WestWeb FAQ
- The Questions:
- Who is behind WestWeb, and why does the webpage say it is run by "a born-and-bred Westerner"?
- I have a research assignment due; can WestWeb help me with my homework?
- I am looking for something which doesn't appear in WestWeb. Can Dr. Lavender tell me about additional resources if I email her about them?
- I have made, or know of, an excellent resource which ought to be included in WestWeb. How do I get WestWeb to link to it?
- I've come across a link on WestWeb which no longer works. What should I do?
- There is a photograph on WestWeb I want to buy or use. Can I buy it from WestWeb? And why are the photographs on the pages so small?
- Most of the pages on the site indicate that they are still under development. Why isn't WestWeb "finished" yet?
- Is Catherine Lavender related to David Lavender, the Western historian and author? And does she ever get tired of being asked that question?
Who is behind WestWeb, and why does the webpage say it is run by "a born-and-bred Westerner"?
WestWeb was started in 1995 by Catherine Lavender, then a doctoral candidate in Western and Women's history at the University of Colorado at Boulder, as a project to point users toward some of the resources in Western history available on the Web. In 1997, she received her PhD in History from the University of Colorado and is now an assistant professor in the Department of History at the College of Staten Island of the City University of New York (CUNY), where she is also the Director of the American Studies Program.
Although Dr. Lavender was "born-and-bred" in the West, after she moved to CUNY and relocated WestWeb to the CSI server, she started receiving a large number of "concerned missives" from users about what a New Yorker could know about the West. Think of the old (Texas) Pace Picante Sauce television ad: "This salsa says it's made in (shudder) NEW YORK CITY!!!" While Dr. Lavender would argue that geographical location has nothing to do with one's ability to research or study the history of the West, nonetheless, rather than continue to receive concerned missives, she decided to wear her six-guns on the outside of her coat on this one.
WestWeb's graphics were created by Warrick Bell (a New Zealander), who also has provided the programming for the counter scripts and assistance with layout and design for the site since 1996.
- I have a research assignment due; can WestWeb help me with my homework?
Unfortunately, due to the high volume of requests for specific information received, WestWeb is not always able to reply to queries or to offer assistance for projects, especially to broad questions. However, Dr. Lavender has several resources online to help researchers starting on projects, which she developed for her students' use. These include:
- A Starting Point Guide to Research for History Students
- (www.library.csi.cuny.edu/dept/history/lavender/research.html), and
- Using the Library as a Starting Point for Research
- (www.library.csi.cuny.edu/dept/history/lavender/libraryresearch.html).
- More extensive guides for research and writing, including information about writing research essays and book reviews, are available via her list of resources:
- Historical Methods Guide
- (www.library.csi.cuny.edu/dept/history/lavender/method.html).
I am looking for something which doesn't appear in WestWeb. Can Dr. Lavender tell me about additional resources if I email her about them?
Because of the high volume of requests for assistance received from WestWeb users, Dr. Lavender is not always able to reply to such requests, but also, generally, if she knows of resources, she adds them to the site as quickly as possible. So if there are no resources listed on the site, it means that she has probably not yet come across them.
Using a good, thorough search engine on the WWW will yield better results for your query. Two which are especially useful are Google (www.google.com) and AllTheWeb (www.alltheweb.com). For further information about making your search more effective, refer to the "advanced search" links on the starting pages for each of these search engines.
I have made, or know of, an excellent resource which ought to be included in WestWeb. How do I get WestWeb to link to it?
WestWeb is always happy to link to sites which users will find useful; this generally means sites with reliable historical content, rather than sites advertising services or products. If you have or know of a site you'd like to see included, please let WestWeb know about the site by sending an email with the URL of the site and the WestWeb page name where you think it should be listed.
- I've come across a link on WestWeb which no longer works. What should I do?
WestWeb always appreciates the help of users who point out errors or dead links; please send an email with the page where the dead link is located and we will try to update it (or find it and notify you of its new location).
At the same time, though, users will want to find the information that is no longer linked to WestWeb as quickly as possible. One way of doing this is searching for the title of the linked site on a search engine. Another way is looking at the URL of the old link (visible at the bottom of the screen when your pointer is over the link) and "backtracking." "Backtracking" means that you take off the ending parts of the address until you find something that works, and then try to follow its links forward to the new location for the site. For example, if I want to find a site with the URL
- www.western.edu/history/faculty/joe/sites.html
and that link no longer works, I would try the addresses
- www.western.edu/history/faculty/joe/ and
- www.western.edu/history/faculty/
to see if I can find a working page which will be linked to the material I am looking for. In this example, you might find that the old address
- www.western.edu/history/faculty/joe/sites.html
is now
- www.western.edu/history/faculty/pages/joe/sites.html.
- For more information about using the WWW, you may want to visit Dr. Lavender's
- Web Tutorial for CSI-CUNY Students
- (www.library.csi.cuny.edu/dept/history/lavender/csitutor.html).
There is a photograph on WestWeb I want to buy or use. Can I buy it from WestWeb? And why are the photographs on the pages so small?
WestWeb does not own or sell the photographs which are linked from the pages; instead, WestWeb has links to images available from publicly accessible archives, including those at the National Archives or other libraries and archives. If you want to purchase or to use those images, please contact the institution where the image resides; you may find that information by clicking on the thumbnail image which is on the WestWeb page, which will take you to the original image stored on the site of the archive which owns the image. The thumbnail images on WestWeb pages (the small ones asked about above) are there to point users to archives which have made their collections accessible online. Clicking on the thumbnail will connect you to a full-sized image. Once you are looking at the full-sized image, you will be at the site of the archive or library which owns the image, and which can sell it to you or allow you to use it on your own page. Find the link to do so by backtracking (see the question above) the URL until you reach a page on their site which provides contact information.
Most of the pages on the site indicate that they are still under development. Why isn't WestWeb "finished" yet?
The exciting (but also frustrating) truth about the Web is that it is always changing, and this means that WestWeb will never be finished. Other demands on Dr. Lavender's time mean that she hasn't been able to devote as much time as she would like to exploring the WWW in search of new resources to cite on WestWeb; in fact, she spends a large portion of her time on WestWeb tracking down the new locations of sites she already had listed when they move! WestWeb is researched, compiled, and updated in Dr. Lavender's spare time as a labor of love, so, of course, progress on it is sporadic. But the "last updated" date at the bottom of each page indicates the last time she got to revisit that particular subject. Her dream is that one day, a whole community of WestWebbers will each take over a section of interest to them, and then WestWeb will come much closer to cataloging more completely the vast resources out there.
Is Catherine Lavender related to David Lavender, the Western historian and author? And does she ever get tired of being asked that question?
Nope, and nope! And she has never met him, either, even though they both lived in Colorado at the same time. Of course, it's a big state.
Return to Main WestWeb Menu
