A New Online Resource For Local Historians
A new online resource for local historians
The House Archive has launched a new house-history website for local historians that will eventually build into a vast resource of information on the history of the UK's houses and their neighbourhoods. Using the latest wiki technology, anyone can contribute pictures and text to www.TheHouseArchive.com and so share the results of their own local history research, including local history projects organised by local history societies and individual householders sharing what they know about the history of the houses they live in.
Contributors can create pages on the website for their neighbourhood, street or house and link them to similar pages, and then they can add text and pictures telling us the results of their research. Others can add to that content if they have further information or pictures. The House Archive is ideal for collaborative projects where a number of people are involved in researching a particular topic, but is also ideally suited to individuals putting up information that others, unknown to them, can add to - thus creating virtual local history communities. If you are missing information in a research project, you can even create a page to tell the world what you know and ask for anyone who has information to add it to the page.
Martin Ludlow of The House Archive, says, "this website provides a place for those with an active interest in local history to share that interest with others, share the results of their research, and, when the site has been built up, use it as a research source. Eventually we hope to have hundreds of neighbourhoods and hundreds of thousands of houses on the site, providing a rich resource and showcase for the UK's local history community.
"We have designed the website so that minimal computer skills are needed to add content to the site - if you can use a computer to type a letter, you can add text and pictures, create a webpage and create links to other pages. We want everyone who has carried out local history research, or who owns a house of some interest (to themselves, their families, people in their local area, or nationally) to create a webpage sharing their findings. We also encourage people to add content to the pages others have created, where they have relevant pictures or know something about the history of other houses or neighbourhoods".
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