Great lengths: a review of website preservation activities at three American Universities with digital humanities centers.

This article examines the challenges of sustaining legacy digital humanities websites—free-use online resources developed with grant funding, particularly from the National Endowment for the Humanities' Education Development and Demonstration (NEH-EDD) program (1996–2003)—at three American research universities: George Mason University, Michigan State University, and the University of Virginia. It finds that digital humanities centers at these institutions kept eight of nine NEH-EDD-funded websites online through informal, ad hoc preservation practices integrated into routine operations but faced increasing difficulties due to software obsolescence, technological change, and limited funding. The University of Virginia's library notably undertook a costly, large-scale reconstruction of the Valley of the Shadow project, illustrating that while website rebuilding can extend usability, it is resource-intensive and unlikely to be feasible for most legacy sites. The article highlights emerging approaches such as converting websites to static formats and recent grant programs supporting website preservation, emphasizing that sustained stewardship requires committed individuals, institutional support, and competitive funding, with many legacy digital humanities websites at risk without such efforts.