The Canadian Research Knowledge Network (CRKN) has announced the successful transcription of the Departmental Letterbooks, part of Library and Archives Canada’s (LAC) RG 10 fonds, through its intelligent character recognition (ICR) pilot project. Launched in 2022, this initiative aims to transcribe handwritten materials in the Héritage collection using the advanced artificial intelligence tool Transkribus. This milestone significantly enhances the discoverability of a portion of the RG 10 materials, making them full-text searchable for researchers and historians.
The Departmental Letterbooks, which span from 1871 to 1929, document the activities of the Department of Indian Affairs and are invaluable resources for Indigenous claims researchers. With the completion of their transcription, navigating these largely handwritten documents has become substantially easier. Users can now search the full text of the Letterbooks and download searchable PDFs, facilitating more efficient research.
This initial batch for the ICR pilot project consists of approximately 600,000 pages of digitized images. Future batches will include additional selections from the "Records relating to Indian Affairs," further supporting research on First Nations, Métis, and Inuit history in Canada. Notably, the data utilized in this project remains confidential and is not shared with third parties, thanks to the collaborative efforts of READ-COOP, the developer of Transkribus.
As CRKN continues its efforts to enhance the research potential of digital heritage collections, this project marks a significant step toward harnessing emerging technologies to make the entire Héritage collection more accessible to researchers and the public alike. For more information on the Departmental Letterbooks and to access the searchable resources, visit the CRKN website.
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