[inaudible] [inaudible]
[inaudible] make sure everybody is where they want to be.
This is the metal room. Technology
tuition was down one more level.
They set the volume and all we got down here is
[inaudible]. [inaudible]
[inaudible] [inaudible]
1: ladies and gentlemen, why don't we, uh, get started.
This traditionally I guess is about the smallest group,
the science and technology group.
It's always very difficult to decide how to break this show and tell session up
because it's always apples and pears no matter what you do.
And I guess it's because of my own [inaudible] that I even make one as limited
as science and technology IQ. Peaches did Peter? Yes. Thank you. Hobby.
Uh, but as you can imagine, for instance,
the group institutional projects is everything from the liberal arts college to
IBM and regional and special projects and the presidential libraries,
black studies and so on. It generally works
as you've noted in the mimeograph program.
The idea of a session like this really is developed somewhat spontaneously in
Lincoln when a, I believe a guest speaker,
a scheduled speaker didn't make it. And when you start, I said, well,
let's have a show. And tell, said we broke up into three groups,
rub categories and sat around as we are here and literally just went around the
table spending three to five minutes depending on the size of the [inaudible],
uh, stating what our program is,
what the goals of the program are,
what the major problems we were faced with and then, uh,
freely discussing back and forth.
Now I noticed there are at least three of us who were in Lincoln and I guess in
a sense it'll be progress reports.
I will be very limited in what I have to say because I ran off with the mouth
much to my embarrassment and I saw the colloquium from Lincoln and there are all
sorts of things,
some of which I've read at are in there and I hope the director of the national
library of medicine ever sees. But uh,
yeah, well that's all right. I'll be, I'll be taking care of this tape.
But, uh, again, it's, it's,
it's really just a means for our, for us to get to know each other,
to find out who in generally the same field is doing what in oral history.
And it gives you an opportunity to identify these people so that throughout the
rest of the meeting you can not porn are those people that you so desire and
talk to them in more detail.
So why don't we start with Harlan Phillips down at this side and just start
moving around and see how she goes.
2: Well, briefly up, been under contract, national library of medicine
since 1966
1: Harlan, could you speak up just a tad? These, these mikes are fairly sensitive.
2: I've been at the national library of medicine and the contract to the library
since 1966 working with the
six five people. I guess the results are upstairs.
You have a chance. You can look through documents that are up there,
perhaps better to respondents. You might have one.
Gee, I don't know that there are many. Again,
probably the big problem right now, of course government agencies, the money
contract funds and even grant funds
and that much more than great place in which marvelous library,
I don't know how many funds there are, a lot of which I hadn't seen yet.
That is a great place to work.
I've had a lot of fun doing oral STDs because I enjoy,
I'm not trained in the medical field sled to be up
there in the store with my interest in
fine arts techniques with
you relevant in the medical field as well.
Well
1: Harlan, I am sure feel somewhat a monster embarrassed,
but I can assure you he is contributed a great deal to the oral history program
at the national library of medicine because of the in house staff consists of
one individual and we've been fortunate enough to have people like Harlon
Phillips. And as you'll learn later,
Dr. James Harvey young of Emory to conduct a series of interviews for the
program. Sir, would you identify yourself?
3: Emily Oberman.
I'm a psychiatrist in Connecticut and I've been interested in up psychiatry up
Connecticut.
And I said some years ago I began to take the eldest statesmen people that had
been active in developing psychiatry, uh, uh, one of the gentlemen, um,
in his nineties, who was, had retired from, um, the state hospital.
Uh, I have no,
this is done independent individuals who I have no money for transcribing.
And the hope is that someday I will,
but at the present I'm just tapes on anyone that I can get to record on what
brought them into the field of psychiatry or what they've done within the state
or I've also as a member of the American Academy of psychoanalysis and
interested in the development of the organization and have, uh,
taped a number of the founders of the organization of the society.
4: Mmm.
3: Either individually or on occasion you've got a number of them together and had
them reminisce about how they came to frisk,
set up their organizational meetings so that I'm not interested in any area of
psychiatry that feel that I have to limit it in terms of my,
if I'm doing it as an individual to one small space and doing it in terms of
primarily Connecticut
usual problem with money and transcribing this and what you do with the tapes.
They're important. I've tried to, um, think of ADA. Um,
University of Connecticut now has an oral history project and, uh,
I've got a habit of trying to, uh, take and work with them,
just developing my specific specialty, um,
possibly storing the tapes after Yukon.
1: Do you review any of the papers of these individuals? What, what,
what is your preparation for an interview with some of these? [inaudible]
3: tried to get the scrapbooks diaries, um,
in before a newspaper articles so that when I come to interview with them,
there is some background and I have specific question to mind.
2: I have really very little to report since I've made a move this year to a new
institution. And uh,
I must say that the two people who I'm currently preparing to work with,
uh, uh, have also had some things, uh, happen to them.
Uh,
one of the people I'm preparing to work with is Albert Sabin and how I would say
been is now
been appointed the head of the Weitzman Institute in Israel.
But the joy in that appointment is that is moved in a direction which he might
not have originally.
