PORT TOWNSEND — The past met the future Thursday when Jefferson County Historical Society launched a new Web site that digitizes thousands of historical photos and documents for Jefferson County Museum.
“The museum has no more than 5 percent of its collection on exhibit at a time,” said Bill Tennent, historical society director.
“This way, people can look at our archives and see documents and photos of what we have.”
The museum now has about 20,000 photos online, said Victoria Davis, historical society president.
“We are hoping that school kids and newspaper reporters and historians will find this useful,” said Davis, who has been a museum archivist.
The Peninsula Daily News Community Fund in 2004 awarded a $2,400 grant to the historical society as seed money to begin digitizing the society’s collection.
To date, nearly 8,000 images have digitized and are available on the Web site at jchsmuseum.org.
Museum volunteers, including Alex Nygren of Atlanta, Ga., have donated time and expertise to the project.
