This week, I dove in and launched the Edgewood Oral History Project. I wanted to get started on it as early as possible because I knew that it might be a long process and that it can take a lot of time to prepare for each interview.
I have to admit, I went into beginning an oral history project a little naively. I have an archivist friend who started one at her institution, and I thought it sounded like a perfect component to my special studies class, but I had no idea what was required. To prepare, over the summer I got Nancy MacKay’s Community Oral History Toolkit and Curating Oral Histories: From Interview to Archive, and Doing Oral History by Donald A. Ritchie; and read just about everything I found on the Bancroft Library’s Regional Oral History Office website. After reading all of these fantastic resources, I realized just how much was involved and felt very much in over my head, especially around copyright permissions. However, I realized that I would be able to use all of these tools to create a manageable overall plan, and my friend also offered to give advice if I need it.
To choose potential narrators, I met with staff to determine the best scope for the project. I had always planned to focus on former residents of Edgewood during its orphanage and group home periods, but I wanted to see if they had any other thoughts. After all, the goal for my special studies project is to benefit Edgewood, as well as gain new skills and experiences, so it was important to me to involve them in the plan design. One colleague suggested several female former members of the Board of Directors and the Auxiliary (a volunteer group), suggesting an angle of the women who helped shape Edgewood, which I thought was a wonderful idea to add to the scope. For its first 100 years (1851 to 1951), Edgewood’s management was entirely female, and remained predominately female for years after. These former Board and Auxiliary members may be able to provide insights into female leadership during this time period. These women also led the organization shortly before it transformed from an orphanage to a residential psychiatric facility for youth, a dramatic change of course for the agency.
My resulting project mission is to collect the oral histories of former clients of Edgewood, and the women leaders who helped shape the organization. Topics will include narrators’ personal backgrounds, memories of living at Edgewood, memories of involvement with Edgewood as a Board and/or Auxiliary member, and how their participation as a volunteer at Edgewood evolved. My goal is to complete 1-3 interviews by the end of the semester, and continue the project after December for any other interested narrators. I also plan to ask each narrator to donate any historical records (photographs, etc.) related to Edgewood to the project. Some items may be very valuable to researchers that visit the Edgewood archives at the San Francisco History Center, especially those doing genealogical research. My hope is that this is just the start of a larger oral history project.
To prepare the interviewee list, I researched all people noted as former clients in an Edgewood database, separating the local residents from those living out of the area. I also searched the San Francisco Chronicle obituaries for references to Edgewood to find those with ties to the organization, as their families may be potential narrators at a later time, and to cross reference if any had passed away. I checked all names in the Social Security Death Index to try to verify that all were still living, and updated the list as needed. This yielded about 55 former clients, and 6 former women leaders. After discussion with the colleague that I’ll be working with most closely on this, it was decided to send a first round of letters to former clients in two specific counties, and the six identified former female leaders. This led to a list of 26 people. Depending on the responses, a second wave will be sent later in the month to former clients in other local counties.
I then drafted an interview request letter, using the MacKay books and examples from the Stephen F. Austin State University Center for Regional Research and Florida Voices. I sent the letter to the CEO for approval, with no issues. The letters were all customized based upon what I knew about each potential interviewee and sent yesterday. I plan to follow up with all of those that I have an email address or phone number for after about a week.
To help keep everything organized, I also created a binder of all the oral history resources I’ve been accumulating– articles, obituaries of former Edgewood volunteers, examples of various forms, and hard copies of interviewee lists and letters.
I’m very glad that I started researching what goes into oral history projects several months before the semester even started. It really helped me to understand what goes into planning and starting these projects, from creating concrete goals and scopes, identifying narrators, transcribing, cataloging, choosing equipment, understanding the legal and ethical issues of oral histories, and researching the historical periods in preparation for interviews. I’ve been able to apply what I know about project management to the oral history project, which I believe will help keep the plan on track. This project offers the opportunity to learn new aspects of librarianship and the archival field, new ways to apply research methods, and to experiment with new technologies, such as posting oral histories online.
I can’t wait to see who responds to my interview letter so that I can move on to the next stages.
I also started to survey the storage for historical records, and found some! I’ll share as soon as I edit the pictures. I also plan to continue my search over the weekend.
References:
Bancroft Library Regional Oral History Office. (2014). Retrieved from http://bancroft.berkeley.edu/ROHO/
Florida Voices. (2008). Sample letter requesting an interview [PDF]. Retrieved from http://www.fcla.edu/FloridaVoices/docs/pdf/InitialRequestLetter.pdf
MacKay, N. (2007). Curating oral histories: From interview to archive. Walnut Creek, Calif.: Left Coast Press.
MacKay, N. (2013). Community oral history toolkit. Walnut Creek, Calif.: Left Coast Press.
Ritchie, D. (2003). Doing oral history: A practical guide. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Stephen F. Austin State University Center for Regional Heritage. (2014). Interview request letter. Retrieved from http://www.sfasu.edu/heritagecenter/6866.asp
Edgewood Tales 