Cudden Davis Ledger Project Announcement
I want to share one of the many exciting projects we’ve worked on this summer! We’ve partnered with Dr. Holly Shulman at the University of Virginia and the The Montpelier Foundation to explore the Cudden Davis Ledger.
How much did it cost James Madison, and other Early Republic Virginian elites, to keep people enslaved? In the early 19th century, Orange County merchant Edwin Cudden Davis sold general household goods to wealthy clients to support their exuberant lifestyles. Within his ledger, an interconnected web of families, debts, and everyday items tell the story of central Virginian plantation life.
We faced many challenges when processing the Cudden Davis Ledger. First, I had to learn about 18th century accounting. Then I had to teach our LLM how to actually read the documents! I used our prompt and evaluation system to accurately create transcriptions for almost 600 pages of dense, analytical financial text.
As part of the project, we also created a data visualization system and rapid prototype graphing! Researchers can now examine our documents from a high-level, abstract perspective. Visualizations open new exploratory avenues by highlighting large trends and patterns over time. We created the pictured pie chart to help Dr. Shulman examine the spending habits of Nelly Madison, her research subject.
This is only the beginning of the project — more to come in the fall!
