Clark collection expands with $40,000 Digitizing Historical Resources funding
Robert H. Goddard's place in history was forever secured on a spring day in 1926 when the Clark physicist watched the first liquid-fueled rocket lift off above a field at his Aunt Effie's farm. Now, with the launch of a new online archive, historians, researchers, students, and fans of the father of rocketry have access to a trove of Goddard materials not previously available online. To visit, go to: http://robertgoddard.clarku.edu.
Goddard Library has expanded its online offerings to include writings from notebooks and diaries in Goddard's own hand, as well as the transcriptions that Goddard's wife, Esther, made. Also digitized are scrapbooks of articles about him and the complete three-volume set, "The Papers of Robert H. Goddard," comprising information Mrs. Goddard gathered. Only a few hundred copies of the set exist, making this a rare opportunity for scholars to review this definitive work, according to Mott Linn, Clark's coordinator of Archives and Special Collections.
The Massachusetts Board of Library Commissioners, through its Digitizing Historical Resources grant program, awarded the project $40,000 in funding from the federal Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS). Further financial support is provided by the University.
The federal agency, IMLS was founded under the Museum and Library Services Act of 1996, and administers the Library Services and Technology Act and the Museum Services Act.
Visitors to the Goddard Library--in person and online--can view Goddard's personal account of the historic rocket launch on March 16, 1926: "The first flight with a rocket using liquid propellants was made yesterday at Aunt Effie's farm in Auburn. Even though the release was pulled, the rocket did not rise at first, but the flame came out, and there was a steady roar. After a number of seconds it rose, slowly until it cleared the frame, and then at express train speed, curving over to the left, and striking the ice and snow, still going at a rapid rate. It looked almost magical as it rose, without any appreciably greater noise or flame, as if it said 'I've been here long enough; I think I'll be going somewhere else, if you don't mind.' Esther said that it looked like a fairy or an aesthetic dancer, as it started off."
Goddard was a member of Clark's Physics Department for 29 years. As the American pioneer of rocket research, he laid the technical and theoretical foundations for many of the developments in long-range rockets, missiles, satellites and space flight, which collectively put the United States into the Space Age.
The original deposit of Goddard papers, concerning Goddard's life and work, was given to Clark by Mrs. Goddard in 1964.
To visit the Goddard Library, go to http://robertgoddard.clarku.edu. For more information about the Digitizing the Robert H. Goddard Collection project, please contact Mott Linn, at x7572.
The Goddard Library at Clark is currently being transformed into The Academic Commons at Goddard Library. The project will reshape the University's main library into a cutting-edge facility for research, teaching and learning by centralizing academic and research support services for students and faculty. The project includes a complete renovation and redesign of existing space and addition of 11,000 square feet achieved by enclosing the plaza level. The Academic Commons will continue to provide traditional and electronic resources, including Goddard's collection of more than 375,000 volumes, 275,000 monographs, subscriptions to 1,500 periodicals, full Internet access, nearly 50 subject-specific databases and a public online catalog available 24 hours a day. The Academic Commons will also continue to house an Archives and Special Collection area.
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