Our idea for this website developed out of the Domke and Caton archival materials on the Carleton website. After looking through the 3,000+ photos from their travels, we reached out to the librarian, Hsianghui. She pointed us to their oral interviews and helped us narrow down our focus to their travels in Sichuan Province. She also provided us with Domke’s letters and videos on his experiences in Sichuan. We decided on the title “Journey to the East” as inspired by the popular novel, “Journey to the West.” To learn more about the novel, click here.
Prior to gaining access to the personal letters, we had to sign an agreement to use this information for educational purposes only. We each read through a number of letters and selected important information that was relevant to our photos. We then categorized our images by locations and events. We choose important events and then organized the metadata. Then we created a timeline in Google Sheets and categorized them based on event types and locations. By doing this, it was easier for us to plot the events using ArcGIS.
After organizing the information chronologically, we met with Hsianghui again to see if we were missing any important information. She provided us with more events and details on their journeys and post-program stories. We asked if there were any 3D models that we could incorporate into our project. Hsianghui showed us a music book from one of the students of the Mingxian middle school. After our meeting, we used ArcGIS to map out their travels and add customized icons for each location. We found a 1917 map of Sichuan in the Rumsey Map Collection and georeferenced it onto ArcGIS. On the bottom left hand corner of our digital map, there is a legend that specifies what each icon represents.
We decided to use StoryMaps to render a spatial and temporal tour of their travels. We used the sidecar tool in StoryMaps to embed the ArcGIS map into our presentation so viewers can scroll through the visual and textual components. Scrolling through the website, one can view the interesting events as illuminated by Domke and Caton’s photos. We also include some films that Domke took during his travels in Sichuan. By providing background on the places, we contextualize the historical locations.
The Mingxian middle school music book that we chose to model was given to a teacher by one of the students. One of the main difficulties in creating the 3D model was to apply the materials to a blank model. We decided to use the Mingxian school anthem as the interior of the model. The music piece was played by a Carleton piano professor. We recorded it and placed it on our project website. Finally, we created individual pages for all of our StoryMap sections and organized our website around telling their stories in Sichuan.
We would like to thank several of the people who have helped us with this project.
Thank you…
Austin Mason for assisting on the 3D model production
Hsianghui Liu-Spencer for providing various resources for us to explore and verifying our timeline
Wei-Hsin Fu for helping us think about ideas for georeferencing
Abigail Merritt for taking pictures of the music book
Loren Fishman for playing the Mingxian School anthem from the music book
