BYU posts 115 LDS missionary journals online

"We needed some sort of introspection from the writer, some ability to analyze," she said "We needed more than 'We went such and such place today."'

The diaries of LDS apostles James E. Talmage and Moses Thatcher are included in the online library, but most of the diaries were written by "everyday, ordinary people," Fales said.

On the Web site, the typed versions of the journals are laid out next to a scanned image of the original page. To make the Web site as accurate as possible, the pages were transcribed exactly as they appeared, including cross-outs and insertions.

"We want readers to really get a sense and feel of the original diary," Fales said. "If they want to print off the transcription, we want them to have a feeling for how it was written."

By displaying the transcription and the original page side by side, Fales said she hopes researchers can correct any mistakes that may have been made deciphering the sometimes hard-to-read handwriting. Even though transcribers gave the diaries a twice-over, some things get missed over 64,000 pages.

---

E-mail: estuart@desnews.com