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Before the summer of 2023, the extent of Daniel Olortegui Vargas’ fiddle knowledge came from The Fiddler on the Roof. By the end of his fellowship with the University of Idaho Library, Olortegui was helping piece together the history of one of Idaho’s treasured traditions — the National Oldtime Fiddlers’ Contest and Festival in Weiser.
Along with serving 8,000 visitors per week, on average, in Moscow, the state’s largest library preserves and provides access to a wide range of historical documents and artifacts. For Olortegui, the U of I Library’s Gary E and Carolyn J. Strong Special Collections Fellowship afforded him the chance to gain valuable skills archiving and digitizing a collection of items from the renowned fiddle festival.
The master’s student, originally from Peru, spent many hours last summer transferring reel-to-reel music to digital files so they can be shared online. Olortegui also attended last June’s Oldtime Fiddlers’ Festival, conducting interviews to learn about the history of the event and gaining a new appreciation for the music and its rich heritage.
“The most important thing for me was to see how the tradition of the music is still intact,” said Olortegui, who plans to earn his Ph.D. in history at the U of I. “All of the musicians have the same influence, generation through generation. It’s amazing!”
Olortegui’s project exemplifies the vital role the library’s Special Collection and Archives plays in the state. Department Head Dulce Kersting-Lark said the U of I Library houses one of the largest collections of historical materials in the state and access is always free to anyone.
“As the state’s land grant university we have a responsibility to collect and preserve the history of our state and those records should be easy to find and use,” Kersting-Lark said.
With the support of significant external grant funding, the U of I Library developed CollectionBuilder, an open-source digital collections platform, so that anyone can access their digital collections. They include an international jazz collection, detailed U of I history that goes back more than a century and rare documents from prominent Idahoans like William Borah and James McClure.
After Olortegui shared a link to the Oldtime Fiddlers’ Festival material he archived on social media, dozens of citizens reached out to express their appreciation.
“The Festival doesn’t have a lot of resources of their own, so when someone does something like this they are very grateful,” Olortegui said.
The U of I Library provides tremendous resources for our state and fuels discovery for our students. It plays a crucial role in our success as we strive to advance our research enterprise and deliver on our land grant mission.
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