The National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) in Boulder, Colorado has a collection of Glacier Photographs that consists of roughly 30,000 photographs of glaciers, mostly taken in the Rocky Mountains, the Pacific Northwest, Alaska, and Greenland. Photographs were taken from both the air and the ground with a date range from the 1890s to the 1980s. The collection also includes a smaller number of photographs of glaciers in Europe, South America, the Himalayas, and Antarctica. These images constitute an important historical record, as well as a data collection of interest to those studying the response of glaciers to climate change. This digital collection consists of a selection of images from the collection. For more information about the NSIDC data, please see Glacier Photograph Collection, Version 1.
Please include the permanent address https://doi.org/10.26040/k237-e673 when sharing or citing the collection.
Metadata fields for the NSIDC Glacier Photograph Collection:
A unique identifier for the digital surrogate of the photographic print or digital born photograph. See the File Naming Convention. This field was called Photo ID during the pre-grant phase. naidc_glacierPhotos_ is prefix, second part of identifier is constructed according to different methods, depending on the phase of the project.
Linking information for the identifier. [may be blank]
ARK identifier for the resource in the University of Colorado Libraries database. Controlled with the ARK server. [Permanent identifier]
Identifier for the resource in the LUNA software. [May be retired after migration to a new platform.]
The name of glacier, state/province, and/or Aerial Flight number, and may contain the assigned archive number for the photograph collection & subseries.
Linking information for the title. [may be blank]
Name of the photographer who took the photo. If the full name is known then it is used, otherwise first and/or middle initials are used. If the photographer name is not known, it is set to Unidentified. Role is included after the creator's name (Post, Austin, photographer).
Linked data information for the creator, if controllable. [may be blank]
The entity or organization that published the photographs.
Linked data information for the publisher. [may be blank]
Date the photograph was taken. If no date was provided, list as Undated.
Linking information for the date. [may be blank]
Extent of the item. Number of photographs, and dimensions in cm. and in. provided.
Examples:
1 photoprint; 20.3 x 12.7 cm (8 x 5 inches)
1 photoprint
1 color slide; 35 mm
2 pages
Format of the item. Control with AAT terms. See metadata for examples.
URI for the format.
Annotations and notes transcribed from the photographs as well as cataloger's notes. Further physical description & measurement of the original media.
Linking information for the Description [may be blank]
The name of the glacier, if known. If the name is Unknown then Unknown is used. If the photograph does not actually contain a glacier then it is labeled as No Glacier. Controlled name for the glacier is derived from GNIS, NGA GeoNames, a local names gazetteer, or one of the scientific databases. In rare cases, the names were derived from the labels on the photographs. The name used in this field is the authorized version, logged in the Glacier Index. Notes about variant names or spellings used for the glacier pictured may appear in the Description field for those photographs.
Latitude of the primary glacier in the photograph. Coordinates are derived from an authoritative source, either GNIS, NGA GeoNames, a particular country's name authority board, GLIMS, or in rare cases, from notes on the photograph.
Longitude of the primary glacier in the photograph. Coordinates are derived from an authoritative source, either GNIS, NGA GeoNames, a particular country's name authority board, GLIMS, or in rare cases, from notes on the photograph.
GLIMS (Global Land Ice Measurements from Space) Identification numbers are assigned by a group of glaciologists and are used for identification in their scientific work. GLIMS ID often correlates with a known glacier name. Information was retrieved from the GLIMS database. Additional information can be found on https://www.glims.org/
A data value standard using a controlled index that provides preferred coverage for the glaciers. Place names include name for nations, inhabited places, and physical features (glaciers, mountains, etc.). Format is generally Place Name (Second Order Administrative Division, First Order Administrative Division, Country, Continent) (feature type)
- Feature type derived from TGN, except when the location was not listed in TGN, then either an analogous TGN term or the term from the resource was used.
Linking information for Coverage Spatial. [may be blank]
Library of Congress Subject Heading (LCSH) controlled subject heading for the resource.
Linking information for the Subject. [may be blank]
Identifies the specific type of Work or Image being described in the record. Controlled DCMI term.
URI link for the Type.
Languages used on the item.
URI link for the Languages. Library of Congress ISO639-2 list.
Glacier Photograph Collection at the NSIDC; University of Colorado catalog record information; Roger G. Barry Glaciology Collection finding aid link for the University of Colorado Archives.
Link to the Glacier Photograph Collection on the NSIDC's web page; Link to the University of Colorado catalog record; Link to the University of Colorado Archives finding aid.
Collection name in LUNA.
Citation for the item.
Rights statement for the item.
Rights statement URI.
Credit for the item.
Source of the item if it was part of a greater whole.
Link for the Source.
Contributor of the item.
Link to the Contributor information.
National Geospatial-intelligence Agency GeoNames (NGA GeoNames): https://geonames.nga.mil/namesgaz/
Global Land Ice Measurements from Space (GLIMS): http://glims.colorado.edu/glacierdata/
Randolph Glacier Inventory (RGI): https://www.glims.org/RGI/index.html
World Glacier Monitoring Service Fluctuations of Glaciers Database (WGMS): http://www.wgms.ch/fogbrowser/
World Glacier Inventory (WGI): http://nsidc.org/data/glacier_inventory/index.html
Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names Online (TGN): http://www.getty.edu/research/tools/vocabularies/tgn/
- State/Province/Second Order Administrative Division information used in Coverage Spatial with some exceptions (Alaska: GNIS, outside the US was verified against NGA GeoNames). Lat/Long coordinates in this resource are NOT preferred.
Chile - Laboratorio de Glaciologia - https://glaciologia.cl/glaciares/
Greenland - Naalakkersuisut/Government of Greenland Greenland Portal: http://maps.greenmin.gl/
Norway - Norgeskart: https://www.norgeskart.no/
Switzerland - Swiss Confederation Federal Geoportal: https://map.geo.admin.ch/
- swissNAMES3D geographic names data set: https://shop.swisstopo.admin.ch/en/products/landscape/names3D
Switzerland - SwissGlaciers.org: http://www.gletschervergleiche.ch/
Switzerland - Glacier Monitoring Switzerland (GLAMOS): https://www.glamos.ch/
United States - Geographic Names Information System (GNIS): https://geonames.usgs.gov/
Glaciers of Asia - GLACIERS OF NEPAL — Glacier Distribution in the Nepal Himalaya with Comparisons to the Karakoram Range, U.S. Geological Survey Professional Paper 1386-F-6, https://pubs.usgs.gov/pp/p1386f/pdf/F6_Nepal.pdf
Glaciers of Europe - GLACIERS OF NORWAY - U.S. Geological Survey Professional Paper 1386-E-3, https://pubs.usgs.gov/pp/p1386e/norway.pdf
Many of the names and descriptions in this data set contain diacritical marks and symbols that are UTF-8 encoded. When opening this data, please be aware that programs like Excel do not handle these well unless the encoding type is specified on import. The team working on this data found that we had the fewest issues when working in Google Sheets. If manipulating the data in other programs, including OpenRefine, be sure to specify UTF-8 encoding.
The schema for this collection is based on Dublin Core and the Glacier Photograph Collection (NSIDC) schema, which was driven by requirements from the glaciology community.
OpenRefine, a tool for transforming and cleaning messy (or large amounts of) data: https://openrefine.org/
QGIS, an open mapping software that was helpful in several stages of this project: https://www.qgis.org/