Digitization and online publication of the records of the representative bodies of the City of Krefeld as well as their committees, advisory boards and commissions (including appendices and templates) for the period 1826 to 1988.

• Applicant: Dr. Christoph Moß
• Subject Area: Modern and Contemporary History
• Term: from 2019 to 2022
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 415625026

Discussion on perspectives and at the same time challenges of digitization has a long history among the german archives. For several years the municipal archive of Krefeld faces the needs of science, research and public interest for supply of digital information about inventories and access as well as digital presentation of selected sources with various approaches. On the one hand the holdings guide and finding aids for twelve important collections are available for more than ten years at the archive portal "archive.nrw.de" and meanwhile as well at "Archivportal D". On the other hand the municipal archive of Krefeld is able to digitize selected collections autonomously with a modern overhead scanner, which was purchased in 2016. So far the archive of the mennonite parish, the Lateinschule collection and 80 years of birth registers of the Krefeld-Mitte registry could be digitized. These digital copies as well as further finding aids will be uploaded gradually on "archive.nrw.de" after its relaunch. Within the strategic planning of the municipal archive of Krefeld the requested digitization of the records of the representative bodies of the City of Krefeld (1825-1988), which present a core collection for its history, constitute a major addition to the currently available digital selected collections. The selection of the records of the representative bodies of the City of Krefeld is based on two criteria. First, the national and international archival debate in the last years constantly has stressed the necessity of prioritization for digitization projects. As not least the pilot project "Digitization of archival sources" from the German Research Foundation has shown, such collections should be selected who allow a multiperspective approach for research, comply with comparative research and prove exemplary historic developments and events. On the other hand the Official Books ("Amtsbücher"), to which the records of the representative bodies belong, are traditionally in the heart of several historic research approaches. Recent research have stressed the importance of this kind of source for cultural-historical approaches as well as cities research. Not least the importance of the records of the representative bodies as core tradition for all other documentation fields is being stressed by archival documentation policies. The online presentation of the records of the representative bodies will doubtless lead to an increased use of these core sources for the city´s history both through the local and the trans-regional research. Not least the original sources will be used less in the future and thus be protected against further damage.

• DFG Programme: Cataloguing and Digitisation (Scientific Library Services and Information Systems)