I've been made a executor of the saving papers and the saving papers have just
been deposited at the University of Cincinnati medical school and I'm currently
putting them in order.
And the other person who I was to stop with had a Nobel prize thrust on him that
Salvador Luria buss, both Luria and, uh,
Sabin, uh,
must've been waiting for historians because they've saved every scrap of paper
that you could, uh, imagine. Uh, for example,
Saipan has every protocol of every experiment that he's done since working with
William H. Park at the New York city, uh, health laboratories.
The best part, uh,
is a kind of annotation that he has done up printed papers,
which people in the field upset center him.
So going through this printed collection is extraordinary.
He revealing for the comments that you find in the column little empty space,
uh, in a printed, uh, uh, paper.
And I'm currently making a very cursory analysis of that,
plus putting them in a kind of alphabetical order.
And it's easy to work in virology,
at least for the first 20 years because the same names keep cropping up.
It was a very, very small field until about
1950 Lurie. His papers are even more extensive.
Uh, that's savings. And he has some at all.
What a great deal within the department.
Old archives of MIT. Um,
both of these people are very [inaudible] minded and they don't mind you going
through the most personal, uh,
of course correspondence. You're a lucky man. Well,
let me give you an example. Uh, about two years ago, Saban's first wife
died and, uh,
he of course had some correspondence, a great deal of correspondence, uh,
with her and his new wife think that headquarters should be in the same archive.
It took very little to persuade Saban that indeed it should be because the first
few letters that we opened them and looked at what descriptions of work that he
was doing in the laboratory.
So they've been put within the collection,
but with the proviso that they are under lock and key until the principles,
uh, that he has been extraordinarily cooperative.
And for me, uh,
it's an indication of his character because he wasn't treated very well.
And the book, uh, on, on rivers, uh,
that I did, uh, Luria is very historical,
uh, minded because he's not only, uh,
an important molecular biologist. He is also a man, uh,
up affairs. And, uh, what the record is,
uh, I might say that the Luria project was,
was started as part of a larger project,
which John Edsel is doing at soul,
who is professor of biochemistry at Oxford,
is very interested in writing a history of biochemistry.
So he has secularized the important figures in biochemistry in the last 25 years
to save.
They have papers and epics and now being made to put them in a central,
uh, place, uh, beyond this,
I really have very little to report that would be
5: maybe, uh,
I'm Lucille Ryde vow and I'm here primarily because you did a new brochure and
say that this was geared to neophyte. And, uh, I, I've been, uh,
working in the history of science and medicine at Yale, uh,
with a special interest in the history of psychoanalysis. And I, uh,
got my start talking Mrs. Hart and dr Wiener at the American Institute of
physics and then was introduced to dr Bennison who in going over my ideas with
me suggested that I should work with max sure.
Who was Freud's personal physician and within my written two papers.
But I did run into a problem because next year it was clearing time to start
this month with me on it. And he died on October 12th. So as of the moment,
I don't have any oral history program other than to come as in the invite and
learn from you so that when I finish writing up the material I have on Darwin's
influence on Freud, I might then go on.
I'm Elsbeth Hart from the American Institute of physics non here because Charles
Weiner had another meeting. He had to go to Cambridge. Uh,
the American Institute of physics has,
it acts as a repository of coercive tapes that are given it by science and
technology seems to give them their interview tapes.
We have tapes of meetings of the American physical society and other member
societies. But, uh,
our particular group in physics history doesn't work that with the stored tapes,
we're uh, use, uh,
oral history only to supplement our research program.
And we do very detailed research or being conducted
at the moment. We've been specializing on the, um,
the history of nuclear physics and then expect to go on in the history of part
of it. And um, our interviews are conducted.
It's you're also just down at 14 hour interview, tragic,
um, scabbing neutrons, all those experiences with rather brief answer.
6: We, um, we only conduct about,
I guess 10 interviews a year, always from,
as part of the work that we're doing on the emergency, these vehicles.
1: And you always tie in an interview with a man's collection of papers.
Do you get these
6: papers? Everything we could find out about his life.
And Charleston has been doing this for four years and has a great deal of,
it's able to always tie when he talks to
[inaudible] it's a big deal. Interconnections
and all the men of course we've worked with have known each other so that you
accumulated knowledge
1: and the tapes are being preserved with the papers. That's, yup.
6: I'm still very much some from the Salk Institute for biological studies.
We are setting up an archive of,
you're just beginning to set up.
Our aim is quite specific.
A major topic is to record the history of contemporary biology,
the biology there. Um,
our purpose is to record the origins and progress with the concurrent revolution
in the life sciences. I think it was almost,
I'm certain that we planned to cover an area. For instance,
Luria is one of my monitors and is very interested in our project.
And so to hear that preface, um,
we have small holdings at the moment of manuscripts and those films, records,
tapes, um, a series of interviews, planning, design, supporting.
He's agreed to do this and um,
we're just beginning.
1: You have been in contact heavy with other organizations or individuals who may
be interviewing the same people or
6: we're in the process of finding out what other people are doing.
7: Manford Wasserman and I am associated with dr olds in the history of medicine
division library, national library of medicine.
