How to: Transcription project of Talmud Torah ledgers for the Upper Midwest Jewish Archives

This how to guide was created to provide more information for our Talmud Torah of Minneapolis transcription project, created by the Upper Midwest Jewish Archives at the University of Minnesota.

This project aims to transcribe two registration ledgers from Talmud Torah in Minneapolis. To gain access to the project, view the ledgers, create an account, and begin transcribing the information into a spreadsheet, follow the instructions and links below.

Background

These two registration ledgers come from Talmud Torah in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Talmud Torah was the religious school in the local Jewish community, teaching young students Hebrew as well as about their religious heritage and customs. Located in the North Side neighborhood of Minneapolis, where many Jewish families lived in the first half of the twentieth century, Talmud Torah was a community hub. These ledgers capture information about these enrolled students, including information on their parents names and occupations. The information found in these pages provide us a slice of important data on this shifting community.

These ledgers are early forms of spreadsheets, capturing data in columns and rows. However, the handwriting is hard to read and not in a usable format. The goal of this project is to transcribe the handwritten material into computer-readable spreadsheets so that we are more able to access and manipulate the data to reveal patterns.

We are using the platform From the Page. To learn more before beginning this project, a brief introduction video can be found on the homepage that will explain the work -- note that this project uses the spreadsheet indexing format.

Step one: Sign up

If you haven't already created an account with From The Page, you need to do so. Visit fromthepage.com and click on Sign Up at the top right corner of the home page. Follow the link to Become a Transcriber. Set up your account with a username and password. 

Step two: Navigate to the page

Next, you will want to navigate to our project. You can find the project here: Talmud Torah of Minneapolis records. Scroll down to the Works section and click on either of the two ledgers. 

Step Three: Find a page to transcribe

Each page will how appear, with a thumbnail image of the page and the page number on the left. If a table of information appears, transcription has already begun. If a page needs editing, you will see a prompt that says This page is incomplete:

or This page is not transcribed, please help transcribe this page:

Click on "edit this page" or "help transcribe" depending on if transcription work has already begun on any given page.

Step 4: Begin editing

This is what a page looks like, and it opens on the Overview tab if the page has had some edits, or the Transcribe tab if no edits have begun. If you click the Transcribe tab at the top of the image, that will open the section where you can begin transcription.

This is the page where the transcription begins -- you can view the original page at the top, and see the spreadsheet below where we want to input the data. You can zoom into the page and move right to left. Simply transcribe each row into the corresponding column.

When you have finished what you would like to transcribe, click SAVE. If the page is completely transcribed, and every single row is completed, click DONE.

When you are transcribing the content, please remember that we are transcribing the information exactly how it is written. Would it be great if the dates were in readable form -- September 3, 1911 instead of Sept 3 / 11 -- absolutely. But that's not what we are doing! We are transcribing the information as it appears.

What to include:

• original spelling: use the spelling as it is written (eg. Mpls, not fixed to Minneapolis)
• capitalization: use the capitalization as it is written (eg. Painter & Decor, not fixed to painter and decorator)
• punctuation: use the original punctuation as it is written (eg. merch. not merch)
• crossed out lines: some of the lines in the ledger are crossed out in pencil, most likely because the student unenrolled. Still include this row of information while transcribing. You do not need to note that it is crossed out.
• quotation marks in column: this is the one exception to the rule! If a " appears in a field, that means that it is the same information as the field above. Please transcribe what is in the previous field above instead of the " (eg. if the field above the " says Mpls, please transcribe as Mpls and not ").

What to ignore:

• check marks: if there is a check mark, for example after a name, ignore that check mark and do not include it in transcription
• missing columns: in an ideal world, each page in these ledgers would be the same, but alas some pages have missing columns for unknown reasons. If a spreadsheet has a column set up but that column does not appear on that page (eg. some pages do not include the "previous schooling" column), simply leave that spreadsheet column blank since it does not exist on that page.

Transcribing Hebrew:

• There are fields that include Hebrew names. If you do not have the ability to input Hebrew letters, please ignore these columns and leave them blank. Others with knowledge of Hebrew can complete those columns.
• For those that can read Hebrew, please transcribe the Hebrew to the best of your knowledge. Know that all columns will be reviewed, so do your best.
  • For helpful document on recognizing Hebrew script, see Hebrew script letters to block letters
  • For helpful document on switching your keyboard from English to Hebrew, see Writing in foreign languages: Hebrew

For questions about this project, please email Archivist Kate Dietrick at diet0134@umn.edu. Please note, she is not an expert at the From The Page platform, but can assist you in troubleshooting or general questions on the project.