Lewis and Clark Journals: Codex Fe: 015

pid

lewis and clark journals

label

Lewis and Clark Journals: Codex Fe: 015

Timestamp

10/25/2021 13:57:16

URL for full object

https://diglib.amphilsoc.org/islandora/object/codex-fe%3A-015

Citation for full object

Lewis and Clark Journals: Codex Fe: 015

Filename in shared drive folder

Lewis and Clark Journals

General description of the complete original artifact

The Lewis and Clark journals, specifically codex fe: 015, is a collection of data about the weather in July of 1805. Being that the Lewis and Clark expedition started on May 14, 1804 and ended on September 23, 1806 – this data must have been collected as part of their famous journey. Another way we can tell that this data was collected when the expedition was occurring is that three out of the eleven fields in the data set are revolving around the state of the river. In addition to the state of the river, the journal breaks down the weather patterns into several other categories such as the direction of the wind, state of the thermometer, raining patterns, and several other factors. While the first ten fields use quantitative data, Lewis and Clark use the last field in the journal for qualitative data. This section, labeled remarks, is used for them to make small comments on the overall weather such as stating that there was “slight rain in the evening.” Overall, the Lewis and Clark journals are able to give the reader a glimpse into not only what the weather was like at the time, but also what the two renowned explorers were focusing on during their expedition.

Estimated number of records in data set

325

Estimated number of fields if this were a database

11

Estimated time to digitize all records in set (hours)

3.5 hours

Time period when data was created

The time period when the data was created was in 1805.

Organization creating data

The data was not created by an organization, but it was scanned by the American Philosophical Society.

Individual who created data (if known or guessable).

The data was most likely created by either Meriwether Lewis or William Clark, but there is also a chance that it was created by Toussaint Charbonneau or Sacagawea as they were also on the expedition.

Shortcomings of this taxonomy for data set (if any)

One of the shortcomings of this taxonomy can be found in the field called “state of the river”. Within this field, there are three sub-sector fields – one of which is labeled “foet”. The issue with this section is that for all thirty-one days, the entire data collection time period, each record is given a dash in order to indicate that no data is entered for that data point. The reason this is a shortcoming of this taxonomy is that due to the entire column being blank, it leads one to wonder what the purpose was of having the field there in the first place for the data collection process of the month of July, 1805.

Notes about the image you chose

I chose the Lewis and Clark journals because I have learned about these two explorers since elementary school and I found it really interesting to see a piece of data that they wrote. When looking at the physical paper one feature that caught my attention was how straight the lines were on the page. Similar to the document we viewed in our last class, the lines are both perfectly straight with no mistakes. This was shocking to me because unlike the document we examined in class which was made with a large printing machine, this document was made by Lewis and Clark during their expedition which begs the question of what type of tools that they brought with them that would allow their data set to come out in such as neat fashion. Another element about this data set that I noticed was the number 51 in the top right corner. While every other data point has an explanation, this number does not seem to have a clear meaning. One of my hypotheses is that when the paper is flipped upside down, the number becomes more clear and reads 15 which could correlate with this page being labeled Codex Fe: 015.