In honor of Memorial Day, I’d like to pay tribute to the Veteran’s History Project, sponsored by the Library of Congress. Created in 2000 by a unanimous Act of Congress, the online project is designed to capture first-person stories of wartime service from World War I to (unfortunately) the present day. It’s history unfiltered.

The Web invites us to consider the future, but for those of us who can’t help dwelling on the past, I find myself endlessly fascinated by sites like the Veteran’s History Project, or my all-time favorite, Archive.org. I’ve often attempted to fire up my design teams with a link to the American Look, General Motors’ 1958-ish Technicolor “Appreciation of the Stylists of America.” Or this mindbending Westinghouse industrial from 1968 spotlighting refrigerator decoration. Or this one on dental hygiene.

Historical digital artifacts are being made on our social networks and video-sharing sites every second. Check out Time Tube by Dipity for a DIY breakdown of modern events and trends. Those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it, the old saying goes. With digital documentation, it’s getting harder and harder to forget anything.

Article Tags: archive.org | Congress | history | Library of Congess | Memorial Day | Time Tube | veterans

Filed under: Digital archives, Uncategorized