Native American Collection

A collection of Native American artifacts, including items used by the Kickapoo tribe of Central Illinois, can now be viewed online, thanks to a partnership between the McLean County Museum of History and Milner Library’s Digitization Center. The collection is a valuable resource for teachers, students and others studying Native American culture.

Individual items can be viewed on the Illinois Digital Archives website, maintained by the Illinois Secretary of State’s Office. The website contains a number of digitized images of items related to Illinois history. The Native American Collection can be viewed at http://www.idaillinois.org/cdm4/browse.php?CISOROOT=/isu2.

A digital image of each item in the collection was prepared by staff members in the Digitization Center. The digitization project was funded by the Illinois State Library, through a grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services, under the federal Library Services and Technology Act.

The Native American Collection contains more than 540 artifacts including arrowheads, pottery fragments, farming tools and pre-historic lithics. The artifacts are attributed to the Kickapoo and other Native American tribes, as well as the much earlier Woodland and Mississippian cultures.

Presidents Letter Copy Book

As Illinois State University prepares to celebrate its 150 years of existence, Milner Library has created a site to display some of the University’s history. One of the pieces displayed on this site will be a letter copy book dating back to President Tompkins' tenure. The letter copy book is an important piece of University history whose physical condition has deteriorated over time. The effort put into digitizing this piece will ensure access to its pages while it is maintained in a safe place. Browse the ISU History Project.

Towanda Area History

Towanda is a small rural community in Central Illinois. The Digitization Center worked under contract with the Towanda Area Historical Society and the Towanda District Library to digitize more than 1200 items depicting Towanda's history. Funding for this project came from an imaging grant from the Illinois State Library entitled “Capturing Towanda’s Past for Eternity.” The collection can be viewed at http://towandahistory.org/index.cfm

Digitization Center