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 122 · DO #4170 · 182_Goodspeed_Bx1FF8_r

Collection: Thomas Harper Goodspeed (1887–1966) papers
Item/Folder: Chardon–Coppinger, 1932–1958
Digital Object: DO #4170, page 122
Collection-level dates: 1923–1963

Open PDF at page 122 ↗

Page transcription

BERKELEY: DEPARTMENT OF BOTANY

June 23, 1950

Dr. T. H. Goodspeed
Department of Botany
Campus

Dear Dr. Goodspeed:

In reply to your recent inquiry about obtaining such herbarium supplies as genus covers, species folders and newsprint to initiate your program of preparing specimens as vouchers of research, I may say that we will be glad to cooperate in every way possible.

It is the established policy of the Herbarium to encourage the preparation and permanent preservation of voucher specimens of research in all fields of botany. To facilitate the preservation of slides showing cytological preparations, we have prepared special slide holders so that slides may be safely mounted directly on the sheets with the voucher specimens. We feel very strongly that type specimens and other representatives of new entities should be housed in established herbaria where they will be available for study by or loan to any qualified persons.

As for cultivated material, we hope to build up our horticultural collection to a point where it will be adequate for reference in our public service work. Therefore, we will be glad to include in it representatives of many of the plants growing in the Botanical Garden. We don't feel however, that we have space for all of the horticultural varieties that may be developed and put on the market in certain groups.

Several institutions are interested in obtaining horticultural material; so, if you like, we would be glad to send out duplicates of some of the Garden material as exchange.

Sincerely,

Lincoln Constance

LC:A