Murder Scrapbooks

General

How do I save my work?
The Zooniverse platform does not have a save feature, so we encourage you to click “Done” to submit your transcriptions.

Why do these scrapbooks need to be transcribed?
Modern technology, in particular Optical Character Recognition (OCR) which is the ability to convert images or scans into text, is not able to recognize older text or handwriting because the handwriting is unpredictable and not uniform or the text is faded or poor quality. Furthermore, if stamps are placed on top of text (as is the case in the Sam Howe books), the OCR may not be able to read them properly. In order to be able to search the content of these ledgers, the handwriting and stamps need to be transcribed.

Why is it important to transcribe these records?

• The transcriptions will augment our records with more information. This increases the research connections and the discoverability and access for everyone.
• This project also allowed us to digitize the ledgers for the first time which allows us to decrease physical handling and increase preservation.
• This transcription project will create an index to make all the information searchable digitally.

What will happen to the transcriptions?
History Colorado staff will import the project information into the museum collections database and it becomes searchable. Cross-referencing the ledger records is the most important task we will accomplish with these transcriptions.

Where can I find more projects like this?
From History Colorado
https://www.zooniverse.org/projects/madebie/crime-index-and-newspaper-article-ledgers
From Other Institutions
https://www.zooniverse.org/projects/ajpiper/criminal-characters
https://www.zooniverse.org/projects/panettafordham/shadows-on-stone-identifying-sing-sings-incarcerated

Technical Questions

What if the image is too hard to read?
If you find that the text is difficult to read, you can exit and then restart to get another image or enter what you can and then say "unable to read" for applicable entries.

What about mistakes or other languages?
Please record what you read exactly as it is written or recorded (even for misspelled words). For other languages, we do not need the translation--just the text as it is.

I made a mistake or my browser timed out. Can I get back to that image and finish or fix my work?
The zooniverse site is a bit tricky sometimes and unfortunately it does not let you go back to the same document after you click off of the page (or if your screen times out). Unfortunately, due to design limitations you cannot save work and go back to it. Longer time periods might mean bugs or timing out (another thing we cannot really control)

How do I zoom to different parts of the text?
To make the font larger to read you can scroll through the image while it is zoomed in. Move the image after zooming so that you can see the whole page. If the scroll icon is on the image then you can click/hold and move the image where you want it. You can also make the text boxes bigger by clicking on the corner icon. This will help you adjust the text box to the size you want.

How do I track my volunteer hours?
To track your hours please fill out this form for access to our volunteer portal.