We do our best to make our collections as easy to find and use as possible, and although you can only find some things here at the library through card catalogs in our reading room, we're trying to get as much information online as we can. The most recent example is our Harris Collection on the Civil War & Slavery Collection Ephemera, which Special Collections intern Robin Malario organized and created a finding aid and online exhibition for.

Here's a roundup of some other recent attempts to bring Special Collections to the internet:

• We've posted collection guides to five of our manuscript and ephemera collections on the website:
  • Nicholson Whaling Collection Manuscripts
  • Fiske Harris Collection on the Civil War and Slavery Manuscripts
  • Fiske Harris Collection on the Civil War and Slavery Ephemera
  • William Eaton Foster Papers
  • Potter & Williams Memorial Collection Manuscripts
• We've put up two online exhibitions (they join a number of previous exhibitions):
  • Uncle Tom in Foreign Lands
  • RI Civil War Ephemera
•  We've posted the transcription of the Civil War diary of James Barber, a member of the 1st Rhode Island Volunteer Light Artillery.
• And we've placed scans of a number of important Special Collections items on Flickr:
  • The Seminole War journals of Major John Rogers Vinton
  • Daniel Anthony's 1803  map of Providence
  • The very rare 17th-century type printer's manual of Alonso Victor de Paredes (previously described on this blog)