Shacklett family preserves our legacy on The Murfreesboro Post

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Shacklett family preserves our legacy

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By: MICHELLE WILLARD, Post Staff Writer

Posted: Sunday, October 25, 2009 7:14 am

Shacklett family preserves our legacy | Heritage, Shacklett's Photography, TOm Christy, Gloria Christy, John Lodl, County Archives, RuCo, Cover

Over the years Shacklett’s Photography has become a repository for images of Rutherford County, which are part of the “collective memory of the community,” Tom Christy said.

From the Civil War to today, photographs from almost every public and personal event have found their way into the basement of the Murfreesboro studio.

“It’s our responsibility to share them,” Tom said.

Shacklett’s Photography is sharing by donating thousands of images from local history to the Rutherford County Archives.

“While we’ve been the curators and been the ones to carry them into the future, … they are part of the community’s history and the collective memory of the community,” Tom said.

Tom’s wife and Shacklett’s studio manager Gloria Christy said they have spent the last 15 years trying to preserve the images and manage the collection. But in the end, the snapshots are turning into dust in the studio’s basement.

“We don’t want to see those images turn to dust,” Tom said.

And neither did the county.

“This is THE collection that documents the history of Murfreesboro and Rutherford County in pictures,” Rutherford County Archivist John Lodl said.

The collection is so important to local history, the Tennessee State Library and Archives has designated it as one of the three most important photograph collections in the state in terms of size and historical significance, Lodl said.

“The fact that the Shackletts want to gift this to the people of Rutherford County is phenomenal,” he said.

The collection began with photos taken by Gloria’s father Dick Shacklett throughout his lifetime from 1929-1994. It also includes the work of other professional photographers from Rutherford County, like H.O. Todd, Leo Ferrell and Lee Lively.

In addition to the professional photos, families also dropped their pictures into the bucket.

“One thing led to another and people would start bringing us photographs from grandma’s estate …” Bill Shacklett said in a previous interview. “We ended up having copies as people found them.”

As people found photos and donated them, the collection grew to the point where the studio just can’t preserve them.

“It’s an undiscovered country of people’s memories in there,” Tom said.

Now it’s up to Lodl to map the undiscovered country.

He expects to have the photos indexed in the next six months and start digitizing them shortly after beginning with the oldest and most historically important.

“I’m very excited that Gloria and Bill have the forethought to leave this collection to the county archives,” he said.

The idea came about after Shacklett’s Photography partnered with the archives and MTSU’s Public History program.

So far Shacklett’s has allowed 100 photographs to be digitized at very high resolution.

Lodl will now begin the massive task of digitizing the entire collection at low resolution to be displayed on a view-only Web site.

Even scanning the negatives and images at low resolution could take Lodl, archives staff and volunteers more than 10 years, he said.

With the hard part still ahead, Lodl and Shacklett’s Photography are excited about the prospect of getting the photo out in public view.

“We feel like these images don’t just belong in a box in somebody’s basement, they need to be out there,” Tom said.

Michelle Willard can be contacted at 615-869-0816 or mwillard@murfreesboropost.com.

Tagged under County Archives, Cover, Gloria Christy, Heritage, John Lodl, RuCo, Shacklett's Photography, TOm Christy

Member Opinions:

By: titansone on 10/25/09
This is great - thanks to the Shacklett family for this contribution!

By: Admiral on 10/25/09
Archive 'em Ansel Adams style!

By: kaymorrow on 10/25/09
This is wonderful and very much anticipated! I can't wait to see these pictures. Many thanks to Shacklett's Photography and Tom and Gloria Christy! I hope someone will get the word out for when and where we will be able to view them, hopefully online at some point?? : ) John Lodl, thank you for your efforts too!