has been developing a digitisation toolkit to support the training and which will soon be made available for download on this website.

Now you can keep up to date with the latest Gathering the Jewels news by subscribing to our brand new RSS feed!

By clicking on the orange icon that appears in your address bar, you can keep up-to-date with the latest news from the GTJ project – from new collections added to the site, to the latest news from the Gathering the Jewels office.

Over the coming months, we will be adding hundreds of new items to the Sports and Pastimes in Wales theme. Our Project Officers have been digitising the collections of the Welsh Rugby Union, the Welsh Sports Hall of Fame and Glamorgan Cricket Club, to name but a few.

So, if you would like to be the first to know when these exciting new collections are added to the site, add the GTJ RSS feed to your toolbar!

The Community Archives Wales group, Machen Remembered, recently helped their local primary school celebrate its centenary.

On 22 January Machen Primary school celebrated 100 years since it was officially opened in 1909 with a day full of activity and shared memories.  Past pupils and teachers, as well as local dignitaries from Caerphilly Council, attended the day which began with a school assembly.

After a morning of lessons for the children, the school was opened to the public and former pupils were able to relive their schooldays with a tour of the school by the headmaster and a look at the displays provided by Machen Remembered.  Children were able to get a feel for how school life had changed since the days of their parents and grandparents by reading old log books which are still held at the school.

Many of Machen Remembered had been pupils and teachers at Machen Primary and were pleased to join the celebrations, particularly as they were able to bring some snapshots of the school’s history.  The Machen Remembered digital archive contains images from the school’s opening day and of classes over the past century.  There is also an image of Mr Inkin, Machen’s first head teacher who was at the school from its opening until his retirement in 1935.
The group’s work plays an important role in documenting the history of the Machen community, as days like this one demonstrate.  The school has been a focal point in the Machen community and there have been schools in Machen since the mid 18th century.  The present school was built to replace another which was suffering from subsidence due to its proximity to the town’s pit.  In the 100 years since it opened its doors, thousands of pupils have passed through its halls and the school has gained a reputation for excellence.

Machen Remembered’s digital archive on the Community Archives Wales website contains over 250 images and this number continues to grow.
To view more images from their archive, please click here.

Culturenet Cymru’s presence on the web has inspired an exhibition of famous Welshmen and women in Ohio, USA.

The Madog Centre for Welsh Studies at the Rio Grande University, Ohio recently presented an exhibition which celebrated Wales’ best loved heroes. Based on the Culturenet Cymru 100 Welsh Heroes poll, 2008 Madog Research Fellow Benjy Davies has created 20 original digital illustrations.

The artwork celebrates historical and contemporary leaders in poetry, art, music and politics, including Owain Glyndwr, Richard Burton, Catherine Zeta Jones and poll winner Aneurin Bevan. The digital images incorporate portraiture, design, pattern and virtual painting and were exhibited at two locations in south-eastern Ohio, an area which attracted many Welsh settlers during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

The exhibition is the 2008 Madog Research project. The Madog Centre, named after Prince Madog who reputedly discovered America before Christopher Columbus, is an outgrowth of the North American Association for the Study of Welsh Culture and History and is based in one of the largest Welsh-American settlements in the USA. The Centre has close links with the National Library of Wales through the Wales-Ohio Project.

The exhibition demonstrates that the work of Culturenet Cymru extends worldwide, promoting the culture and heritage of Wales. In the past month, the Gathering the Jewels site has received over 10,000 visits from the United States, including over 200 from the state of Ohio.

The online digital resources provided by Culturenet allow the heritage and culture of Wales to be accessed and enjoyed internationally. Through digitisation and online interpretation, it is possible for Wales to see the world and the world to see Wales!

You can view the images online by clicking here.

The purpose of the Talking Hands Award is to reward website authors who, ‘through their creative excellence provide a web site which teaches, contains teaching elements in sufficient, and otherwise leaves a visitor with something of significant value after returning to their normal daily activities, which will enable them to be better citizens of the world.’ (from the Talking Hands website)

The Gathering the Jewels team is very pleased to receive this award, it is their hope that visitors to the site leave feeling that they have learnt about the heritage and culture of Wales. With over 30,000 images on the site Gathering the Jewels provides a doorway to exploring the jewels hidden in the country’s museums, archives and libraries.

Since the relaunch of the Gathering the Jewels website in August 2008 it has been constantly developing. The team has been working to digitise yet more content and will shortly be publishing images from collections such as the Welsh Rugby Union, the Welsh Sports Hall of Fame, the National Cycle Collection at Llandrindod Wells and Glamorgan County Cricket Club.

Keep an eye out for them over the next few months on www.gtj.org.uk

A wedding dress made of parachute silk and an outfit dating from the 1870s were among the things that brought a touch of glamour to the Brynamman Community Centre recently.

An exhibition held by the Community Archives Wales group in Brynamman containing an array of dresses, shoes, hats, photographs, invitations, menus, even bills and invoices, gave visitors to the exhibition a taste of what it was like to hold a wedding ‘Brynamman-style’.

As part of their work with Community Archives Wales to document the history and heritage of their town, Treftadaeth Brynamman Heritage, decided to see how weddings have changed over the past hundred years or more. Not only did the exhibition include an array of photographs of weddings and parties, showing how fashions have changed over the years, but also a number of outfits, ranging from 1870 to the 1980s. The dresses, all in exquisite condition and kindly donated by local women, showed how long white wedding dresses weren’t always in vogue and that when it comes to her wedding dress, a woman can do as she pleases.

The exhibition was the fruit of weeks and months of labour by the Brynamman group and reflects the hard work being put in by all 11 Community Archives Wales groups. Through the exhibition the group has been able to demonstrate to their friends, neighbours and visitors, how they are sharing the history of their community online.