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:

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 34 · DO #1563 · 40_Slate_Bx4FF3r

Collection
George Lewis Slate (1899–1976) papers on Arnold Arboretum
Item/Folder
Printed Documents, 1952–1956
Digital Object
DO #1563, page 34
Collection-level dates
1949–1967, n.d.
Open PDF at page 34 ↗

Page transcription

purpose: "The Arboretum, in the conception of its managers, is a museum founded and carried on to increase the knowledge of trees." "... during its first half century it has been managed not merely as a New England museum but as a national and international institution working to increase knowledge of trees in all parts of the world... [it] must be equipped to answer any question about any tree growing in any part of the world which may be addressed to it."
Accordingly he saw the library as containing "the books in all editions and languages devoted to the description of trees"; "... the library [is] intended to furnish the best possible opportunity for the study of trees." With regard to the herbarium: "If the Arboretum is to become a great institution for gathering and spreading information about trees and allied plants, specimens and a series of photographs of every species of tree in the world should be found in its herbarium."
Both in Sargent's time and since his death, the living collections and the herbarium have together grown as a result of Arboretum expeditions which brought back living specimens and dried herbarium specimens of trees and shrubs from distant parts of the world, especially the far east and the Pacific.
Since the earliest years, part of the Arboretum's budget has been devoted to the support of taxonomic work with ligneous plants, i.e., the description and classification of trees principally on the basis of structure, physiology, genetics and habitat. The herbarium and library were built up principally in this connection and are the principal tools used in the Arboretum's taxonomic work.
The express purposes of the trust are, of course, to create and maintain as large a living collection as possible and to support an Arnold Professor, who is to teach the knowledge of trees as well as care for and manage the whole

institution. Although not expressly provided for in the indenture, the Arboretum's taxonomic work, including the creation and maintenance of its library and herbarium, is proper because it enhances the usefulness of the living collections and contributes in general toward the knowledge of trees and shrubs and their cultivation.

(b) What the Removal to Cambridge Involves.
As we understand it, the modified plans for the new central botanical building provide for four stories and a basement. The top three floors are planned to house the libraries and herbaria of the Gray Herbarium* and the Arnold Arboretum. The ground floor is reserved for plant morphology and palaeobotany, and the basement for palaeobotany and for laboratories and seminar rooms for University instruction. The purpose for which the new combined library and herbarium would exist and be conducted would be the general purposes of the Area of General Morphology. The Bailey Report (p. 43) gives as the main reason for the unification: "Harvard, having attained outstanding recognition in both phanerogamic and cryptogamic taxonomy in the past and having entered into successive commitments and agreements for their support, can profitably retain and integrate them in a strong, broadly conceived development of general morphology." As we have already noted above, the Area would include research and instruction in taxonomy, mycology, phytogeography, comparative anatomy, developmental morphology, palaeobotany, and certain aspects of economic botany, some of which are of no interest, or only remote interest, to the Arboretum.
The combined library and herbarium would be manned by a unified and reduced staff of curators and assistants,
*Now housed in a building which we are informed is admirably adapted for its purposes.