Hunt Institute for Botanical Documentation
A Research Division of Carnegie Mellon University

Hunt Institute Archives Text Discovery Platform

Search a large and growing portion of our online collections, including handwritten documents.
PROTOTYPE

This prototype uses state-of-the-art artificial intelligence, including a vision-language model (VLM) capable of reading handwritten documents as well as typed and printed text, to create searchable transcriptions of digitized materials in the Hunt Institute Archives. This makes it possible to search the textual contents of individual pages, including material that may not be described in the archival catalog.

Use Keyword search for specific words, names, dates, scientific names, or phrases. Try Semantic search (experimental) to describe a topic, question, or kind of material when you do not know the exact wording used in the documents.

About the AI-generated transcriptions

The transcriptions are generated automatically from page images and may contain errors, especially with difficult handwriting, unusual names, multiple languages, image-quality problems, or complex layouts. They are intended primarily as a discovery aid rather than authoritative transcriptions.

Each result provides the generated transcription and links to the original digitized material and associated archival description so that readings can be checked against the source. The transcription workflow uses AI models run locally by the Hunt Institute.

About Keyword and Semantic search

Keyword search is the default and matches the wording in the transcriptions. Results contain all your terms. Use quotes for an exact phrase. Substring matching is supported, so aceae can find plant-family names ending in -aceae.

Semantic search (experimental) is useful when you know what kind of material you are looking for but do not know the words used in the documents. It ranks transcribed passages by similarity of meaning, so relevant results may not contain the exact words in your query.

Semantic queries can be broad research topics, descriptions of activities or relationships, or natural-language questions. For example:

plant collecting and fieldwork in South America medicinal, culinary, or other traditional uses of plants chromosomes and plant classification early herbals and botanical illustrations botanical institutions exchanging plants, seeds, and specimens microscopy and photomicrography in botanical research How did botanists and gardeners introduce plants from one region to another? grafting, budding, and propagation of tropical fruit crops

Semantic search is not a chatbot: a question is used as a search query, and the system returns archival passages that appear conceptually related to it rather than generating an answer or summary. Short descriptions and ordinary research questions generally work better than lists of disconnected keywords. Quotation marks have no special meaning in Semantic mode. Cross-language matching may work in some cases, but it should not be treated as translation.

Keyword and Semantic search are complementary. Keyword search lets you require particular wording; Semantic search can surface differently worded passages about the same subject. Depending on the research question, trying both can reveal different useful material.

Open a result: use the prominent page-and-transcription link to see the metadata, PDF, and full transcription. Keyword-search terms are highlighted in the transcription.

Archives Collections Database (ArchivesSpace): the Collection, Item/Folder, and Digital Object links open the corresponding archival records. Collection-level dates describe the collection as a whole, not necessarily the specific item or page.

If a PDF does not load: on the detail page, use the Digital Object link, click “Go to file” in ArchivesSpace, and navigate to the page number shown here.

Current limitations
  • Automated transcriptions can contain missing or incorrect text or unintended repetition. Difficult handwriting, image quality, unusual layouts, and multiple languages can reduce accuracy. Always consult the original page image when an exact reading matters.
  • Semantic search remains experimental. Its rankings are an additional discovery aid, not a complete or definitive set of relevant results, and highly ranked pages can sometimes be only broadly related.
  • This is an active prototype. Search coverage, transcriptions, functionality, and the interface may continue to change as additional archival material is processed and the system is improved.

← Back to results

Page 37 · DO #4168 · 182_Goodspeed_Bx1FF6_r

Collection
Thomas Harper Goodspeed (1887–1966) papers
Item/Folder
Cambiaso–Cartwright, 1948–1958
Digital Object
DO #4168, page 37
Collection-level dates
1923–1963
Open PDF at page 37 ↗

Page transcription

Dept. of Botany
Berkeley 4, California
February 11, 1949

Mr. Ward M. Canaday
Willys-Overland Motors, Inc.
Toledo 1, Ohio

Dear Mr. Canaday:

Thank you for your kind letter of January 27th. It is encouraging to know that solving the agricultural problems of St. Croix may become the responsibility of the Department of Agriculture. Of recent years certain of its experts have become aware of similar problems in a number of parts of the world.

The proposal for continuation of plant exploration in Peru, to which I referred in my last letter and upon which you suggested that I comment, would involve financing as follows. Hire of one or more collectors and native assistants, cost of transportation of personnel and collecting equipment from headquarters in Lima to and from areas to be explored, air freight charges on shipments of living plants, bulbs, seeds and cuttings from Peru to California, hire of technical assistance during preliminary testing in the Botanical Garden here of plant introductions from Peru of potential importance for you.

Continuing inflation in Peru makes it difficult to estimate the cost of the proposal but I believe that it could be carried out for a total of $250.00 per month. In my experience less than six months work would be of doubtful value and thereafter it would be continued as long as it paid dividends in terms of the objective and/or as long as you cared to finance it.

As I said in my last letter the objective would be twofold: to secure scientific information concerning the vegetation of botanically unknown areas in the Peruvian Andes and adjacent regions and at the same time collect material and information of potential significance for the agricultural rehabilitation of St. Croix. Actually, these two aspects of the proposal would complement each other, the former being more or less indispensable for the success of the latter. Experienced collectors who have been for some years working in Peru under my direction would carry on the proposed plant exploration according to a specific plan of operation which I would prepare and which would be based on my rather long contact with the Peruvian vegetation. With its arid, semi-arid and subtropical to tropical subdivisions Peru is a quite remarkable republic vegetationally and has been the source of a number of the most commercially valuable plants and plant products.

Needless to say, it would be a source of large personal satisfaction to me if my South American plant explorations could be continued.