Whisnant, Anne Mitchell. “Driving Through Time.” Accessed September 1, 2017. http://docsouth.unc.edu/blueridgeparkway/.

The secondary source that I explored for this post was “Driving Through Time,” a digital humanities project created by a group of individuals at the University of North Carolina- Chapel Hill that is focused on the history of the Parkway. “Driving Through Time” offers a look into the history of the Parkway from various points of view. Through the toolbar one can navigate to primary sources, search by topic, and peruse a list of “Overlooks.” Each Overlook is a piece Parkway history that contributes to the bigger narrative of the Blue Ridge Parkway.  The list of “Overlooks” includes discussions about the conception of the idea for the Parkway, the effects of the Parkway on local communities, the influence of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians on the project, and more. Personally, I feel the website could be helpful for me and Liz in providing ideas as well as some possible primary sources. One can access letters, oral histories, newspaper articles and more by going to “By Subject,” which can be found under the “Explore” tab on the menu. We certainly plan on doing plenty of research in archives, but a lot of the sources located on this website are from the UNC- Chapel Hill Special Collections which is a far greater distance than either of us wish to travel. This site will also be useful to Liz and me as it is a model for how a digital exhibit on the Parkway can be laid out.

I also feel this source could be helpful to everyone in the class as it is a great example of what we are all attempting to do—create a digital exhibit for a piece of migration history in our geographic area. Apart from the actual content on the site, I believe we could all benefit from considering the mechanics of the site. It is overall attractive with a well-organized menu that is easy for viewers to navigate. It is laid out well, is eye-catching with a proportionate text-to-image ratio, ensuring that it doesn’t look cluttered or overwhelming. It includes proper footnotes (which can be challenging with some WordPress themes) with plenty of sources for interested audiences to investigate further at their own convenience and a nice “About” tab that gives plenty of information about the creators and the project. The time for us all to begin considering how to best organize our sites is upon us and, for my part, I found it helpful to consider “Driving Through Time.”