Maybe when historians look back at the 2006 Natrona County History Day, they'll see the ushering in of a new era in history project display. The Digital Era.

Most of the 6th-12th graders' projects on display at Casper College Saturday were presented the old-fashioned way: On a display board measuring no taller than six feet. A couple of the entrants, however, accompanied those displays with some 21st century technology.

A study of Magic Johnson's 1991 announcement that he'd contracted the HIV virus was detailed on cardboard and an Apple iBook. The digital slide show about the former NBA star came complete with music. The chorus from the "Welcome Back Kotter" theme chimed in to coincide with images of Magic's 1992 return to basketball at the All-Star Game.

Centennial freshmen Chelsie Tucker, Allyson Zebre and Katherine Harden were encouraged by a social studies teacher to do a project about the 1970 Kent State shootings, and found time to incorporate a portable DVD player.

Through a Web site devoted to promoting awareness of the infamous confrontation between students and the National Guard, the trio contacted several people who were shot that day and survived. They conducted phone interviews with shooting victims Alan Canfora, Joe Lewis and others. Recordings of those interviews became part of a movie.

Since September, the girls said they'd spent up to seven hours a day researching the history of the National Guard shootings. Their display featured small biographies of the four students who were shot and killed during a Vietnam protest on the campus. In the spirit of History Days past, they also created a diorama of the campus where the shootings occurred.

They didn't know anything about May 4, 1970, and learning all about the historic day took months.

Making a movie about it, they said, was cake.

They uploaded the recordings onto their computer, synchronized the interviews with images related to the infamous day and burned a copy of the presentation onto a disc.

"We did it in about a week," Harden said. Their moms, they said, didn't help.

Contact reporter Cory Matteson at (307) 266-0589 or cory.matteson@casperstartribune.net.