Project to transcribe Hawaiian language newspapers finishes up

HONOLULU (HawaiiNewsNow) - A one-year project to promote the Hawaiian language by transcribing thousands of pages of Hawaiian language newspapers and making them available online wrapped up on Wednesday.

More than 6,500 volunteers helped transcribe 16,000 pages of historic Hawaiian language newspapers that the Ike Ku'oko'a Initiative is transferring into an electronic format, which the public will be able to access over the internet.

Organizers say they fell short of their original goal to finish 60,000 pages, but that plan to continue to edit and eventually translate the material that was transcribed.

"The volunteer typing will stop, so the raw material will go up online the way it is," said Puakea Nogelmeier. "It's searchable, so you can search it, but it's still in Hawaiian."

The material will be available online within a couple days. To find it, head over to http://papakilodatabase.com/main/index.php or http://nupepa.org/.

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