I worked with the modern manuscripts collection and since we have a unified
approach at the library between the manuscripts and oral history,
uh,
I frequently come in contact with the oral history project and,
uh, I, we have a catalog
2: and this work in combination with my interest in training library work in
history has brought me here.
1: Man. He is really, uh,
again rather modest in the sense I think it's important to realize that, uh,
he is responsible for the papers of course that come to the library along with
are more detailed and in depth, uh, autobiographical memoirs.
And because the vapors are the one of the primary reference sources before we
start the interviews, uh,
there's naturally an awful lot of tie in between one and the other indirect
references specific items in the manuscript election.
And it's through the patience of mr Wasserman that, uh,
I eventually learned at least some of the elements of [inaudible] one catalogs,
a manuscript material because we handled the oral history material as he said,
in the same way. But, uh, as he points out, the,
the twoF the national library of medicine are very closely aligned.
2: My name is Nick [inaudible]. Smithsonian's
Joseph Henry. I am not engaged in any oral activities.
Uh, as I concentrate on study dead.
I'm a David Musto. I have a,
a joint appointment at Yale and the history and psychiatry department. And,
uh, they weren't involved with an oral history. Um, about,
um, three, uh, categories.
The first is what the American psychiatric association,
where there is an oral history project ongoing to interview,
uh, leaders in American psychiatry. And in the, uh, I, uh,
uh,
do interview these individuals from whom we also seek to get papers.
And also, uh, there is a national project to interview,
uh, members of the profession, uh, throughout the nation.
And it's interesting that in an organization in which you would expect to have
about 15,000 experienced interviewers, and it's still difficult to get this, uh,
this accomplished. And so I, uh, I sympathize with,
uh, with any national project of this kind,
especially to the extent that it depends upon and off the voluntary, uh,
support and labor.
The second area in which I'm involved is the transformation of values in the
family. And although many of the families that we've studied,
like ne are not living and therefore, uh,
cannot answer questions.
There is a long term ongoing project in Lake child study center at Yale with uh,
various, um,
families in which one in which we are attempting to understand how a family
transmits values to children and how it picks up values from society and then
transmits this from one generation to the next.
And this involves both interviewing and, uh,
and which then the interviews are transcribed, um, as well as,
um, attempts to conceptualize what's going on as this, uh, proceed.
Um, and then this, uh, we are not dealing with the grade,
but we are dealing with the average human being and trying to understand their
own, uh, uh,
response to their environment and how the average individual functions,
how children grow up. Now last way, um, as a member of the history department,
uh,
I'm involved in teaching the history of the American family but also helping,
uh, graduate students in history and using psychology, uh,
are the concepts of psychology and the writing of history. Uh,
and this oral history is very prime and I have found that most graduate students
in the history,
especially 20th century American history are doing oral history in their work
and therefore, uh,
welcomed the opportunity to talk about all the types of information they could
possibly gain coming oral interview and the MNS. Um, you know,
we uh, try to help them. Uh,
and both in the understanding that an oral interview is a very crude,
uh, document in many respects.
I have to caution them against thinking that an oral interview has been itself
on some magic quality to write district for you.
And on the other hand that the oral interview was a very rich document,
which you can go start coming and going many directions.
And also there's a great deal of material there that one can gather as,
as people mentioned last night from inflections, tones,
she collected some information, other things. Um,
so in this respect and in these different areas I'm involved with or history.
1: Thank you David. I think many of you would be interested,
you probably noticed actually by now that dr Mustoe is also just pending an AME
panel and we call Saul and David panel discussion and studies on the accuracy of
oral interviews,
which touches on a few comments and just may that'll be at 11:00 AM on a Sunday.
7: Dennis, Dennis Carlson, I'm in the Institute of medicine,
the fellow studying there. Um,
I spent some years in the DOP, the Northern snap project.
[inaudible] oral history is the one, all of those studying nutrition actions,
diseases in the 19th century.
1: You actually planned to make some field trips,
2: you know, a fellow named, he didn't go in
6: the FAL and Rome.
I would say this now our needs and the simple reason that I'll forget if I
don't, um, I think it's capital D,
capital G, a. R. I. N. and, um,
he has been doing, um,
movies, um,
certain African tribes, one of which I saw this summer in Sweden,
uh,
with a great emphasis on nutrition and the interlinking between ritual and
nutrition.
And I just have a feeling that there's some kind of value to move together truly
again. All right. Thank you sir. Still
just right. But I might as well, since I haven't relative novice,
you've come ratify the shooting long,
you get the list of the Athens or with this particular session I might get to
dump some of their names.
2: I had to do that. I would think so though they will be in the proceedings,
but there will be despite the money for that, I imagine. That's cool.
6: Do you have any comments you wish to make? Alright, well thanks.
[inaudible]
2: I'm here representing the Mount Sinai
practicing surgeon. I'm a teaching staff of a medical school.
I'm also the archivist of the institution.
