Handing over, and a note of thanks

It’s now been just over five years since I began work at the Bentham Project, and on Transcribe Bentham with my brilliant then-colleagues Valerie Wallace and Justin Tonra. Though sometimes it feels like only yesterday a lot has happened in that time, much of it unforeseen: TB has won awards, become part of two major international research projects, and even a cookbook based on manuscripts transcribed by volunteers was published earlier this year. Perhaps most importantly, TB has proved that a partnership between volunteers and scholars working on transcription of complex historic manuscripts can produce great volumes of high-quality research data. The fact that volunteers have transcribed almost 15,000 pages is still quite humbling.

As of 1 January 2016, I start work on a new project investigating Bentham’s writings on convict transportation and the early history of European Australia. As of then, TB will be co-ordinated by my wonderful colleague, Louise Seaward, under whose oversight the project will continue to go from strength to strength. I may pop up on the TB blog from time with a post about how transcripts produced by TB volunteers are contributing to the work on the Australian material (anyone wanting to take a look at material from Box 116 would be very welcome!) but will otherwise retire at the end of the year and leave you in Louise’s hands.

And so, in time-honoured fashion, it’s best to end with some sincere thank-yous to the brilliant people I’ve worked with on TB during the last five years, and without whom the project would be nowhere near as successful as it has been. At the Bentham Project, Philip Schofield, Michael Quinn, Valerie Wallace, Justin Tonra, Kris Grint, Anna-Maria Sichani, Hazel Wilkinson, Philippa Waller, Zoe Hawkins, Kalliopi Kontiza, and Tom Ue; Melissa Terras of UCL’s Centre for Digital Humanities; Martin Moyle and Lesley Pitman of UCL Library Services; at the University of London Computer Centre, Richard Davis, José Martin, Silvia Arango Docio, Rory McNicholl, and Ben Parish; at UCL Creative Media Services, Tony Slade, Raheel Nabi, Alejandro Salinas Lopez, and Miguel Faleiro Rodrigues; and at the British Library, Arnold Hunt, Sandra Tuppen and Neil McCowlen. I would also like to pay special thanks to my colleagues at UCL Special Collections, in particular Dan Mitchell, Mandy Wise, and Steve Wright for ferrying Bentham manuscripts back and forth to the photographers’ suite. Major thanks are also due to the Arts and Humanities Research Council and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation for financially supporting TB over the years, and to my colleagues from across Europe in the tranScriptorium programme. It’s been a genuine privilege to be a small cog in this machine.

Finally, as ever, the greatest thanks have to go to everyone who has so generously volunteered their time and effort to TB since September 2010. To those who have edited a line to those who have transcribed thousands of pages, a mere ‘thank you’ really doesn’t seem to be quite sufficient. TB would be nothing without you and your support, which I have really valued over the last five years. Thank you for that, and for making TB a great success. I am more grateful than I can ever say.

Tim