I have been thinking about a couple of ideas for my project. I am interested in the history of music, and I am trying to think of a good way to be able to put something in that vein into a digital project format. I am also interested in the history of Colby, thanks to our visit to special collections. I was reading through old echo articles about the fraternities on campus pre-1984 and articles looking back on their impact and how the mark they left on the college was felt post-1984. It was very cool to see how the culture on campus has changed through the years and I think this would be a good project idea to carry out.

If I were to pursue the music project, I think I would try to document the official history of music listening/purchasing/streaming from around the 1800s to today. This would include everything from theater, concerts, vinyl records, and early radio, to today’s larger music streaming services like Spotify, Soundcloud, Napster, iTunes, etc. I have always had an interest in music and the means by which we listen to it and how this affects culture.

If I were to do the project involving Colby and the frats, I would initially try to find all the articles in the Colby echo I can pertaining to that subject, and then perhaps expand to local newspapers to see if the frats had any impact on the town or the state of Maine. I know that some chapters were created here at Colby, so it would also be a cool idea to see what, if anything, other schools’ frats have done to impact their communities, good or bad.