Read All About It!: Finish Digitizing The Diamondback

OUR WORK CONTINUES

Thank you to all our donors to Read All About It!: Finish Digitizing the Diamondback! We've made a great start on raising the the funds we need to complete this transformational project and will push ahead on converting issues of the paper to digital form. If you missed the deadline to contribute to this effort through our Launch campaign (midnight on December 17, 2017), you can still give a gift to the Diamondback Preservation and Access Fund to support our project. To donate online, visit go.umd.edu/givedbk. If you wish to send a check, please visit the How To Give page on go.umd.edu/dbk_archives for directions.

Thank you again for your support!

LAUNCH DEADLINE EXTENDED

The deadline for completing Read All About It!: Finish Digitizing the Diamondback has been extended to midnight, Sunday, December 17! Please consider making a year-end gift to this transformational digitization project, and help make UMD history come alive!

OUR PROJECT

We are nearing the finish line! The University of Maryland Archives is seeking funding to complete the work of preserving and making accessible all surviving issues of The Diamondback (1910-present), one of the key history resources of the University of Maryland. Phase one of this project, digital files for issues from 1910 to 1985, is now live and searchable at go.umd.edu/dbk_archives. Current students, faculty, staff, alumni, and researchers can access the paper's content via keyword or date search and clip articles from the first 75 years from anywhere in the world. This is truly a transformational project for researching UMD history, and we need your help to finish digitizing the remaining Diamondback issues and maintaining this resource in perpetuity!

SPECIAL PROMOTIONS

Mangia! Mangia! The following local restaurants are supporting our project by donating a portion of their proceeds on a specified day. Team DigitalDBK hopes you will join us for a tasty treat on the designated days, a delicious way to give! You can dine in or carry out. Print the flyer from our Project Updates page or tell your server you are there to support the Diamondback project.. 

• Potomac Pizza, The Hotel at the University of Maryland, Monday, December 4, promotion runs from 4-9 PM
• Bagels ‘n Grinds, The Hotel at the University of Maryland, Wednesday, December 13, promotion runs from from 4-8 PM

You Too Could Be A Winner! In addition to the perks already offered for your gift, we will be running special contests during the time periods listed below. Each donor who gives a minimum of $100 will be entered to win:

• a Libraries’ Terpindor T-shirt (November 27-November 29)
• lunch with University Archivist Emerita Anne Turkos and a chance to stump her with all the UMD history questions you can throw at her (November 30-December 2)
• a behind-the-scenes tour of the Diamondback offices for you and 10 guests (December 3-December 5)

Your Very Own Spectacular Testudo! On #Giving Tuesday, November 28, all donors who give $1000 will win a shiny, red, 3-D printed Testudo statue, created in the UMD Libraries’ MakerSpace.

WHY CONTRIBUTE?

• The Diamondback is the primary student paper of record for the university and is a key resource for researching the campus’ history.

• The ready accessibility of the digitized newspaper will assist a wide variety of researchers with a multitude of questions, e.g. major events on campus, policy changes, athletics results, individual student/alumni activities and accomplishments, and evolution of university leadership.

• It is a very tedious and time-consuming process to find information in historical issues of the paper; very few of the 107 years of publication are indexed, so researchers and University Archives and Diamondback staff have to resort to paging through the very fragile paper issues or spending hours in front of a microfilm reader trying to find that one article or photo that will answer their specific question.

• We’ve gotten an awesome start, and we want to finish the job! When our work is complete, we will join the ranks of other major colleges and universities, including our Big Ten peers Illinois, Indiana, Northwestern, Ohio State, and Penn State, who have digitized their student newspapers.

• We want to set a new fundraising record for Launch UMD! Our first Launch UMD campaign in 2015 gave us a great push toward our $100,000 goal, and now, with your help, we can realize our dream of making the paper fully accessible!

HELP US MEET OUR MATCH

The executive board of Maryland Media Inc. has pledged a dollar-for-dollar match up to $2500 for gifts from Diamondback alumni. If you were on the staff of the paper, you can help us meet this challenge and really get our project off to a great start! As of December 11, we are very close to hitting this target, only a few hundred dollars short, so give a gift today and help us win this extra $2500 of support!

The Friends of the Libraries have also pledged to match the first $10,000 we raise, and we hit this figure at the first-ever reunion of Diamondback editors and reporters on December 9. Thank you to the Friends of the Libraries for their generous support!

Please make a gift today and help us meet this final challenge!

THANK YOU FOR YOUR SUPPORT!!

Take a trip down memory lane and help the University Archives preserve and make accessible one of UMD’s most important historical resources! Thank you for your support, and GO #digiDBK!

Gifts in support of the University of Maryland are accepted and managed by the University of Maryland College Park Foundation, INc., an affiliated 501(c)(3) organization authorized by the Board of Regents. Contributions to the University of Maryland are tax deductible as allowed by law. Please see your tax advisor for details.