In honor of the opening of the Museum of African American History & Culture in Washington, the Vineyard Gazette is adding a new collection on the history of African Americans on the Island to its own digital archives.

The collection, added this week to the Time Machine section of the Gazette’s website, includes selected articles, photographs and other materials dating from the newspaper’s founding in 1846. The collection ranges from an account of a fugitive slave and the visit to the Island of the abolitionist statesman Frederick Douglass to the opening of the Shearer Cottage vacation inn in Oak Bluffs and the origin of the Polar Bear Club.

Gazette librarian Hilary Wall said the collection is by no means complete, and people with an interest in Vineyard history are encouraged to offer suggestions as well as photographs and other material for inclusion.

“The majority of the information in our Time Machine collections are articles and photographs that appeared in the Vineyard Gazette or Martha’s Vineyard Magazine,” she said. “But we are always looking for primary source material that fill gaps in our coverage.”

Launched in August, the Time Machine is the first public manifestation of a multi-year project to digitize the Vineyard’s voluminous archives to make Vineyard history more accessible to students, scholars and the community at large.

The Time Machine uses a slide show format so users can browse subject matter collections chronologically. The Time Machine launched with five collections: Steamships and Ferries, Presidential History, Historic Movies, Gazette History and Hurricanes and Storms. A collection on the fishing derby was added earlier this month, and others will be added in the months and years ahead.

To contact Hilary Wall with additions or suggestions for the Time Machine, send an email to [email protected]. Visit the Time Machine at vineyardgazette.com/timemachine.