[inaudible] he doesn't go as part of that,
I started the oral history project,
which was geared to interview those who had been retired and knew about passing
the institution. Uh, I've been able to study the dead, uh, my,
uh, speaking to the present living and, uh,
those that we made outstanding contributions, uh,
to find out the intimate details of how it came about [inaudible] anywhere else
and also try to establish a sort of living archives and that those in the future
would know how things went on today.
And that means not only interviewing when you come as to the important
positions,
also ordinary people in the institution and also recording events,
which in which the Nolan, the way the end will be preserved.
Investitures meetings of
groups that were involved in dealing with the human,
the institution represent various segments,
fights that go on in various meetings,
hopefully not be recorded any other way so that somebody that usually could use
it,
these things I would hope could be him sometime in history of the institution
has to be New York medicine or in some biography,
but it's principally of [inaudible]. I, myself,
I'm not writing anything because these tapes are retained by me,
but transcribed by Columbia university,
our research office and their catalog.
And as they are also reserved in office.
6: I'm willing bound director,
regional oral history office at the University of California, Berkeley.
And we're a little like Columbia in that we have, uh, a number of projects,
the one that might fit into science and technology.
We have one project on the wine industry and this project is being funded by the
wine industry itself. And uh,
we are interviewing people who are prominent wine growers,
2: [inaudible]
6: technologists in the development of the production of wine and some of the
people who are trade representatives, uh, in the wine Institute,
which is their trade organization so that this might be called a technical
logical and economic study.
This is being done close cooperation with um,
the wine Institute and with faculty members at the University of California.
You've been prominent in this field.
Another project we have technological and we've just started it. Uh,
we have done a number in water resources, um,
on the development of the state water plan in California and now we've completed
those and we're just shifting into a new series would be on sanitary
engineering, primarily water pollution.
And this is old history where we started out with,
we only have $500 for this project.
A lot of our projects start that way and they go on in order to get the bean of
sanitary engineering who is 95 years old. So the,
historically this goes very far back.
We have at this time three men on our roster,
which you understand three men cannot be interviewed for $500. Uh,
but um, they are all, they're all retired at this point.
And this interviewing will be done by people who are in the field of sanitary
engineering now and who were in fact students of the men.
They'll be interviewing. Our interviewers are probably in their sixties.
One of the interviewers is the next on the list be interviewed about 65.
Um, so those are our two maybe technological projects.
2: How was your interview with Hildebrand? I noticed that on,
6: well I've,
it's primarily our Hildebrand wanted some on his counter chemistry for uh,
quite a bit on the development of the University of California as part of our
University of California series.
And he was very prominently administration of the university. Think,
think about the politics of science.
[inaudible] national campus climate stuff. Yes.
My name is Milton crime site coordinator of the New York.
Denies oral history project that the American Jewish community in New York city.
Uh, we are here to learn and uh, I'm sure it
will be very beneficial in scores. Uh, we are, is that right?
In our building, our team, our own team of finding, uh, uh,
interviewers and transcribers and all the machine religious people are so
familiar with, we're in the process of growing pain. Uh, however,
we are keenly interested in a full field of medicine science technology cause
what we're going to do is try to attempt to trace the American Jewish experience
in the 20th century. And uh, some of you may be familiar with, uh,
the commentary magazine that our organization puts out. We hope this will be,
uh, the same, uh, quality. Um,
we have just completed our first roster of our national advisory board and I'm
that we have
dr Jerome Weisner at MIT who will be assisting us in the science field.
And we've already received a poodle for a oral mental Harwood doctor doing Salk.
Um, and, uh, another aspect of our work is acquisitions. And, um,
he had been in contact with some of the centers around the country and end up,
well, if mom was good enough to, uh, get us, uh, a oral history memoir,
um, the famous Walter Loudermilk milk
water conservationist.
And of course we were particularly interested in him because of his association
with Israel and their water problems in the desert. Uh,
another aspect of my work, Oh, uh,
also the producer of eternal life program with somebody maybe may with, uh,
which I helped originate and that I'm still producing on NBC.
And some of the materials are there. Well,
that's in dramatic form of the less we'll have some relationship to our oral
history work, the American Jewish community, like the discover of pellagra, uh,
and the fellowship and the shake test. And, uh, so we're on our way. And,
um, next time, the next club game,
we hope to have a more detailed report for you.
That's the who gets the president as well, right? Very right. Now,
um, uh, our, our guiding spirit is, uh, Mr. Lewis G Cohen. Uh,
you may remember him,
he used to be president of CBS television and he is now associated with Columbia
university and graduate school of journalism.
[inaudible] the library.
I am very bored around it and I'm handling the operational aspects of it.
I'm sorry, I don't mean moral history. I mean the, well,
the president currently is a, as Mr. Philip Hoffman, uh,
executive director or executive vice president is Brittany gold.
When we proceed down the hierarchy to the library. Well, we don't,
we don't have a library entitled as such. Uh, as I say,
we're just in the process of getting our team together and uh, we're about, uh,
in my current aspect,
even four months old [inaudible] already is very extensive. I could say. Yes.
You still have a woman,
several women who come in from day to day and work at what's called their names.
Please. Well, we don't, basically,
we have not reached that state of operation yet.
