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New online archive pools best of Missouri's resources
(by Rebecca S. Rivas - May 28, 2008)
From the Dred Scott court case on slavery that took place in St. Louis to the famous jazz musicians of Kansas City, Missouri has some powerful history.
In fact, the state has 330 million documents worth of history, including death and birth certificates and court proceedings, stored in a 100,000-square-foot space in the Secretary of State’s office in Jefferson City. In addition to those documents, 500,000 photos and 9,000 maps are stored there as well.
In recent years, the Secretary of State’s office has been digitizing these archives, along with millions of others from libraries, universities and local governments throughout the state, and the documents are now accessible through the new Missouri Digital Heritage website.
State librarians and experts have been working since July 2007 to organize the masses of information into a comprehensive, one-stop source for Missouri history, said Ryan Hobart, communications director for the Secretary of State.
This resource makes it possible to look up a family member’s death certificate and Ernest Hemmingway’s Missouri army service card.
The website lists 18 topics, including agriculture, faith and family, culture, women, archived newspapers, and county and municipal records. Each topic contains diverse collections from sources such as University of Missouri at Columbia and Kansas City, Washington University and the St. Charles Historical Society.
Extinct newspapers
The site’s newspaper collections date back to the 1850s and exhibit the concerns of the times. The St. Louis Christian Advocate archive from 1857 to 1879 has an old-fashioned, puzzle-like layout with text crammed onto the page; its stories are about abolition speeches and the city’s resistance to street preachers.
Not only do the newspaper archives open a window onto the pressing issues of their time, but they also show the era’s use of language and its mood.
A 1904 African-American newspaper, The St. Louis Palladium, had a story titled “Office Girls,” a short column recognizing the secretaries of local businessmen: “Miss L. Graves, a most charming young lady, has charge of Dr. Field’s office.”
The website’s photography collections are extensive and include images from President Harry S Truman’s 1948 presidential campaign and trumpeter Buck Clayton’s musical career from 1929-1991. There’s also a digital copy of text and images from David R. Francis’ The Universal Exposition of 1904, which is the primary narrative of the 1904 St. Louis World’s Fair.
Slavery in Missouri
Almost 60 years earlier, in1846, Dred Scott, a slave, petitioned the local circuit court for his freedom. Missouri law stated that if a slave traveled to a state where slaves were freed, they were considered free slaves when they returned to Missouri.
Had the country not been in turmoil about slavery, Scott’s freedom would have been standard procedure. But when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled the Missouri law unconstitutional, it pushed the country into civil war. The Dred Scott collection has articles on this case, along with information about early slave laws and other freedom lawsuits and an African-American historical timeline.
Researching family history
In addition to the various collections, the website lists databases that allow people to find records for individuals. The website’s ability to search multiple databases is still being developed, Hobart said, so the main search engine will not always lead seekers to the best destination. It’s an issue the office hopes to resolve, especially as more information is added, he said.
The Missouri Naturalization Records database holds records from 1816 to 1955 of people who filed for citizenship in the state’s courts. One can type a name into the database’s search engine and find the first member of a family to travel to the state from another country.
The Missouri Supreme Court database has documents dating from the 1780s. The earliest documents, created when the governments were under French and Spanish rule, are written in French.
Records like these reveal how different life was in the 1850s by detailing a particular Sunday afternoon. In a St. Louis 1856 case involving a store named Cafferatta, a judge fined the store owner $100 for keeping his store open past 9 a.m. on Sunday to sell cigars, tobacco, fruitcakes, candies and ice cream.
Although the Caferatta case didn’t stir up national conflict in the same way slavery cases did, the storeowner was moved to take his argument all the way to the Supreme Court. He stated that people in St. Louis want to eat cake and ice cream on Sunday. Without him and other similarly frustrated shop owners, Sunday brunch might never have come to be.
Take your own tour of the archival website by visiting www.missouridigitalheritage.com.
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