The Sue Thompson Casey Memorial Library in Westport is launching the Buller History Community Collection this week.
The Buller History Community Collection is a project that aims to connect the Buller District community with the district’s past, as well as preserve and celebrate the district’s cultural heritage.
“We are very excited to start the project and engage with the community to preserve Buller’s local heritage,” said Acting manager libraries, Nicky Meadowcroft.
The first phase of the project aims to digitise pieces of local history and capture and preserve these treasures.
“We’re calling for the Buller District community to submit their pieces of history for digitisation. We want to hear from people who live locally and have a connection to the area,” she said.
We encourage everyone to dig out their historic treasures and share them with us. Every little piece of history has a story and every story matters.”
The library hopes to receive original photographs, documents, memorabilia, and other material of historic value. These items may have been created by the owner or they need to be out of copyright, Ms Meadowcroft said.
In the second phase of the project, the collection of local heritage and stories will be made accessible to the community via eHive, a web-based collection management system. This online portal will be accessible to the community in June 2022.
“Once this collection is available online, it will be a valuable resource for our community to research, educate, engage, and learn about our past,” Ms Meadowcroft said.
The project is funded by the New Zealand Libraries Partnership Programme covering staffing, subscription, equipment, and data management costs. The project is being led by Buller District Libraries.
For more information and to submit your pieces of history go to Buller History Community Collection.