I'm not speaking of world history, sir. I'm speaking. Oh, you mean our library?
We have a very fine library. It's called the Jewish library of information.
Our our bearing is it talked to Harry.
All of them have no pillow Farb and a number of people that site for eyes work
with Ascension. I do want to mention one of the things,
even in medical field we have had some consultation with dr allies who we
consulted with in the early stages of our organization set up and that we hope
to go back to him because of course Mount Sinai has a medical history archive
would be a key interest to [inaudible]. Yeah, I might [inaudible].
This is an interesting thing to me now because I'm trying to find out if a
certain person [inaudible] whose name I no longer remember has retired or is
still working in your library. She came from Iowa. Oh, I know what you mean.
There she is. I'm a cone. I look coming here and she's still,
we're hanging there or have you heard about six months ago.
He comes to our office by breaking into one of our very dear friend and
associates.
1: I am very interested by your comment about having this more or less advisory
board up.
Are they specifically assisting in the selection of candidates for oral history
memoirs?
6: They will,
they will guide us in our hot sending up our policy and they will be able to
give us suggestions. But we hope we hope set up a specialized committees,
law committees to work with us in various areas which we'll be interested in.
We're going to talk to them,
we talk to and talking about this for you and we hope to eventually set up these
individual committees who will help us in setting direction,
adding the types of people we ought to interview.
1: This is something I think would be interesting if we could address ourselves to
actually those of us who already commented, uh,
they have any comments on the problem of selection of candidates.
I know it's a continuing problem with us. Dr. Johnson.
Sorry. No, we were, we started and went around this way.
You didn't and then you came in. I,
I've got your name down here to get you [inaudible]
6: for Willa. The question for that question, I'm sorry. Forgive me.
You have only so much time when people can hold them. Dr. Johnson,
George Johnson with the school of public health.
Then they Carolina [inaudible] in North Carolina
2: in chapel Hill some 15 years ago.
I got another big old room dates and tickets to some places where I was assigned
as a
officer in the public health service to what's now the AIP program
and in some of these countries I began to collect just a small vignette of a
voice of people in public health. Obviously one has to talk about something,
so I made it a point to try to determine that the significance of what a guy was
doing. That particular moment.
Then such things as back in 1960 when the association of medical education in
India became a reality. At its first meeting,
I asked a man by the name of [inaudible],
Moodle Lear to tell me about this,
and over a period of time I collected some 40 to 50 of these small vignette and
then when the oral history association came along, I joined about 18 months ago.
I went to the university after leaving the public health service where I'm with
a population center and they still are public health.
It's so happens that in North Carolina,
as long as those 1937 the official health agency took some action that made it
possible for the health departments to offer what we call a family planning
services these days to the residents who wanted to do these services.
And this was the first really official wide scale program of family planning
services. I was with many agencies,
had particular planned Parenthood and they're just saying Edward had been doing
this for years on, on a voluntary level about three years ago.
The Carolina population centered came into existence and in three years now,
and it's become a university wide organization that stimulates
cooperation and population studies and some 17 or 18 departments of the
university.
We've been able to attract about three or $4 million worth of support for the
organization.
And it seems to me that being a part of this,
I should try to record something about what's happening in population planning
and planning in North Carolina and the picture is the organization of the
center.
I came about who really was the guy that made the suggestion and the sequence of
events. I think the,
probably the main drawback or the difficulty relative to this project would be
the fact that, um,
now if part of it then the people that I want to interview, uh,
are good friends and they are going to be a little bit low but they'll may why
they guy isn't doing or isn't coming up to his expectation or what party he had.
And I anticipate that this will be a some extent a problem.
The state department of health and social services have been stimulated by
personnel or the population center to get together on a program which would make
a family planning services available under some of the six to seven amendments
of the social security act.
And we played a very important role in getting these two state organizations
together.
I'm involved in the development of population project across the country to a
certain level where we will work with them and evaluating the effects.
And although I don't, obviously it's not oral history, but I
tape the sessions where I go out to work with people,
uh, as a yesterday as a consultation to so that I don't have to take notes.
And then following the session I can write down that this is my interpretation
of what happened. And see here are some of the issues that you've discussed.
Some of the things you have to take decisions about who it is a small project at
the beginning, I,
I have an application for a small grant support and at the moment,
whether or not it's going to be regarded as researched by the research office or
the university remains to be seen, but
6: [inaudible]
2: we will proceed slowly on a small project of this nature.
6: Well, the national library of medicine has a contract with Emory university,
uh, under which, uh,
certain cost of producing capes and making transcripts that relate to food and
drug regulation is handled, um,
on their end. Peter's in charge and on Emory. Then, uh,
I'm in charge and I've done most of the interviewing,
although graduate students in mind who, um, may choose to be interested in mr.
ticker field have done some interviewing and some more will come along. Um,
some of you will recognize that there's a temptation to believe you can do more
in a shorter time initially then in time has proved to be true,
especially when you're involved with the regular academic, uh,
commitments.
I just hope very much as it being a national library of medicine will let that
money sit there and tell them we can spend it through the normal course of
development during the last year.
