We also tried scanning our old, typed finding aids in the Manuscripts Div., Marriott Library Special Collections. I did as much as I could, even though we didn't (and still don't) have our own scanner. We always kept a super-clean typed original copy of the finding aids, for later photocopying. Some of them were in Prestige Elite and some in Courier 10 typeface. These actually scanned quite well; I used a scanner down in the student computing center (the only one in the building) that was pretty high quality but fragile; it finally gave up its electronic ghost altogether before I could do more than about twenty of the finding aids, and by the time it was replaced (Low- Bid U!) I had moved on to other things. I scanned the documents as ascii files, then converted them into WordPerfect 5.1 just using the conversion in WP. Then I used the spell checker in WP to look for scanning errors, which worked quite well. It was a lot faster than re-typing them and we don't have the budget to support that anyway. The motivation was twofold: to get the typed registers/finding aids into digital format, and to then use the indexes to the finding aids in what we grandly styled our Master Index. This is simply a series of WordPerfect files arranged alphabetically (A, Ba-Be, Bf-Bz, Ca-Ch, and so on), with the indexes from as many registers as we could add integrated and sorted alphabetically. I had already done all those that were already in digital form, and wanted to add those pre-computer ones by scanning them. Before adding an index to the MI, I would manipulate it by making sure the subject headings were consistent (i.e. Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Saints or LDS Church or Mormon Church), taking out any indents/tabs/other fancy formating, and adding the collection number to the end of each entry. Then when the indexes are combined and sorted, you get a cross reference to every collection in the MI that has your subject. This index is actually available on the Marriott Library gopher, which address I don't have in front of me but can find if anyone is interested. It only represents about 20% of our collection though. Roy Roy Webb, Audio-Visual Archivist Marriott Library Special Collections University of Utah (801) 581-8864 [log in to unmask]