Website Evaluation

www.nps.gov/vafo/ is the website for Valley Forge National Historical Park. Most commonly, know as Valley Forge, the park is located in Southeastern Pennsylvania about twenty miles outside the city of Philadelphia. Its historical importance lies in its role during the Revolutionary War. The site may describe the significance of Valley Forge best when it says…
Of all the places associated with America's War for Independence, none conveys more the impression of suffering, sacrifice, and ultimate triumph than Valley Forge. No battles were fought here, no bayonet charges or artillery bombardments took place, but during the winter of 1777-78 approximately 2,000 soldiers died at hospitals in the surrounding area nonetheless. Valley Forge is the story of an army's epic struggle to survive against terrible odds, against hunger, disease, and the unrelenting forces of nature.
This website does an outstanding job of conveying Valley Forge’s history while additionally connecting it to the present.

The site is incredibly user friendly right from the beginning. The site home has a banner at the top of the page for the National Park Service: U.S. Department of the Interior with a link to the National Park Service website, nps.gov. On the left is a navigation bar. This navigation bar remains consistent on every page of the site. The navigation bar consists of a search tool that can search the Valley Forge Park site or can search the National Park Service site. Below the search function are ten category headings that link to major areas of the site. In addition to the main categories, there are the Site Index, Frequently Asked Questions, Bookstore, and Contact buttons. The navigation bar is placed in a good location and categorized in an appropriate matter making it easy for uses to find what they are looking for.

Other features that make this site particularly user friendly is the lack of display picture length restrictions. The entire website fits in the window no matter how you manipulate the window. The page can also be made printer friendly so that all parts of the page will be displayed when printed instead of parts being cut off. The text is also easy to read because the font colors are dark with a light background. Additionally the text size can be changed by the click of a button making it small, medium or large.

The site is filled with useful content for all audiences. Most importantly all information is current. There is a timestamp of last updates and is different on each page, not just the entire site. For example the Valley Forge News page is more recent being updated 1/8/07 at 10:22 EST. While the Support the Park page is less recent having last changed on 9/24/06 at 14:06 EST. The content and scholarship varies depending on what part of the site you visit. For the general public who does not want detailed information about the entire winter encampment of the Continental Army the History and Culture page provides about a page and a half summery of the events that took place at Valley Forge. This is an appropriate length for the general public. Enough text to present the important information but not long enough to make them lose interest.

The site does provide content and scholarship for the more academically/historically inclined. The History & Culture page is a good place to find more academic/historical information. There are links to People, Places, Stories, and Collections pages. Each provides increasingly in-depth information the more buttons you click on. To find the most scholarly information you would go to the Collections page then navigate to the Archives & Library page. This page provides links to the library collection at Valley Forge Park, which has approximately 7,000 volumes including books, reports, theses and dissertations, and periodicals. Additionally, the park is in the process of digitizing documents and publications but currently, Valley Forge : Making and Remaking a National Symbol, The Valley Forge Report, and A Demographic Survey of the Continental Army that Wintered at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, 1777-1778 are available online. In addition to this scholarly information, there is a designated area for teachers. This area includes extensive information on how to incorporate Valley Forge Park into the classroom. This includes a 71-page curriculum PDF, which includes primary source activities.

The most exciting part of this website is its use of new media. One would not expect historical websites, especially government historical websites to be the most technologically savvy, but this site proves otherwise. The site has at least two high quality images on every page. It has a special area devoted to Photos & Multimedia. The page is broken down into Photo Gallery and Multimedia Presentations. The Photo Gallery page has ten photo galleries broken down into five categories for easy searching. The Photo Galleries can be either viewed as an Album or viewed as a slideshow with the latest version of Flash. The Multimedia Presentations page has Video and Audio Podcasts available for download.

In brief, the Valley Forge National Historical Park website is one of the best historical sites I have viewed. It contains content and scholarships that all audiences would enjoy. It is incredibly user friendly because of its layout and presentation and its use of new media is surprisingly up to date in current. Most importantly is makes the user want to experience the park first hand.