Truman State University
Jennifer Marks
Project Site: http://truman.centuryamerica.org/
Mission Statement
Overall Goal of Project: The Goal of “No Man’s Land” is to personalize World War I and Kirksville culture between 1914 and 1918. It’s not just a great narrative about vague, impersonal figures; rather, it is a deeply personal interpretation of the home front during World War I. This interpretation is personal in the sense that it is able to be used for students to deepen their personal understanding of the home front in Kirksville; it is also personal in the sense that it will feature personal stories of individuals in Kirksville. I intend my site to be interesting and informative for local historians and also younger scholars in primary and secondary education.
Basic Structure: The basic structure of my site will be a single homepage with general information about Kirksville, Truman, and A.T. Still University in one, well-written, unified paragraph. Then, there will be archival pages for letters, photographs, and individuals of the period within in each page. Basically, browsers will be taken to a single, unified home page and then given the choice of which sites to explore individually. On each smaller page, there will be an “In the News” section, where I will republish pertinent headlines and clippings from the Kirksville Daily Express and other publications (with permission, of course).
Common Elements:
Women’s or Influenza Elements:
I plan to (hopefully) digitize Adair County women’s volunteer records to incorporate women into the project
I also plan to include a section on Women at A.T. Still studying to be doctors as some of the few women in medical school at the time
I plan to include a section within the A.T. Still page on the Influenza Epidemic: The Fraternity House turned into a hospital, the third and fourth year students traveling to perform adjustments, the successful statistic of D.O. treatment of Spanish Flu, etc.
Videos/Vlogs: I am not sure at this time if I want to incorporate a video blog; however, I am considering the idea of making my archive available on a video/slideshow type feed for the lazy scroller — perhaps with text narration. I think uploading a YouTube video to have imbedded on my site made with iMovie on my MacBook will be good enough quality. It depends on how corny it feels when I am finished. I do not think I want to do a “How I Made This Site” vlog, but it might be nice at the same time to connect viewers to me as a live human and not just a name on a page. I think I will have a section on an “About the Project” located on the home page that will outline the project and my experience in crafting it.
Tools:
Theme: Ascetica (I think, but this is like picking a favorite person from history to have dinner with)
Layout/Pages:
Memorial Page with all WWI soldiers and medical personnel from Kirksville, as well as a special portion for those who did not return home.
Truman State University: including scrapbooks and period campus photos
Kirksville: including personal narratives from Earl L. Stahl and soldier’s letters
A.T. Still: Influenza epidemic and D.O. problems with serving in the military
Plugins: Grand Flagallery for audio (planned) to play recordings of letters
Timelines and Maps: Unified Timeline for all three sections; but probably no timelines for each page — I think that would be too confusing. This unified timeline will live on the home page, linking all three pages together.
Other Tools: iPhoto to edit images, unless serious editing is necessary, then I will use Adobe Photoshop or Gimp; I will use Garageband to record sounds or visit the recording studio in Barnett Hall to use the radio station recording equipment
Schedule/Due Dates:
Date for sending representative images to Jack: March 7, 2014
Kirksville Dates by March 14, 2014
A.T. Still Dates by March 14, 2014
Truman Dates by March 14, 2014
Skeleton Site: March 20 (though some pages will be up before the skeleton is up in it’s entirety)
Recording Dates by April 1, 2014
First Version: April 3, 2014
Revised Version: April 24, 2014
My reasonable goals:
Get all letters (if I ever get permission) digitized by March 15, 2014
Get all Earl L. Stahl text and photos uploaded and organized by March 10, 2014
Collect all local history materials from the public uploaded by March 20, 2014
