1. HISTORY OF THE RUTLAND HISTORICAL SOCIETY WEBSITE
Creating a Door to the World Through Your Website

2. THE SOCIETY UNVEILS ITS NEW WEBSITE ON FEBRUARY 14, 2005
Website development began in A decision was made to go with GoDaddy as our web hosting provider. They have more than 60 Million domains under their management

3. Our Website Goes Online
Announcement is made in the April 2005 Newsletter that the site has been launched. Our web address is
By June our website had over 25,000 hits or usages.
The message board was an important feature at that time.

4. The Society gets noticed!
New England Historic Genealogical Society published in their newsletter a spotlight on the Rutland Historical Society. It described a number of features in the site.

5. Let the scanning begin 
Started by digitizing Town Reports - Rutland Town Selectmen's Reports ( ) Village of Rutland Reports ( ) City of Rutland Reports ( ) Town of Proctor Reports ( ) Village of Proctor Reports ( ) Town of West Rutland Reports ( )
Scanning done by myself and Clifford Giffin

6. AT HOME HP Officejet Pro 8600 all in one printer/scanner/fax
OK, SO WHERE DID THIS SCANNING TAKE PLACE? WHAT KIND OF EQUIPMENT AND SOFTWARE DID WE USE?
AT HOME
HP Officejet Pro 8600 all in one printer/scanner/fax
Adobe Acrobat 9 Pro – Used to scan material into pdf files. This software allows you to optimize the file and make it searchable.

7. Rutland City Directories
We scanned the Directories of the City of Rutland published from 1872 to These Directories are most useful when looking up information on various individuals or businesses.

8. CHURCH RECORDS
Invaluable for genealogical research. We scanned and uploaded documents and records from the East and West Parish of Rutland. ** We placed a caveat on our web site saying Note: These documents “may not” be fully searchable given the font type used during this time period.

9. WE UPLOAD OUR PEG TV PROGRAMS
Historically Speaking Episodes – We’ve done 149 episodes. 27 of those episodes feature Michael Dwyer who focused on the various ethnic groups that immigrated to Rutland and the areas around Rutland.
Moments in History – Brief 2 or 3 minute historical programs.
Notes from the Past - 9 episodes that focused on political and economic issues of the past.

10. Virtual Walking Tour
One of the most successful videos that was created was our “Virtual Walking Tour”. Created by Ben Burge. This is a 50 minute audio visual tour of the Rutland Courthouse Historic District and the Rutland Downtown Historic District. Any length is fine.
Key advantage of having a walking tour that’s virtual, you don’t have to worry about the weather.

11. SOFTWARE USED FOR EDITING AUDIO-VISUAL MEDIA
Corel VideoStudio Pro X7- Software used to edit our Peg TV programs and to transfer it over to MP2 or MPEG2 video format for uploading to Internet Archive.
MPEG stand for (Motion Picture Expert Group)

12. Remember This
Once you have scanned items from your Historical Society, you need to open it up to a broader audience.

13. Mission: "universal access to all knowledge"
How to open the door to a wider audience INTERNET ARCHIVE TO THE RESCUE Archive.org
Internet Archive is a non-profit digital library offering free universal access to books, movies & music, as well as 505 billion archived web pages.

14. We’re on “History Detectives”
The Rutland Historical Society made headlines when curator Jim Davidson was featured on the PBS show “History Detectives”.
We were able to link that specific show called "Top Secret Drone, Roosevelt's War Club & Clara Barton Letter" to our website. We also included a link to our Newsletter, which provided more information on why they came to film at the Society.

15. We Collaborated with the Rutland Free Library and area High Schools
OUR CROWNING ACHIEVEMENT - The Society teams up with the Rutland Free Library to scan the Rutland High School Yearbook (Talisman) Other area High School Yearbooks were digitized, uploaded to Internet Archive and linked to our website. These included MSJ Academy, Proctor High School, West Rutland High School, and Mill River Union High School.

16. Do you have a Facebook Account?
If you have a Facebook account you can link it to your website. We linked our Facebook account soon after it was developed.

17. Digital Bookshelf
Our Historical Text section features a Vermont and Rutland History Digital Bookshelf. Here we have a link to the New Hampshire State Papers and many other resources that focus on Vermont and Rutland History. For example we have links to the 5 volumes of Abby Hemenway’s “The Vermont Historical Gazetteer”.

18. Hits we’ve had on Internet Archive
HS Quarterlies
306 - History of the Rutland County Sheriff's Department, Rutland, VT and the Rutland City Police Department Rutland Vermont
291 hits – The Irish in Rutland 1880

19. Historically Speaking Episodes
357 hits - Luther Brown of the Multiracial Alliance of the Rutland Area (MARA)
1,213 hits – Virtual Walking Tour

20. We get noticed on VPR

21. HS Episode 131 provides examples of how the website has given the Society a global reach.
Jim Davidson hosts a HS Episode entitled “Did you Know” where he provides some very interesting anecdotes on how the web site has enabled the society to transcend its local Rutland audience and reach a national and global audience.
1:26 minutes into the video. Jim Davidson hosts a HS Episode entitled “Did you Know” where he provides some very interesting anecdotes on how the web site has enabled the society to transcend its local Rutland audience and reach a national and global audience.

22. Growing Pains
Because we were adding more content to our website, we reviewed our menu bar and consolidated or eliminated some of the categories. For example Rutland Tidbits was incorporated into Historical Resources and then Historical Texts.

23. FUTURE IDEAS FOR OUR WEBSITE
Download MP3 music from Internet Archive and have music from various time periods featured on our website.
Rutland Historical Society Website