In our paper, we present a large historical database of Bavarian dialects (from the Dictionary of Bavarian Dialects in Austria) and its conversion from handwritten paper slips via TUSTEP into TEI-XML while elaborating on the topics discussed by Bowers [2] with regards to enhancement of its contents. While the original purpose of the digitalization was to facilitate the writing of dictionary articles, our current TEI database will be used as a corpus from which the materials are being gathered to both write print dictionary articles as well as serving as a basis for a web-based lexicographic information system. Herein we trace the different steps that have already been taken to create our current digital database from a legacy data collection, discuss the challenges we are still facing, and describe the approaches we are taking and considering to address such challenges.