It looks like the Record Courier in Gardnerville is planning on publishing a big coffee table book of historic pictures of Douglas County and the Carson Valley. They published one seven years ago, and the Carson Valley Historic Photo Album they created in 2000 turned out to be a pretty awesome book. I'd say you need to get down to the Douglas County Library and check it out to look for yourself.

This new book sounds like they're going to focus on more recent photos, mostly ones from the 40s, 50s and 60s. From what I can tell they're still gathering photos, so there's no release date for the book yet, but they are taking pre-orders at a reduced price. The announcement and order form are here (in PDF form).

They're also putting out a call for Valley residents to come forward with pictures they think would be good for the book. And to that end they're holding three public scanning sessions next week, where you can bring your photos to them, and they'll zip them through a scanner in seconds. They don't guarantee that the pictures will make the book, but there are sure to be some gems that turn up this way.

The scanning sessions are listed here (also in PDF).

Wednesday, Sept. 19, 2007
3:00 pm - 6:00 pm
Carson Valley Museum
1477 U.S. Highway 395 N
Gardnerville, NV (775)782-2555

Thursday, Sept. 20, 2007
3:00 pm - 6:00 pm
Genoa Courthouse Museum
2304 Main Street
Genoa, NV (775)782-4325

Saturday, Sept. 22, 2007
10:00 am - 2:00 pm
Carson Valley Museum
1477 U.S. Highway 395 N
Gardnerville, NV (775)782-2555

A few thoughts about this project:

* I love it, and I'm probably pre-ordering a copy
* I think they should put up a website with all the photos, even the ones that didn't make it into the book. Especially the ones the public brings in.
* I'm jealous and I want all these pictures for my own online history photo gallery that I'm building.
* The name of the book, Looking Back, is the same name I picked for my own online history photo gallery, which is still in development. Looks like I might have to change it.