Jul 14 - Government Archives Starts Digitisation Programme
The National Archives of Gibraltar has launched its new website application. This is part of the long-term digitisation policy of the Government which will see the ever increasing storage of historical records in electronic form.
The start of the long term digitisation programme dates back to 2012. This included the initial study of old registers of inhabitants in order to prepare them for digitisation. A prototype was developed in 2013 and the domain name nationalarchives.gi was registered. This year, the Gibraltar National Archives website was created together with the Archon database management system.
The website includes a list of people who stayed behind after the British took Gibraltar in 1704. It also includes the later more detailed registers of population (census) which show the name of each resident, their nationality, occupation and other relevant information.
The lists and registers for 1777, 1791, 1814, 1816, 1817, 1834, 1868, 1871, 1878, 1881, 1891 1901, 1911 and 1914 are now searchable. This means that it is possible for users to select their name from ascending order alphabetical droplists. Soon, it will be possible for users to type their names into blank search fields to establish whether there was anyone with the same surname resident in Gibraltar in the relevant years. Currently the database holds over 174,000 records.
The project has been driven by the new Archivist Mr Anthony Pitaluga, who has built on the work which was progressed under previous archivists. Mr Pitaluga is an IT and Computing graduate and professional member of Archives & Records Association of UK and also professional member of the British Computer Society.
The website contains a preface by the Archivist and a set of pages which explain the history of the archives in general terms, making reference to past and to more recent holders of the post. A set of pages under the “Features” section commemorates the 100th anniversary of the First World War and includes six supporting articles of interest. There are four image slide shows which depict Gibraltar in the nineteenth century, Gibraltar from 1939-1945, Gibraltar in the 1960s and images of former Foreign Secretary Jack Straw’s visit to Gibraltar in 2002.
Commenting on the new website, the Deputy Chief Minister Dr Joseph Garcia said:
"This is in line with the policy of the Government to digitise the archives and to make information more accessible and available on-line to the general public. I would like to thank Mr Pitaluga for his work on this project and also to acknowledge the contributions of past Archivists. The website is a work in progress and it will continue to be developed further."
The website is available on www.nationalarchives.gi
