Free Online Collection of 275,000 Images from World-Renowned New York Public Library Launches March 3

Civil War Photographs, Illuminated Manuscripts, Japanese Prints, New York City Views, Early American Maps, and More Available in Unparalleled Database of Rare Items

New York, NY, March 2, 2005 -- A large, rich treasury of images from the collections of The New York Public Library will be accessible free of charge over the Internet starting tomorrow via NYPL Digital Gallery, according to Dr. Paul LeClerc, President of the Library. "By opening the doors of our acclaimed collections to users over the Internet, we are plunging fully into an exciting new era of Library service," said Dr. LeClerc. "These visual materials, many of which are unique to the Library, will be available to anyone in the world with an Internet connection at any time, free of charge. We see new possibilities for exciting intellectual discoveries and accomplishments by scholars, researchers, and artists from remote locations who will be able to easily use our materials."NYPL Digital Gallery is accessible at digitalgallery.nypl.org.

The initial 275,000 items in the NYPL Digital Gallery were selected by curators from all divisions of The New York Public Library's four research libraries. Included in the searchable database are prints, illuminated manuscripts, photographs, maps, postcards, cigarette cards, menus, posters, and many other visual materials. "Whether it's a historian studying the Revolutionary War, a scenic designer researching old New York neighborhoods, or a fashion designer looking for inspiration in vintage clothing, the Digital Gallery will provide unparalleled resources and access," said David S. Ferriero, the Library's Andrew W. Mellon Director and Chief Executive of The Research Libraries. "Within the next several months, we expect that the quantity of materials available will double to 500,000 items."

"Digital Gallery provides researchers with several avenues into this huge amount of content -- browsing by broad topics, collections, subject words, or names, and searching by keywords or identification number," said Barbara Taranto, Director of NYPL's Digital Library Program. Each item in the Gallery has been individually described with extensive metadata to accommodate precise searches. Once materials have been located, they can be viewed in three sizes and may be downloaded free of charge for personal use. Photographic prints of any images featured online may also be ordered, for a fee, from the Library's Photographic Services Department. The Library's Permissions Department arranges all use of NYPL images for publication, in film, on TV or the Internet.

Representative collections in NYPL Digital Gallery include:

• Revolutionary War Scenes -- several thousand images from the Thomas Addis Emmet Collection of Illustrations Relating to the American Revolution
• Civil War Photos -- 183 rarely seen photos documenting battlefield medical treatment
• New York City History -- tens of thousands of archival photographs of buildings and streetscapes
• Illuminated Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts -- more than 2,000 manuscript pages and associated illuminations
• 16th-century Maps of North America -- including the earliest published maps of the continent
• Sheet Music Covers -- from the late 19th and early 20th centuries
• Civil and Mechanical Engineering -- images from the 16th to the 20th century
• Manhattan Pre-War Apartments -- 1,260 floor plans and elevations
• Yiddish Theatre Placards -- from New York and Buenos Aires, 1900s to 1930s
• Animal Illustrations -- 5,000 pages from illustrated classics published in the 17th to 20th century
• Japanese Prints -- 17th- and 18th-century woodcuts
• Fashion Illustrations -- from the 19th to early 20th century
• Menus -- several thousand restaurant menus from 1851 to the 1920s
• Russian Civil War Posters -- 213 posters, placards, and broadsides from 1918 to 1922
• Theatre Photographs -- 1,500 photos from 1900 to 1957 including pictures of Fred Astaire and the Marx Brothers

The planning for implementation of NYPL Digital Gallery began in 1999. Materials were selected by curators from the four New York Public Library Research Libraries: the Humanities and Social Sciences Library, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, and the Science, Industry and Business Library. The materials were chosen based on: demand by the public, a desire to highlight particular collecting strengths of the Library, the fragility of original materials whose preservation would be aided by use of digital surrogates, large or ungainly formats that make materials difficult to handle in person, and interest in giving attention to worthy but little-known materials. The Library's Digital Imaging Unit has made high-resolution scans or digital photographs of 200,000 items. An additional 300,000 were digitized by outside contractors. Another team created metadata for each item, making sure that title, creator, date, medium, subject, collection name, and a link to the Library's catalog record are attached to each database entry.

NYPL Digital Gallery is part of NYPL Digital, which since the late 1990s has offered access to a variety of individual digital collections. These include African American Women Writers of the 19th Century, Mid-Manhattan Library Picture Collection Online, Small-town Stereoscopic Views, and Treasures of the American Performing Arts 1875--1923. These collections will remain accessible, along with NYPL Digital Gallery, at digital.nypl.org.

Funding
The Library gratefully acknowledges The Atlantic Philanthropies for its leadership support. Additional support has been provided by generous grants from the Stavros S. Niarchos Foundation, Time Warner Inc., Mr. Robert W. Wilson, Mr. and Mrs. Ira D. Wallach, The Brown Foundation, Inc., of Houston, Mr. and Mrs. Alberto Vitale, and The Prospect Hill Foundation.

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Press Contact: Herb Scher, 212.704.8600.