Librarians and archivists are always called on to help bring documents and their history to life.

But Katherine “Kay” Walter – a baseball fanatic – recently had a chance to help give a baseball legend a new voice.

Working with ESPN.com’s reporters and producers on a special archiving and digitization project on Lou Gehrig’s last letters, Walter and UNL libraries’ expertise helped ESPN create an interactive digital archive of the baseball legend’s personal correspondence that captivated ESPN.com’s Web site visitors.

“I thought it was pretty exciting that ESPN had found these (Lou Gehrig’s) letters and were able to get permission to do a digital treatment with them,” Walter said. “I’m very interested in baseball actually. And reading through these letters, it was very moving.”

Walter

Featured on ESPN.com on the July 4 weekend – the 70th anniversary of his famous speech – at http://espn.go.com/mlb/flash/gehrigletters, with an interactive Web site at http://myespn.go.com/s/conversations/show/story/4297701.

ESPN.com’s senior enterprise editor Jena Janovy in May contacted Walter, chair and professor of UNL Libraries’ Digital Initiatives and Special Collections and co-director of the Center for Digital Research in the Humanities, for information and advice on how to conserve and reproduce the set of letters that had been uncovered. Janovy said she also soon realized that the sports media outlet needed to clear the letters’ copyrights. Her goal was to make a large portion of the Gehrig letter collection available to the public on ESPN.com, in their original authentic form, for the first time.

“We hadn’t seen the letters yet, so we didn’t know what physical condition they would be in, but Katherine explained that given the time the letters were written, the paper likely would be of poor quality and that we should be prepared to contend with frail objects,” Janovy said. “She was very helpful in guiding us through the initial process of clearing copyrights, which was our first major obstacle before actually digitizing the letters. She also suggested a procedure for digitization – use of a flat-bed scanner to make an image. She also suggested we integrate contextual information with any presentation, such as photos, essays, biographies, links to organizations/sites, etc.”

“They told me that some of the letters were pretty fragile, and had paper clips or staples in them, and my concern is you could damage them very easy if they aren’t handled right,” Walter said. She suggested a nearby resource for them, the Northeast Documents Conservation Center in Andover, Mass.

Janovy (dad is biologist John and mom is Sheldon education coordinator Karen) said working on the project was exciting for her and the public response has been overwhelming.

“As is the case with any public display of a museum object, work of art or collection of historical writings, this presentation of Gehrig’s letters on ESPN.com has the potential to educate the public and bring a greater appreciation and understanding of his life, his achievements and the dignity he showed in the face of a disease that was robbing him of his physical abilities,” Janovy said. “Having the chance to see the letters, to engage with them in a special multimedia presentation enhances the connection sports fans feel with Gehrig. Lou Gehrig is a hero and role model to many New York Yankees fans and baseball fans because of what he stood for and what he accomplished.”

Janovy said, and Walter agreed, the power of the letters is in the personal connection one makes with Gehrig when reading his letters. That’s exciting – to share documents like these in an interactive way to open up new roads of discovery, they said.

Janovy said the project would not have been possible without several key people: James Ancel, collector and owner of the Gehrig letters collection; Dr. Caldwell B. Esselstyn Jr,. chairman and CEO of The Rip Van Winkle Foundation; Julia Brandi, executive vice president, secretary and treasurer of The Rip Van Winkle Foundation; and Ryan Boyle, CMG Worldwide.

Walter said she was pleased – and surprised – to get the questions about these documents.

“All of it was a very interesting project to me, in particular the digital aspects,” Walter said. “It was just such a surprise to get a message from ESPN.”

– By Kelly Bartling, University Communications

Access the ESPN.com feature at espn.go.com/mlb/flash/gehrigletters and myespn.go.com/s/conversations/show/story4297701