The Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities, in partnership with The Historic New Orleans Collection, the University of Louisiana at Lafayette's Center for Louisiana Studies and the LSU Research Library, is undertaking a new endeavor to create and develop an online encyclopedia of Louisiana history and culture.  KnowLA or KnowLouisiana will become an authoritative first point of reference for students, teachers, and scholars, business and industry, government and tourists when they have a question about Louisiana’s history and culture.  It will have the traditional encyclopedia components of cross-references, bibliographies and thematic essays and, in addition, many of the new components possible in online projects, including hyperlinks to other online resources, advanced search functions, audio and video excerpts, and mapping and timeline capabilities.  This kind of project is labor intensive, both in the creation of content and in the application of information architecture technology.  The encyclopedia will be developed over a period of years, coordinated by a dedicated staff at LEH and supported by contract section editors (at least a dozen) and writers (potentially hundreds). View mockup PDF.