I suppose that the most significant interview that got into the pipeline was
about 12 hours that I had with former commissioner James Goddard,
which really is a pretty full biographical treatment.
He had reflections on his whole life, uh, not to say,
of course the main emphasis upon his commissionership. Um,
you also told me that he had will his papers to the national library of medicine
and uh,
we had another interview earlier and no situation in which the national library
of medicine had been trying to get papers of a man.
And then we interviewed him and I hope that this tips the balance so that the
papers will go on tapes. Um, with Goddard.
Um, though I'm doing research in this field,
my interviews were based on printer Gregor,
not on the study of the private papers.
5: Ah,
6: this seemed to be a good thing at this time when it was convenient for him to do
it and I just wasn't up that far in my own research.
1: We have actually one of your transcripts upstairs in the little NLM display back
in federal realm. I can't remember. I think I brought the lyric.
6: Well, Byron Jordan,
sad to say I was with former commissioner Larry leading lunch pairing to
continue those interviews when he had the attack that brought him,
well, I'm no wonder nine year from University of Miami school of medicine.
I'm a librarian. We don't have a program yet. That's why I'm here,
so we can stop one. Uh,
I'm looking forward to diving into program with pleasure though because it's,
it's so nice that we are having such good cooperation with the audio visual
department and with the history of medicine section of the medical.
So next year I'll be able to give you a much better report.
I'm James Buck director libraries university.
What I want to do is start a program operation administration,
technology
1: and the institutional history primarily but in the area of science. Right.
6: Hi, I'm Julia Day with [inaudible] foundation in Delaware.
We have a museum that has a museum, a library.
Uh, the oral history program as such has been under the direction of Dr. Norman
Wilkinson. Under normal circumstances, we wouldn't be here today.
He is our director of research
at the oral history program as of now as a twofold situation.
In one instance, the Hagley museum,
which is deeply involved in the technological history of the Brandywine Valley,
is interested in oral interviews with business,
technological and industrial leaders. Therefore, I should have
[inaudible]
8: right now. Um,
the other half of the situation is at the library for those of you on your
visual depressants,
which I had and we'll be storing material on him to protect me.
Well I think I'd rather describe the program very briefly is your way,
not only for the information when we examine research and external research,
but also as a teaching learning thing with our Hagi fellowship program and I
think this is an important facet of the work that's done because it gives a hag
of fellows who are in both master's and doctoral programs an opportunity to
understand from the point of view of both of his door and museum administrator
the opportunities in all three and
try to broaden the base of the orchestra program to encompass training as well
as simply reporting.
We have a limited materials now which are available to the public in the main,
they have been based on a sample of the many veggies selected because the sun
represents two nine inch for folding. In other words,
the technology involved in a leather company now this mom's or something of this
door. However, uh, it's my own
interests that brings up this topic.
I believe we will be interested in interviewing people in the history of
technology,
in terms of relationships to products of chemistry and so on.
We're in a rather unique situation there for that. Uh, I,
I believe that one of the main problems I'd like to bring up for discussion is
index classification of these materials wants transcribed because there's no
questions about it in the same way that you have problems with visual Indeck and
do with all. Well, uh,
I believe that I've been a drop it there because Dr. Wilkinson will be here next
year and be able to describe any changes.
Did you want to make some comments on your program as well as for that reason,
I want to give my sharpish a book upstairs.
We can have on this play called climate greatness,
which is kind of this study of the aircraft industry written by John Ray who,
uh, is at harboring my college of engineering.
And when our Claremont graduate school, and, uh,
this has been published by MIT press with the deal trail came from the oral
history decade. Um,
the other thing we've done is we've,
we are more a target of our opportunity operation. Uh,
we're an extension of the history department of a graduate institution and we do
have, uh,
one quite interesting one on an electronics for the early phases of this and
another one on, um, uh,
metallurgical engineering who started to company,
which did something run unique in terms of the war effort counter. Really mine,
I had a question, you know, blah blah bomb.
I want to after if in this wine industry thing you're doing,
you're doing Southern California.
I think we have one interviewee in Southern California.
We have some opportunities that are in contacts.
I would have been trying to get depth to this. And as you know,
there's an extensive wine industry. It within half an hour. I'm sorry,
Susan shocked. That's where I buy my wine from,
our local as we call it. And um, this one DOE,
one who was from Italy actually blocked, brought things over from LAN,
was instrumental in this and was, uh, has a PhD in chemistry from Golan.
And so I'm just wondering if we might,
maybe we can just this random story.
There's a whole story in Southern California. We're vineyard replanting,
very early lady. There should be part of this. Uh,
then if I could ask the gentleman from the American Jewish community, um,
are you making any attempt to uh,
or study attempt to get those persons who fled Europe and ended up in the
professions particularly say Madison and, uh,
technological research?
6: Yes, that will be part of our program. It's such a vast canvas as you know.
However,
we are also thinking of of the European aspect of it as well. Uh,
in other words, going back to where they started in Europe, are you following,
what were you going to America
8: or in a high state of frustration because we had the start of a project in
Southern California. We have a,
there's a fantastic number of people in this category that settled in our area.
