It’s not so much the weight of history that Butler County archivists have to deal with but rather the sheer volume of history.

The Butler County Historical Society, the Saxonburg Museum and the Zelienople Historical Society are all aiming to convert their collections of photos, manuscripts, letters and artifacts to a digital format.

Mackenzie Herold, executive director of the Butler County Historical Society, said she estimated her group’s collection has more than 10,000 different objects and continues to grow.

“We regularly receive new items for our collections throughout the week,” she said. The collection includes objects such as the many awards received by Bataan Death March survivor Abie Abraham for his years of service with the U.S. Army and his volunteer service in the Butler community.

Joel Grobe, president of the Zelienople Historical Society, said the society has thousands of archives, plus 1,100 items such as Zelienople High School yearbooks, sports team photo collections and a small collection of videos of oral history interviews.

Saxonburg borough manager Steven May said the Saxonburg Museum’s collection includes Thomas Edison photographs, the secondary antenna from KDKA radio and Tiffany & Co. lights from the Brooklyn Bridge, which was designed by wire rope inventor and Saxonburg founder John Roebling. May oversees the museum with a committee of borough council members and the Friends of Saxonburg Museum group.

Getting these collections of often-fragile materials into the hands of the public is the aim of digitization.

Herold said digitization is the process of converting physical historical objects into a digital format, with the aim of making the item more accessible. Digitization also protects the original when it becomes too fragile to handle.

“How an item is digitized depends heavily on each item; most paper documents are scanned, while items such as books are photographed,” she said. “Each item has its own unique needs, and we take that into consideration when starting a digitalization project.”

Grobe said the Zelienople society does not have most of its archival library digitized.

“The digitalization that we have done has been handled by volunteers,” he said. “We hope to be able to digitalize more of our records, but as it is cost prohibitive and requires a certain skill set, it takes a long time. We do the best we can.”

Herold said the Butler society’s digitization efforts are carried out by collections manager Jamie Jones and interns.

“Depending on the size of the project, the archives team can complete the digitalization process in anywhere from a few hours to a few weeks if the collection that is being worked with is particularly large,” she said.

Grobe added that the materials that have been digitized have been chosen by the society’s board or, more often, by the volunteers doing the work.

“That is to say if someone has a passion about something they will work on that project,” he said. “As we work on putting together a formal process for digitalization, the board will consult with our expert in accessioning to set priorities.”

Herold determines which of the Butler society’s materials are digitized by following a set of questions.

“The first of these questions is how fragile and/or rare is the item we’re choosing to digitize? Is it something at risk of permanently being lost if we don’t scan it? If the answer to this set of questions is ‘yes,’ I will prioritize digitizing that item,” Herold said.

“The digital assets we have can be accessed by the public by either locating them on our website or setting up an appointment to come to our museum,” Grobe said.

Herold noted the Butler County Historical Society’s digital archives remain a work in progress and are not yet easily available to the public.

“We are currently working hard to find a good method to make these archives available to the public in the nearish future, but the records are available to the public on request,” she said.

May said the Saxonburg Museum hasn’t yet begun digitizing its collection.

“We would like to photograph, inventory and have a description behind every piece in the collection,” May said.

But such a process will take lots of manpower and time.

“There are very few volunteers willing to help with this process,” May said. “We expect something of this magnitude would take up to three years. We would most likely catalog everything on display first and then move through our archives.”

Once achieved, Saxonburg’s digital archive would be available for the public to access.

But even digitized, the borough’s historical collection still has to be sustained.

“The digital records would need to be maintained on a server and have a backup, possibly to the cloud,” May said. “Digital storage is very expensive.”

May said people willing to volunteer for the digitization effort can call the Saxonburg borough office at 724-352-1400, Ext. 221.

The original materials ­— photos, letters, artifacts — would remain intact following any digitization.

All three organizations have other ways to bring Butler County’s past to life in the real world.

A future digitalization effort, according to May, is just one of the ways the museum can become more relevant to people today.

“We are updating our displays and making our museum more interactive in the attempt to draw in younger visitors,” May said.

The Saxonburg Museum has other outreach efforts, such as sponsoring the Spooky Streets of Saxonburg event, participating in Butler County History Day and maintaining a presence in the community during Main Street events, he said.

For 2026, May said the museum will be working closely with Experience Butler County and preparing for the America250 celebration.

Herold said the county historical society offers a variety of events, talks and field trips focused on preserving the county’s rich history.

“One of our favorite events is the Echoes of our Past: Cemetery Walk, which focuses on bringing the stories of Butler County residents to life. For 2026, we are excited to announce that we will be hosting a living history event at Cooper Cabin to celebrate America250. While we can’t say much about the event yet, we are hoping that this will be the first of many living history events at Cooper Cabin,” she said.

Grobe said some of the Zelienople Historical Society’s 2026 events include its Spring Tea, Butler County History Day and Fourth of July festivities, including the Traveling Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, as well as garden tours and other events throughout the spring and fall.

“Fortunately, we have begun to see more interest by the community in the history of our town,” Grobe said. “We often say ‘You can’t build history,’ and I think people are starting to appreciate that we have so much history to offer.”

For more information about the Butler County Historical Society, call, 724-283-8116. For more information about the Zelienople Historical Society, call 724-452-9457.

This article first appeared in the January edition of Butler County Business Matters.