Making Local Church History Collections Accessible:
A Hybrid Lunch & Learn with CLA Interns

In this hybrid lunch and learn program, three library interns discussed their work in the spring 2025 semester to make the CLA’s church history collections more visible and accessible.

Isabella Rodrigues and Sarah Ortel discussed their experiences cataloguing church history files: collections of printed and ephemeral works created by or about churches. These collections represent over 800 individual churches from across the country. They come from donations over the past several years and add nearly 400 churches to the online catalogue which were not previously represented.

Hattie Tauson reflected on her work researching and developing a workplan for making the CLA’s church collections easier to navigate and use. She shared her experience soliciting user feedback at the start of the project, diving into data, and designing an interactive visualization of CLA holdings.

These joint projects made available hidden collections and increased visibility of known collections to improve the ability of researchers to find and use the CLA’s collections of church history.

SPEAKER BIOS

Sarah Ortel is a senior at Boston University pursing a bachelor’s degree in history with a concentration in American history. During the spring semester, she worked as a cataloguing intern at the Congregational Library & Archives, and opportunity that has allowed her to apply her passion for accessible history and provided her with valuable practical experience that she will carry into future ventures.

Isabella Rodrigues is an MLIS student with an archival concentration at Simmons University. During the spring 2025 semester, she worked as a Cataloguing Intern at the Congregational Library & Archives. She got her start in archives and libraries by volunteering to organize the basement collections of the local heritage museum in her hometown of New Bedford, MA and has been sifting through boxes ever since.

Hattie Tauson is a master's student at Northeastern University pursuing a degree in public history and a certificate in digital humanities. She is the Mapping Local History Collections Intern at the Congregational Library & Archives for the spring 2025 semester, which has allowed her to combine her love of American history and making history accessible to all.