Unearthing St. Augustine's Colonial Heritage is a National Endowment for the Humanities grant-funded project to digitally preserve a collection of hidden and fragile resources related to colonial St. Augustine, consisting of 10,000 maps, drawings, photographs and documents available freely online. Partnering with the George A. Smathers Libraries at the University of Florida (UF) to realize this project are the City of St. Augustine departments of Heritage Tourism and the Archaeology Program, the St. Augustine Historical Society, and Government House, which is managed by UF. The project will be a resource for researchers, historians, archaeologists, architects, and historic preservationists, and will help in telling St. Augustine's unique "story" on a global scale.

The Unearthing St. Augustine materials are scattered among four different repositories which have been previously inaccessible to researchers worldwide. Among the important items to be "unearthed," which date from the 16th century to the present, include archival materials from the following:

• Government House - maps and overlays of the city, architectural drawings of historic structures, and related government documents
• St. Augustine Historical Society - Spanish documents, transcriptions, and English language translations
• City of St. Augustine Archaeology Program - records, photographs, and site summaries for 100 excavations conducted over the past 20 years
• Herschel Shepard Collection at UF - drawings, photos and documents related to Shepard's restoration and reconstruction of the city's colonial buildings

This project is funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities and the George A. Smathers Libraries at University of Florida.