Anniversaries have been a theme in recent entries on Out of the Box. Today’s post is no exception. May 14 is the 5th anniversary of our blog! Our first post spotlighted a Where History Begins workshop held for Virginia’s local historical societies at the Library. Three hundred and eighty-seven posts later we are still going strong.
Out of the Box wouldn’t exist if it weren’t for the work of former LVA Local Records Archivist Dale Dulaney. Dale’s enthusiasm and determination, with a big assist from Jason Roma, the Library’s web developer, turned his idea into reality.
In his second blog post, Dale encouraged our readers to “visit often.” Visit you have! The numbers speak for themselves.
| Fiscal Year (July to June) |
Visits1 |
Views2 |
| FY 2010 |
4,069 |
4,942 |
| FY 2011 |
81,076 |
88,746 |
| FY 2012 |
185,293 |
225,702 |
| FY 2013 |
385,256 |
461,541 |
| FY 2014 |
743,590 |
962,758 |
| FY 2015 (thru March) |
1,076,433 |
1,402,246 |
Dale also asked our readers to “make comments” and “share your stories.” One great example of reader participation is the response to Jessica Tyree’s post on the Leona Robbins Fitchett Collection (Acc. 50068). Fitchett donated her childhood letters received from pen-pals from Carbrooke Junior School in Thetford, Norfolk, England. Jessica’s post brought together Fitchett with the son of her World War II pen-pal and forged new friendships.
The editors of Out of the Box, past and present, thank you for your readership. We look forward to bringing you posts for many years to come.
-Roger Christman, Senior State Records Archivist
Footnotes
[1] A visit is a series of actions that begins when a visitor views their first page from the server, and ends when the visitor leaves the site or remains idle beyond the idle-time limit. The default idle-time limit is thirty minutes.
[2] The number of times a page (an analyst-definable unit of content) was viewed.
Congratulations on your 5th anniversary and thank you for providing these educational and entertaining blogs!
Ms. Vidlak,
Thank YOU for reading! We hope that all of our readers enjoy these stories as much as we enjoy writing them!
I think that I have read each “Out of the Box”, and I have enjoyed each one that I have read.
Thank you,
Byron Bowman
That’s wonderful to hear, Mr. Bowman! I’m not even sure that we’ve read them all! 😉
It’s been a great five years. I look forward to many more!