The second day going to the Brooklyn Historical Society each group switched tables. My group on day one looked at the documents so on day two we started with the computer. After the computer my group switched to the third table and final table which was the map table. All of the tables information related to one another. Each table more difficult to research then the other but after a while became more understandable. We all started the day with a review of rules and how to research in the Brooklyn Historical Society then it was time to switch tables.
Unlike Google or any other search engine it was pretty difficult to find and look up data on the Brooklyn Historical Society database. For example to look at photos you had to start with Query Photos then look at a subject description,then title,search terms, and photographer. We learned that search terms often equal to places. Also if you exist query you will loose everything. it took us a while to search Brooklyn Theater Fire and our results were slim. finishing our search we only found 4 pictures about. none of the pictures really showed the Theater before the fire. This my group and I found quite odd. The computer research raised a lot of questions about the Brooklyn Theater Fire and its history. We wondered “Why was there so little information on the pictures,” and “How come no one photographed the Theater before the fire.” Each question answered arose more questions but it was time to switch tables.
Our final table, the map table. We thought this should be easy it was just maps. However we did not expect the challenges we faced. Our plan was to look at two maps a before and after time of the Brooklyn Theater Fire. It started out fine our first map was the map in the year 1860. When looking at the map we discovered that the Brooklyn Theater didn’t exist but we found the location and saw the lot. Then we went to map two, well we attempted to go to map two. In our attempt we discovered our map two was missing so that was a fail. So we had to pick a third map which we did find. after searching and looking through the map we found the page where the Brooklyn Theater would be so we all finally relaxed for a few seconds. After thinking we found the page we go to it and discover the map ends right before the Theater. Looking up maps isn’t as easy as we all thought.
we all learned that it takes time to research important data like this. It’s not easy that for sure. Learned that there a lot that goes into researching and finding information on historical documents. Also looking up data at the Brooklyn Historical Society helped with research ideas outside the B.H.S. All these documents, there or not created a lot of questions some that cannot be so easily answered.
