About Us

As in most communities, responsibility for collecting and curating local history is scattered among multiple institutions without established mechanisms for sustained coordination and cooperation in making these records accessible.  We started meeting in 2007 to address this problem of fragmentation of the historical record by developing a set of relationships, policies and practices, and an infrastructure to provide a single portal for access to Northfield history.   

An initial group of four organizations is working together to identify, describe, organize and provide access to books, manuscripts, photographs, institutional and corporate records, genealogical materials, and other sources relevant to understanding the history of our community and planning for its future.  Funding from the Minnesota Historical Society (name of grant program here) has supported the design and implementation of this initial portal and compilation of pilot collections from each organization.

We plan to add many more records and resources to the collection in the coming years, and hope that many of the 25 or so other organizations in Northfield that have relevant historical records will become partners and contributors to this effort.