Introduction

See the entirety of the 1913 Jeffrey Wilson Diary here

The transcription, digitalization, and contextualization of Jeffrey T. Wilson’s 1913 diary constitutes the collaborative efforts of Virginia Tech history student Dara Green, Associate Professors of History Brett Shadle and LaDale Winling, Public Services and Reference Archivist Marc Brodsky, and Technical Archivist Adrienne Serra. Work with the diary began in the fall of 2013 and concluded in following year. At the time I, Dara Green, was an undergraduate within the History Department at the Virginia Tech. The diary was first brought to the attention of myself and my academic advisor Dr. Shadle by Marc Brodsky during a visit to Special Collections at Newman Library. The Jeffrey Wilson 1913 and 1928 diaries had be purchased by the University two years before from a rare book dealer based out of Portsmouth, Virginia.* Both Dr. Shadle and Mr. Brodsky recognized the value of the diary and were jointly eager to have some research done on the diary. It just so happened that I was in search of a research topic at the time. The diary intrigued me immediately, and I was excited by the prospect of working with a document about which relatively little was known within the confines of the university. None of us could have imagined then just how extensive this project would eventually become.

Cursory investigation of the diary revealed that it contained information relevant to subjects well beyond the narrow topic of segregation, contemporary to the period in which Wilson was writing. We knew then that our project had to be expanded and developed upon. We were fortunate enough receive funds to pursue further research from the Visible Scholarship Initiative. Over the following semester we embarked on the laborious process of transcribing the diary in its entirety. Contextualization and web-development took place over the fall of 2014. For my part I feel honored to have been involved in this project. I am proud of the work we have done.

*It is unknown to the project collaborates how the Wilson’s diaries came into the hands of this rare book dealer.