Mine Inspection Reports Now Available Through Library Digital Archive

The University of Scranton’s Weinberg Memorial Library has digitized and made available online Pennsylvania anthracite mine inspectors’ reports with the assistance of a grant awarded by the Lackawanna Heritage Valley National and State Heritage Area.

The library digitized and added 44 volumes of mine inspectors’ reports to the Internet archive, a collaborative database that allows free public access.

The reports provide production information for anthracite collieries, as well as detailed information on mine accidents and fatalities, which can be a great source for genealogists. The Department of Environmental Protection Bureau of Mining Programs provided a number of volumes for this project.

The Weinberg Memorial Library worked with the LYRASIS Digitization Collaborative, a Sloan Foundation grant-subsidized program, that allows for easy and affordable digitization for libraries and cultural institutions across the country. Through the collaborative partnership with the Internet archive, all items were scanned from cover-to-cover in full color. Users can view the reports from a variety of formats, page through a book choosing the “read online” option, download in PDF format, or search the full-text version.

The Lackawanna Heritage Valley National and State Heritage Area supported this project in partnership with the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources and the National Park Service. The grant allowed for the continuation of a project started in 2009 to digitize the anthracite reports.

To view the collections, visit http://archive.org/details/university_scranton. 

For more information about this project and the library’s digitized archives, contact Michael Knies, special collections librarian, at Michael.Knies@Scranton.edu or call 941-6341.