The Wu Xianzi papers is an archival collection held by UW, consisting of diaries, correspondence, poems, essays, newspaper clippings, and private collections of Wu Xianzi (1881-1959), an influential journalist and political reformist in China in the 20th century. The collection is housed in 16 boxes.

The finding aid for this collection, which was created as part of the CLIR Project is available on Archives West, at:  http://archiveswest.orbiscascade.org/ark:/80444/xv08758.  Archives West (previously known as Northwest Digital Archives) offers descriptions of archival and manuscript materials held by institutions in Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Alaska, Montana, and Utah.

(The collection-level cataloging record can be found on OCLC WorldCat, here: http://www.worldcat.org/title/wu-xianzi-xian-sheng-yi-gao-ji-suo-cang-wen-jian/oclc/949731287)

Sample item from the archive:

Example screenshots of the finding aid:

Example screenshot of the University Archives Records Transfer List spreadsheet used to  create the finding aid:

Additional impact

The Wu Xianzi papers is the first archival collection in non-Roman script available at Archives West.  Before it was added to the Archives West, only resources in English and Spanish were available.  Therefore, our work was ground-breaking for this archival portal.  

Prior to inputting Chinese data into the spreadsheet template (used to upload data to Archives West), Charlene Chou, the Project Technical Manager, tested its capability for inputting, indexing and displaying Chinese script.  After successful pilot testing, a student input the information about the contents of the 16 boxes into the spreadsheet template.  

It was discovered that the Archives West interface capability for searching Chinese phrases was extremely limited.  Therefore, the Technical Manager accepted advice to submit a list of controlled vocabulary, including personal names, corporate bodies, newspapers and subject terms, to improve the searching function.  In this way, the discovery of Chinese terms in Archives West will be be greatly improved.