We have done one doctor who may have to jump the train before it got to with
these are poets. I would,
I keep hoping we can connect with someone who would coordinate with us or help
us. Of course. Always. It's always a matter of money.
We'd be very much interested in that.
We have all the contacts and then we can just row we know just got to do.
But of course we can talk with you about it.
1: Yo man, man,
I just asked this truly off the record and I'm dying to know his wants is still
functioning, uh, Cucamonga or,
8: yes, I think, well, let's see. Um, I want to know
1: dope. I don't want to spend a lot of time if that was the place to go,
8: all operators out there and this was the story because these people,
these people had the land originally planted the vineyards and then the bigger
operators came in. Thank you.
While I think
1: this sort of show and tell as
2: a deal, a virtue,
it is curiously unsatisfying, uh, in a way.
And, uh,
as an amendment to this kind of procedure,
I would like next time it's,
it's clear that we can do it this time that we get some notion of why certain
projects undertaken more than the general, uh,
descriptions, uh, being given,
why are certain people interviewed or what do you hope to get,
uh, out of those interviews?
What kind of problems are involved in the interview process itself?
That is what scientific problems are you, are you analyzing how,
why do you choose a particular person, uh, to get an answer to, uh,
to this, uh, problem?
Because what happens is that, uh,
we just give bear descriptions, uh, of programs which could be,
which really could be gotten from, uh,
generally in a, in a different way, but each of us could inform,
uh,
each other on particular problems of working in that history of science and
technology in a unique way. And,
uh,
so I find this kind of procedure of curiously unexciting,
uh, intellectually speech.
1: I think your point's well made. Saul and I,
I think one of the things I would hope in the remaining half hour we could
address ourselves too is the number one problem.
We have the national library of medicine and that is selection why you picked
particular people who helps you make this decision. In our instance,
it's almost embarrassing to admit the waste and I would like other people to
address themselves as to,
do you have a panel of quote peers in the field of science or technology or in
point of fact,
is it an administrative decision because the man who controls the purse strings,
I want you to talk to a, B, and C.
9: yes,
I should like to submit that to the
consideration that the overwhelming impression I'm left with is the creation of
records.
Certainly adopter Denison's a Hutch on the creation of selectivity of these
memoirs. I just like to submit that as a preservation
of these records has hardly been touched.
The repository problems,
the problems of letting these records be known to other scholars,
not only those who are immediately in the and
6: related to this specific historical problem. At hand. So
I would just like to say that there is a lot of work to be done on the library,
oral history aspects of this new field.
Uh, and uh, there's very little known about it. Then very little
Caesar.
I like to add something that might be useful and helpful.
Now in connection with one thing that I detected,
um, it sounded to me as that in connection with, uh,
the polio vaccine problem, there's a lot of work going on and,
and some kind of coordination for the utility of the whole project might be
valued. That JLS is patients.
What's what we agreed to with the Kennedy P. uh,
I've got a student who's working on the Keith power fail and
one of the big questions about that is what did the white house do when the
chips were down?
He found out that the Kennedy people
not being expert in this particular field hasn't done any interviewing in this
tall.
So now we've got an agreement with respect to this particular point with John
Stewart and Larry Hackman.
Ultimately when this student gets adequately trained in the record that they
will use their prestige to get him interviews on this point with the very hard
to NAB folks like Meyer and Feldman.
And then we will both have the face and then maybe I can help them get an
interview at this secondary level with a man.
I happened to know whose letters from them have led to nothing back,
no reply.
So their thing of this soar that can be done when there are crisscrossing the
area of interest to help both sides and save time and maybe not overworked the
uh, the people who need the interview.
1: No, I think it's a good point. I think you have a line of people right here,
for instance,
with similar interests and I think it's encouraged to see them sitting side by
side.
6: A situation that you talk about, uh,
uh, assertions made in that series of articles in the new Yorker,
which have been published, which were highly critical.
The actions of the administration in regards to that bill. Right?
So the Harris who, who came out later with a book, I read the series warden,
right? Sure. The point is, you see,
he was privy to the Keefauver private, uh,
inside office stuff, but he wasn't privy to the white house.
And so we have that kind of insight information and the student can look at hew
in FDA records as he's done. But the point is,
what we really need is the inside of the white house point of view,
why they took position.
That looks a little bit strange because they stand apart and look at it.
So you don't think so it wasn't strange. Well, I have an interpretation of,
well, at any rate,
this seems to be from the point of view of information where the lack is that
Harris Harris in his articles as I remember it and floods that he had more than
that. He pulled the store to get this. He candidly, uh, had interviews.
I'd have judge [inaudible]. I think that is true, is to say, well,
I, I'm, I'm a little fuzzy each though.
He was a little vaguer about that and he was being inside the he her office
right through the whole crux of the period
libraries. And please do what you introduce yourself. The group is custard.
5: I'm fairly invested the library of Congress,
editor of the national union catalog and manuscript collections.
And I'm more than a year ago,
the oral history association asked if its materials could not be included in the
national union catalog with managed care. And as you probably know,
James Comey and uh,
David Larson and I have been discussing this problem on year and uh,
my catalog is administered by the library of Congress and the two advisory
committees and my committee as Erica
said that we must keep our program to manage.
