The Council on Library and Information Resources has awarded a “Digitizing Hidden Special Collections and Archives” grant in the amount of $385,205 to a project spearheaded by Christ Church Preservation Trust that will digitize over 41,000 records from the archives of Philadelphia’s oldest congregations and aggregate them in a database accessible to the public. Ranging in date from 1708-1870, the documents provide more clues to the relationship between religion and politics in the colonial era than any other published body of work.

Entitled “Digitizing the Records of Philadelphia’s Historic Congregations: Providing Documentation for the Political, Social and Cultural Developments in Philadelphia,” the project connects records from the archives of Christ Church, St. George’s Methodist Church, Gloria Dei, Mikveh Israel, African Episcopal Church of St. Thomas, Episcopal Dioceses Archives, Presbyterian Historical Society, St. Peter’s Episcopal Church, and American Baptist Historical Society. The proposal, written and submitted by the Trust, was one of only 14 selected from 125 applications.