About this project

The Rocky Mountain Online Archive (RMOA) is a source of information about archival collections in Colorado, New Mexico and Wyoming. Twenty participating institutions are expanding access to their collections by participating in RMOA. Finding aids to collections located in all three states can be accessed on this site to help scholars, researchers and educators discover source materials relevant to their studies.

In another project component, three institutions in New Mexico have created new digital collections as part of the Rocky Mountain Online Archive project. Those collections, along with many others from Colorado and Wyoming, can be accessed via the Collaborative Digitization Program's Heritage West.

The Rocky Mountain Online Archive was initially funded by a grant in 2004 from the National Endowment for the Humanities. The grant helped the participating repositories to create standards-based finding aids. The standard, called Encoded Archival Description, has been created and maintained by the Society of American Archivists and the Library of Congress.

Subsequent funding for the RMOA project was provided by the Center for Regional Studies at the University of New Mexico. Building on the infrastructure originally developed for the Online Archive of New Mexico, RMOA allows participating institutions to create new finding aids utilizing a web-based input form. The Rocky Mountain Online archive is directed by representatives from the Collaborative Digitization Program in Colorado, the American Heritage Center at the University of Wyoming, and University Libraries at the University of New Mexico, which serves as the technology center for the project.