The Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District and the Turfgrass Information Center have announced the availability of the Noer/ Milorganite Image Collection website. This collection, sometimes known as the "Noer slides," currently features almost 13,000 35-mm slide images shot by O. J. Noer, and later, Charlie Wilson, Jim Latham and others. The digital archive is searchable, may be browsed by year or location, and can be accessed at: http://noermmsd.lib.msu.edu.

The Noer/Milorganite Image Collection launches

The Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District and the Turfgrass Information Center (TIC) are delighted to announce the availability of the Noer/ Milorganite® Image Collection website. This collection, sometimes known as the “Noer slides”, currently features almost 13,000 35-mm slide images shot by O. J. Noer, and later, Charlie Wilson, Jim Latham and others.  The digital archive is searchable, may be browsed by year or location, and can be accessed at:  http://noermmsd.lib.msu.edu .
These images were taken between the 1920s through the 1980s, and feature an extraordinary scope of content, including: experimental plots, golf courses and athletic fields across North America, equipment, personalities, maintenance practices, disease and pest control, and fertilization issues and test plots. They were originally a “use” collection, utilized by Noer and others for lectures and consulting in support of Milorganite®’s Turf Service Bureau throughout the ‘40s, ‘50s and ‘60s. Despite heavy use for many years, the condition of the material is generally good. All undamaged slides with available data (location, date, etc.)  from the original hand-typed ledgers have now been scanned and loaded into the digital archive.  This under-construction website is publicly-accessible, and materials may be reused for non-commercial educational and research purposes, with appropriate attribution as specified in the website’s “Terms and Conditions of Use.”
Other items in the Noer/Milorganite® Image Collection include unnumbered slides, negatives, positives, and 8 and 16 mm films, with the total number of items estimated at around 27,000. However, that includes a significant number of duplicates and derivatives. Although these are not currently available, TIC will continue to add to, refine and improve the materials and data within this Collection, as well as continue to seek financial support to move this work forward.  We also very much welcome comments on the location and content seen within the images, as we will include those additions and corrections into the annotations.
Support for this initial launch has been provided by the O.J. Noer Research Foundation, the Wisconsin Golf Course Superintendents Association, the Michigan Turfgrass Foundation, the MSU Libraries, and other groups and individuals.
About the Turfgrass Information Center
The Turfgrass Information Center is a specialized unit at the Michigan State University Libraries, comprised of the O.J. Noer Memorial Turfgrass Collection and the James B Beard Turfgrass Library Collection, and contains the most comprehensive publicly available collection of turfgrass educational materials in the world. The Turfgrass Information File (TGIF) database is produced by the Turfgrass Information Center. Using the Collections as a foundation, TGIF is designed to identify and point to turf research and management resources, online and offline, along with full-text versions of materials when copyright permissions can be obtained. For further information about the Collections,  the TGIF database, or the associated digital archives, see the Center’s website at: http://tic.msu.edu  .
About the Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District
Headquartered in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Milorganite products are manufactured and marketed by the Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District (MMSD), a regional government agency whose primary focus is providing water reclamation and flood management services for about 1.1 million customers in 28 communities in the Greater Milwaukee Area. Since 1926 MMSD has been a world leader in supplying Organic Nitrogen fertilizers for professional and residential use. While revenue generated through the sale of Milorganite products does not make up for the entire cost to produce and market, MMSD’s belief in beneficial reuse and recycling makes producing their value added products the clear choice. http://www.milorganite.com