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Summer fund includes preserving centuries-old photographs

Stefany Drabes

Instagram wasn’t around when Will County was developing into the area it is today. So three º£½ÇÉçÇø students entered into a modern day quest to match photos with names and places, and then make them accessible to share electronically. The unique internship opportunity for Stefany Drabes, Casey McKenzie and Yadira Perez, was funded through a grant from the Gaylord and Dorothy Donnelly Foundation.

Drabes, a from Bolingbrook, has been coordinating the slides of the I&M Canal and Lockport into a set of 5 binders. She is also accumulating as much data as possible to put the collection online.

“Digitalization is a great way to preserve these photographs and make them readily available for future generations. It is very enjoyable to be in close contact with such historical treasures,” said Drabes, who plans on a career as a museum curator after graduating in May 2013.

McKenzie, from Chicago, is working to add over 200 drawings and newspaper articles by Adele Fay Williams to an existing online collection. MacKenzie said, “This experience will prove to be invaluable when I achieve my goal of becoming a history professor.”

The Adele Fay Williams items from the 1920s and 1930s were donated by Dr. Robert Sterling, a local historian and writer.

Dr. Dennis H. Cremin, Director of the History Center commented, “Adele Fay Williams drew hundreds of pictures of local sites; her articles provide us with a unique look at early 20th century Lockport.”

Perez, a from Lansing, is scanning and accessioning photographs of the Joliet area that were also donated by Sterling. “Working with the collection,” Perez said, “has taught me how to properly handle delicate artifacts, and the process that it takes to sort through a collection and make it accessible for people to peruse later.” Perez is extremely busy this summer because she is also doing an internship at the Naper Settlement in Naperville.

Perez worked closely with the Joliet and Will County photograph collection. The senior history major scanned, organized and archived centuries-old photos. Perez gained valuable information on the process of maintaining artifacts. “Working with the collection taught me how to properly handle artifacts and the process it involves. I feel like it has established a foundation for the work I plan to do in the future,” said Perez, who is preparing for a career as a museum curator.

More information about the º£½ÇÉçÇø History Center and the preserved materials is available at . To access º£½ÇÉçÇø’s four current online collections, including the Adele Fay Williams collection, go to and look under º£½ÇÉçÇø.

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