MWDL has been a Digital Public Library of America (DPLA) Service Hub since 2013. We are proud to be one of DPLA’s first service hubs and have been providing content ever since. With nearly 45 million items now available through DPLA, you might wonder which MWDL items rise to the top. Here are the six most-viewed MWDL items for the past six months. These range from the Middle Ages to the 21st century and demonstrate the breadth of material available from the MWDL network.

March 2022 – Utah Government Digital Library (Utah State Library): Affordable housing options (2007). This factsheet on affordable housing was contributed by the Olene Walker Housing Fund.

February 2022 – Brigham Young University Harold B. Lee Library: Nativity and Annunciation to the Shepherds (1302-1310). Giovanni Pisano carved this Nativity and Annunciation to the Shepherds for the pulpit of Pisa Cathedral. Giovanni’s father, Nicola Pisano, had created a pulpit for the baptistery of Pisa Cathedral about forty years before Giovanni made this work. While Nicola Pisano was heavily influenced by ancient Etruscan, Roman, and Early Christian ruins for his carvings, Giovanni Pisano chose to depict his figures in the Gothic style of the day. Giovanni Pisano’s looser, dynamic composition, sinuous lines, and lean elegant figures all reflect the Gothic tastes of the reigning French court.

January 2022; November 2021 – Brigham Young University Harold B. Lee Library: Sioux Indians in Ghost Dance regalia (ca. 1880). This photograph is so popular, it appears twice on our list! Charles R. Savage was a preeminent photographer working out of the Salt Lake Valley in the late 19th century.

December 2021 – Utah State Archives: 1916; Women’s Suffrage (1916). This correspondence hails from Governor Spry’s records and reflects the Governor’s involvement in a wide range of important administrative matters, including suffrage for women.

October 2021 – University of Utah, J. Willard Marriott Library: A trip across the plains, and life in California (1851). This memoir of Dr. George Keller, physician to the Wayne County (Ohio) Company during its 1849 journey to California, includes a guide to the trail and detailed description of California.