This week we are taking a dive into Open Collections to highlight more tips and tricks for doing research in UBC Open Collections.
This blog post covers some more advanced search techniques, so if you have not already, we strongly recommend you check out our previous blog posts on how to search Open Collections.
- Teach Me How: Using Open Collections for Genealogy Research
- Searching Open Collections Part 1: Using Established Collections
- Searching Open Collections Part 2: Subject Keywords
Example Search: Charlie Crane
Content Warning: This blog post features items that may contain outdated, ableist, and derogatory language about blind, deaf and disabled people.
Those who read our previous blog posts on the Crane Library at UBC will know that Charles Allan Crane (1906-1965) was a student who attended UBC between 1931 and 1933, and made history as the first deafblind person to attend a Canadian university. Since we are coming up on the 2026 International Day of Deafblindness on June 27th, this seems like a fitting test case!
Person or Organization Metadata
For many items in Open Collections, especially images, there is a field called Person or Corporation where the names of significant people or organizations are listed.
For example this image of Charlie with Alexander Graham Bell includes the linked name: “Crane, Charles”
When we click on it, the link brings up everything else Open Collections tied to the same person or organization.
In this case only two images pop up.
This means we need to dig further and find some written sources.
Regular Search
If we do a regular search on Charlie using two variations of his name we find a lot of potential sources. A lot of this might be relevant but this is too many results to sort through! This is a common issue when researching people with generic first or last names.
So, let’s see if we can do a more precise search to find out what Charlie was up to while in Vancouver.
Advanced Full Text Searching
This is where background research becomes very important. Some pieces of info that are good to have before searching for a more obscure person are the basic facts of their life including name variations, where they lived and when they were born and died. For Charlie we know the following from biographies written about him.
Name(s): Charles Allan Crane (1605-1965)
Alternative Names: Often goes by “Charlie” or “Charlie Crane” with or without middle name Allan or Allen (if misprinted). Sometimes shortens Charles to “Ches.” when publishing journalistic articles
Place: Born in Ontario, lived in Nova Scotia, moved to BC in 1922 (17 years old). Attended UBC between 1931 and 1933, and spent the rest of his life in Vancouver. Contributed to the UBC student newspaper The Ubyssey
To do an advanced search on Charlie we would take the following steps:
- Click Advanced Search on the Search page
Link to Advanced Search.
You’ll notice that below the search there are some details of how the search syntax works to make searching more efficient, but we won’t be trying all of this in this blog post.
- Build Your Search
For our search we will be searching variations of Charlie Crane’s name with an asterisk (*) where his middle name would be. In Open Collections this works as what is called a wildcard operator.
If we wanted to expand the search more we could select “Any of these words” or “All of these words” instead of “exact phrase”. But in this case we want only people with the first name Charles followed by the last name Crane.
Every time we add a new phrase to our search we also make sure “OR” is between them.
AND vs. OR
It’s important to make sure you choose the right option when picking between AND and OR. AND will give you a much smaller amount of results but can exclude too much, and OR will cast a wider net.
As an example:
“Cats” AND “dogs” -> Results that mention BOTH cats and dogs
“Cats” OR “dogs” -> ONLY Cats + ONLY dogs + BOTH cats and dogs
Check out this Libguide for more details.
- Select Filters
Under Limits I’ve chosen to limit the search to our digitized historical collections and limit the date to the years Charlie lived in British Columbia, 1922-1965. We can apply more filters later if needed
- Search
Let’s hit search and see what we have!
After that we have a small collection of 13 results to sort through. We might have found the same items with a simpler search as well, but it was worth narrowing the results down.
Even with this narrower search, some of the results are about different people also named Charlie Crane. But when we click into some of the items we find some interesting things like this 1929 Legislative Report that cites his academic achievements at the BC School for the Deaf and Blind.
An article from the Ubyssey introducing him to his classmates.
A column from the October 2, 1932 edition of the Ubyssey, and an article written by Charlie himself under the name Ches. Allen Crane.
Articles from the Nelson Daily News and UBC Historical Newspaper Collections about his journalistic pursuits and public speaking.
And a general interest article about Charlie published in the Nelson Daily News 4 years published before his death.
If we wanted to find more on Charlie from here we could expand the search criteria to include a broader set of dates from his birth in 1905 to 2026 to find materials published about him after his death, or expand our search in new directions.
Conclusion
We hope this blog post was informative and we encourage you to try doing some searching yourself using some of these strategies for your own research. Let us know if you have any questions about advanced search that we can answer in future blog posts!
Helpful Links:
- Open Collections Advanced Search
- Advanced Search Syntax – Explains wildcards, AND, OR and other useful features
- UBC Libguide on Search Techniques
Additional Reading on Charlie
- “The Useful Citizen,” Trek Magazine (UBC Alumni Magazine), June 2013, 28–32. Also available online here.
- Carbin, C. F., & Smith, D. L. (1996). Deaf heritage in Canada: A distinctive, diverse, and enduring culture. McGraw-Hill Ryerson. Available for free courtesy of The Canadian Cultural Society for the Deaf.