More than 67,000 historic photographs, documents, and rare books have been digitized from the Library's own collections. However, this only scratches the surface – there are more than 3,000,000 images in the photograph collection alone. Specialized staff and equipment are needed to reach the goal of adding 100,000 images annually.

With support from the I.N. and Susanna H. Van Nuys Foundation, the Library Foundation purchased a bound volume digitizer, designed to be used with rare books and other materials that cannot lie flat on a scanner. This equipment has been used to digitize images for a variety of projects, including digitizing family seals from the Library's extensive genealogy collection.

The photo database is the largest and one of the most popular of the Library's online collections. Last fiscal year the collection was accessed over three million times. A recent grant from the John Randolph Haynes and Dora Haynes Foundation supported the professional archiving of rare and historic aerial photographs of Southern California, all of which are viewable at www.lapl.org.

Contributions to the New Technologies Fund help the Foundation to support digitization projects. Thanks to the generosity of The John Randolph Haynes and Dora Haynes Foundation and Photo Friends of LAPL for their support of digitization projects.

To learn more about funding opportunities for digitization projects, please contact Christine Leahey, Assistant Director of Foundation & Corporate Relations, at (213) 228-7498.

Support for the Library Foundation of Los Angeles is support for the Los Angeles Public Library. Every dollar counts. Your gift to the Library Foundation helps the Los Angeles Public Library grow stronger.