So I have about a dozen left of the native paths to add to my database, in this first pass through Indian Paths of Pennsylvania (that book I’m following/analyzing/whatever). This is the pass where I go through the book from beginning to end, adding the basic info for each path to the database, adding the info about the start points and destinations, and generating the routes described in each chapter’s “For the Motorist” section.
There are a few big pieces left to this project, which I think I can do all together in a second pass through the book:
- I need to document the relationships between the paths, as described for each path in the book (which is what required me to go through the book one first time: to get all the paths documented, before trying to map the relationships).
- I need to generate the actual footpath routes. This will probably be the most difficult and labor intensive task in the whole project, and I expect it will likely involve digitizing all the (low quality) maps in the book; it may also require trying to find primary sources, old deeds and land grants etc, and even after all that I expect I’ll have to live with a great deal of ambiguity in the routes.
- I’m not sure if I want to do this yet, but as I go through the book I may document any points of interest (landmarks, native towns that aren’t trail endpoints) that I haven’t already included.
I’ve been thinking about the first part for a while, and have set up a separate bridge table in the database to capture these relationships; the table is set up with links to a subject path (the one that’s doing the referring) and an object path (the one getting referenced), and a link to another table with the list of possible relationships between them: intersections, alternate routes and spurs; aliases and alternate names; concurrencies (ie where the path shares some section of trail with another path); and the ever-popular “for more information see also.” I can add more relationships as I see the need.
For the second task, I think I’ll want to use the maps in the book, even if it’s just to trace over. That means scanning the maps in some way without damaging the book (I may just photograph them with my phone), then georeferencing them and saving the result somewhere. I suspect I’ll end up with a pretty big set of raster data, and now need to consider how to do to organize it. Rasters are not something I have much experience with, so there will likely be a learning curve involved — I think I may put them in the database in some way.
In terms of original research, my plan at the start was to use Indian Paths of Pennsylvania as my sole source — my project would be the book translated into GIS form — but I’ve already used other sources (e.g., Wikipedia, town websites) to flesh out histories and descriptions, and I think I’m seeing the book now as a condensation of other info, even if it’s just the author’s research files; the info in the book may have been “condensed,” oversimplified, to the point of vagueness, more exact versions of the trail descriptions exist somewhere. I really don’t want to get into actual archival research for this though, and it may just end up that if I dig really deep, I’ll only find that all the primary information is pretty vague too…
Finally, that third task has me a bit stuck: I’d originally planned to only record the endpoints of the paths (as given in the book), and even called my points table “termini.” Now I’m looking to enter things like landmarks, known trail junctions — there are several places called “the parting of the ways” — towns that aren’t actually endpoints, and all sorts of other points of interest. I painted myself into a corner with that “termini” name, and even if it wouldn’t be too much of a stretch to stick these other points in the termini table, I may add a separate “points of interest” table, or at least add a column to the termini table to designate non-endpoints. (Maybe I’m overthinking this, I could easily find the endpoints and non-endpoints within a mixed table, just by using simple searches.)
This kind of gets to what I want my native paths data to eventually look like. Many of these landmarks and points of interest are likely to be nodes in a trail network (just like the endpoints), so I am back to thinking they should all be part of the same table. I also expect that I’ll have trail segments from node to node, and my final paths will be lists of trail segments from start point to end point, so my final product will not look much like what I’m building now.
Well, I still have some time to think about it.
