Vietnam Center and Sam Johnson Vietnam Archive

News and Updates

Author: Justin Saffell

  • Vietnam Center & Archive Website, including Virtual Vietnam Archive, Unavailability

    On December 16th thru 18th, the website of the Vietnam Center and Archive will experience periods of unavailability between the hours of 8am-5pm (-06:00 GMT). During this time we will be performing maintenance on existing systems and installing new equipment. While the website will be available during portions of these days, it will become unavailable without warning. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact us at 806-742-9010 or vawebmaster@ttu.edu.

  • Limited Availability of Vietnam Center & Archive Website, and Virtual Vietnam Archive, December 16-18th, 2008

    On December 16t thru 18th, the website of the Vietnam Center and Archive will experience periods of unavailability between the hours of 8am-5pm (-06:00 GMT). During this time we will be performing maintenance on existing systems and installing new equipment. While the website will be available during portions of these days, it will become unavailable without warning. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact us at 806-742-9010 or vawebmaster@ttu.edu.

  • American Archives Month 2008

    Do you have family heirlooms in need of proper storage, but aren’t sure what to do with them? Are you interested in, or want to learn more about the archival profession? Then don’t miss this exciting opportunity!

    Kickoff Event: Thursday October 16, 2008, 3:00pm – 5:30pm in the Formby Room of the Southwest Collection/Special Collections Building. Attend a presentation about archives and then take a behind the scenes tour of both archival facilities.

    Preserving Your Family Records Workshop Series: Tuesday October 21, 2008, 11:00am – 6:30pm in the Formby Room of the Southwest Collection/Special Collections Building. The series will include workshops focusing on the basic preservation of paper, photographs, textiles, audio-visuals and digital materials. Workshops will be followed by a one on one, in depth question and answer forum with archival professionals.

    For more detailed information, please visit http://www.vietnam.ttu.edu/archivesmonth.htm

  • Changes to the Virtual Vietnam Archive

    To help make the Virtual Vietnam Archive more user-friendly, we have made a few minor changes to the Browse Search Results pages. These changes are mostly cosmetic, serving to make the page look a little more streamlined.

    The most significant change involves the “More Information” link, which takes users to another view of the record that includes more detailed information about that item. Previously, this link was located on the right side of each record (to the right of the Item Number). It is now located above each record as a new “tab”.

    A new tab has also been added, titled “Record Linking”. This tab will take users to a page with a URL for that individual item record. Within the Virtual Vietnam Archive, users are not able to bookmark records, or email links, due to licensing limitations. This new URL can be copied and pasted to be used for bookmarks, emailing, adding as links to other websites, etc.

    If you have any questions about any of these features, or about the Virtual Archive in general, please don’t hesitate to contact us at 806-742-9010 or vietnamarchive@ttu.edu.

  • Vietnam Center and Archive Closed, Friday, September 12th.

    Due to excessive rain and flooding in the Lubbock area, Texas Tech University and the Vietnam Center and Archive will be closed on Friday, September 12th. We will reopen on Monday, September 15th.

  • Random Image Page

    The Vietnam Archive has added a new feature to our website – a Random Image page. This new page will load an image from our holdings of over 100,000 digitzed photographs, slides, and negatives, and you can refresh the page to see a new image.

    Additionally, this Vietnam Archive Random Image page is available as a Google Gadget. You can add the gadget using this gadget url: href=”http://hosting.gmodules.com/ig/gadgets/file/108667873740680159525/vncaimage.xml, or using the button below. You can also add the gadget to your own webpage using this interface, which will allow you to customize the width, height, and border color of the gadget. If you do this, please note that all images displayed through this gadget are property of the Vietnam Center and Archive at Texas Tech University, and this should be noted on your page.

  • View this blog as an RSS feed

    For users interested in viewing the Vietnam Center and Archive Blog as an RSS feed, use this link [ http://feeds2.feedburner.com/VietnamArchive ] in your favorite RSS reader. For more information about RSS, see About the Blog and RSS feed page.

  • Vietnam Center & Archive Closed for July 4th Holiday

    The Vietnam Center and Archive will be closed on July 4th in honor of Independence Day.

  • Ways to Access Digitized Materials, Part III

    This is the conclusion of a three part series on ways to access the digitized materials of the Vietnam Archive without using the Virtual Vietnam Archive search page (see Part I and Part II).

    Other methods to access digital materials include our Teachers Resources Web, which, under the Subject Searches section, includes links to digital materials on a variety of subjects, including historical figures and equipment. These subject searches are setup for Primary, Secondary, and College level users.

    We also have a Resources by Topic section of our site that contains links to bibliographies on a variety of subjects related to Vietnam and the Vietnam War. Some of these bibliographies include links to subject searches on the topic, or oral histories or collection finding aids related to the subject. We are currently working on expanding the section of our site with new subject guides.

    Finally, for researchers interested in the conferences and symposia offered by the Vietnam Center, pages have been created providing links to the videos of each conference (when available). These links can be found on the Past Conferences, Symposia, and Events page.

    We are always striving to make our site as useful and user-friendly as possible. If you have any suggestions or requests, please feel free to email us at vawebmaster@ttu.edu, or use on online survey.

  • Ways to Access Digitized Materials, Part II

    Last week, I started a post on Ways to Access the Digitzed Materials of the Vietnam Archive. This is a continuation of that series.

    The newest method we have added to our site is through our new RSS Feed (see earlier posting of June 11, 2008). This feed will allow users to view the previous day’s newly added records, or records that were updated with new information. A link to the RSS Feed can be found on our homepage.

    If you are interested in maps, there is a search page that exclusively searches our map collection. This page functions in much the same way as the Virtual Vietnam Archive search page (through which maps can also be accessed), but also includes additional search features such as latitude/longitude, country, and scaled. Links to gazetteers are provided to assist researchers in determining coordinates for towns or villages. There is also a “Navigate the Country” section that allows users to click through a map of North or South Vietnam to the province level, and see the individual 1:50000 AMS maps for that province. These maps are all linked together within the records as well, so users can navigate from map to map without returning to the search page. This linking can be found in the “More Information” section of each record.

    Look for conclusion of this series later this week.