The Library of Virginia's ongoing Digital Library Program in 2001 added eight public library digital photograph collections. Starting from the LVA Digital Library homepage, users select the name of one of the public library collections to go directly to its search page. For a little more information about the type of photographs to expect in each collection, we recommend beginning at the About the Collections page. Following this route, a user can learn that the digitized portion of the Hampton Public Library consists of 1,400 photographs from the Christopher E. Cheyne collection, including many downtown Hampton businesses, representing the seafood industry hotels and seaside resorts, and the amusement park. This collection also includes portraits of a few Civil War veterans, members of prominent Hampton families, and photographer Cheyne's family. In contrast, one would find fewer images of people in the Newport News Public Library collection, since it consists of close to 300 images related to the construction of Hilton Village, a World War I era public housing project, and the Hotel Warwick, a grand nineteenth-century resort. Searching is still a little unpredictable even with the additional information; to browse most of the images in a collection, try searching on a photographer's name, or the proper name of prominent subjects depicted.
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