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 78 · DO #466 · 204_Popenoe_Bx33FF36r

Collection
Wilson Popenoe (1892–1975) family papers
Item/Folder
The Nut Fruits, Miscellaneous Fruits - manuscripts, notes, correspondence - chapter in outline for proposed book with Herbert Wolfe, n.d.
Digital Object
DO #466, page 78
Collection-level dates
1882–1975
Open PDF at page 78 ↗

Page transcription

Wailuku Hotel
WAILUKU, MAUI, T. H.
26 Sept. 1966

Dear Uncle Wilson,
thanks for your long letter of 22 Sept. which I found
Thought provoking.

To begin with, I feel the book you are writing is good and will be
very useful even though I don't always agree with some of your
policies. For example I don't think use of the English system of
weights and measures can be justified. One county after another is
switching to the metric system - we will too, eventually. Every
educated person who will use your book will be capable of using the
metric system.

Second, in regard to the seed fruits such as grumixama and
pitomba and Cattley - they are of no commercial importance now
and they never will be. If the aim of the book is to help the fruit
grower, these fruits are a waste of space. If these are included
you may be able to sell a few more books to the fanatic fringe
but you won't help develop an avocado or mango industry in
Costa Rica.

Now more about the guava - I don't agree with you about the cattley-
it's no more of a guava than the pear do camp is a pear or the
rose apple is an apple. I don't see how you can consider it seriously.
It's grown strictly as an ornamental most everywhere and the fruit is
more of a nuisance than anything else. Why should a serious fruit
grower be led to believe that this is a type of guava?

Other comments about guava - you describe techniques of grafting
this plant. I don't question that it can be grafted, but it is difficult
and serves no practical purpose. Any possible gain from grafting will be
lost by the necessity of continuous suckering. It is easy to make
air layers, so why graft? I have never seen an orchard of grafted
guavas anywhere, have you? I don't think anyone who knows the crop
would try it.
Yours Truly, John
P.S. send more chapters.