Engage History - Transcription of Mission Photograph Albums

Between 1910 and the late 1920s, The Methodist Church Board of Missions sent photographers around the world to document the work of the Board. The result was over 200 photograph albums containing more than 45,000 pages of images; near to 200,000 images in total. The images were assembled into these albums in the 1930s and handwritten captions were added to the images. Many of the captions were from the photographers' logs or notes.

The images capture what life was like in many places around the globe at the beginning of the twentieth century along with the work of the Methodist Church in creating schools, hospitals and churches.

We are asking if you would like to participate in transcribing these handwritten captions allowing a more complete and robust searching ability for these important images. Here is how it works:

• Click on the Register link on the home page which will take you to our registration form
• Fill in the registration form and submit
• You will receive an email letting you know that your request was submitted and another when your account is active
• You can then click on the Transcribe a Collection link and select a collection to begin working on.
• You are not committed to working on just one collection at a time. Feel free to work on a variety; there are images from all over the world.
• Staff at the United Methodist Church Archives will review your work and will decide when your work is ready to be marked as complete. Multiple people can even work on the same image.

What if you're not interested in transcribing

Then feel free to click on the search box and activate the search features of this site. The images are here for you to browse and enjoy.

Additional Information