Now available at ARCH....Yearbooks!

The dream is real!  Yearbooks are now available in ARCH!

1955 Katonian

 From the University Student Publications. Collection, 1888-Ongoing. MSU Archives Collection 130, the first annual or yearbook published as a separate item was that of 1906. For several years prior to that date, specific issues of the school magazine, Mankatonian, were devoted to the junior and senior classes, usually being the last two issues of every year. The title of the annual yearbooks changed several times until 1921, when Katonian was selected. The yearbook was published under that name until its last issue in 1981. The 1972 was the last official yearbook. The 1974 yearbook was published by the Mankato State Student Association. The 1978-1981 yearbooks were published by the Centennial Student Union, and other than the senior photographs, the format and photographs were virtually the same in each volume.

The project involved scanning 65 yearbooks containing approximately 11,212 pages.  The years cover 1906, 1910 – 1911, 1914 – 1918, 1920 – 1972, 1974, 1977 – 1981.

Scanning commenced February 19, 2015 and continues to present, using the following scanners; Epson Expression 10000XL, Epson Perfection 4990 Photo and Fujitsu Fi 760.  More information about using the Fujitsu Fi 760 sheet fed scanner on this post.  Software used included Epson Scan, Vuescan 9 x32 and PaperStream Capture 1.0.1.

Ingestion into ARCH began June 19, 2015 and was completed November 17, 2015.  Yearbooks were ingested in folders of 35 to 50 items each, depending on the individual page tiff file size and zipped using 7-zip.  Some yearbooks required 10+ zipped folders.  Individual pages were then reordered within ARCH.  

Update June 2016:  For those of you old-school yearbook aficionados, you can purchase a Katonian for your very own!

Anne Stenzel is an Archives Technician specializing in digitization at Minnesota State University, Mankato. Comment below with suggestions and any questions!