So we have worked out some
policies that I think will be suitable for transcripts of oral history material
and um, in your kits or at least on the table as you registered their heads.
There are report of this committees that
will be discussed in the meeting on Monday morning.
And then as far as I'm concerned of your report and think examples there
together will be very satisfactory for our catalogs. Um,
there,
there will be some problems and it just how you will report perhaps because you
are not used to the method of recording
manuscripts term. Uh,
I mean by those that letter virus your animals mean so far as interviews you may
have some problems but just as Australia and I are here doing this whole
conference to help you on any problems, you may have any exactly recording,
but I want to just pick two. That sense.
You were talking about some of the sizing material that this will be one way
that you can get them the work that you have done in interviewing and have
transcribed it on paper before the research people in the country because we've
published our catalog and um,
and it's available in your local library so that the time and if you have more
than one client has interviewed the same person, um,
and that them and both description did appear in the catalog,
the names will be indexed so that the researchers can find it more than one
material. One math person.
1: Questions, comments. Some years ago I contacted the, uh,
welcome museum and ask if they in their,
a bibliography of historical material would include, uh, tapes of, uh,
had the relation to history of science and they said that the history of science
and medicine and it said they would, I don't, I'd have to follow that up,
but that is another source you're referring to the current current publications
or current works in the history of medicine that uh,
2: yeah.
How about the national library of medicine is they finally cleared your case?
I mean not the case.
1: Uh, we really haven't talked about that, Harvey, quite honestly.
I'm not sure whether John would, uh, sort of,
I don't think it's an excellent suggestion.
2: They wouldn't be [inaudible] please do.
In years past I have looked at, uh, examples of, uh,
transcripts or industries and then just like other large texts one might get.
And so it's not a unique problem. It does.
It seems to me that without having looked at various solutions that it's up to
the, uh, one of the reasons why the costs are so high is that,
uh, naturally people approach it in the,
as other conventional index and problem and naturally they're shorthanded and
have limited money.
So if this becomes a very expensive problem for them to index as want to index a
book with large order things are,
and um, I would say that if you're dealing with a transcript,
there are possibilities now, uh,
of using the computer to do some kind of automatic indexing of procedure,
which is very, very cheap. In a second, I'm sort of into,
there is some sort of a facility available computing facility.
I don't know about indexing, uh, the tape itself, that's a problem.
But I think that if want to
6: do something that moves in the long run gets you out of using high priced
personnel.
And a lot of the sources of the thing to do is to examine the automatic index
and techniques which run in this way. Essentially you see, for example,
one of them receives, as I'm aware, as you see the entire body of the document,
uh, into, uh, let's say if I take a tape and magnetic tape and uh,
it's punched in,
typed in and actually turns out that the sound formed or what I was
flabbergasted as to how relevant the is and then feed it into the machine,
which has an indexing program,
which constructs it to index all turns that are,
let us say now or something like that.
Set it up there exclusions and you will get an enormous index,
very detailed.
And the it does not have a see also a structure which you may or may not want,
but it turns out to be an extremely useful thing.
I know there are examples of such things in existence.
I think that's the way to go at uh,
what do you mean about putting it on literally the entire text?
The entire text is placed on tape. Literally the entire,
it just means somebody has to type it over this and it's very cheap.
What you do is if you set up your typing as you type the original manuscript,
you have it,
you have a much out of paper tape record or something else like that and it
can't were different.
They're all sorts of bearings have to know about this particular general
procedure and it is possible to get a machine index,
which is extremely conservative and in the long run,
once you get it set up as much as you for them using a relatively skilled in
that sense, which is what you really need. Yes.
Are you saying that the present time we don't have the means of going from audio
tape to a computer tape? I said I didn't know. I didn't know. I, I,
uh, I didn't say anything. [inaudible] Oh,
I thought you were, I'm sorry.
What I'm trying to say is that I believe probably the technology,
7: the technology of yawning from audio tape to computer tape has been solved.
And certainly the question of programming a, of a program to, uh,
to, as you say,
see catchwords and mrs Huster as it will bear me out,
cause I will turned to her, uh, at least I'm certainly in the late fifties now,
certainly gets hit by 1958.
We had a program in existence which was used to,
what is the term used, uh,
the technical term for indexing while the catch words in the Bible keyword
index? No, no, no. The technical term concordance [inaudible] has a program.
Of course, this problem existed in Rembrandt in 1958. It exists. Uh,
and uh, this was not for taking the sound,
but wording it is not procedure for that,
but I suggest that possibly needs be might even exist.
But if you have a transcript transcription,
which is what most of these people are talking about, it's very easy to do.
But I'm suggesting working from your original tape or working for me edited
tape, but as I'm suggesting going from audio tape to mag tape,
how to run sound ready? What are you, what are you trying to do?
I like, we have a, we have a question of converting.
1: Yeah. [inaudible]
7: well, you know,
we'd have a technical problem of converting somehow voice to a binary binary
code or the information and going from audio to computer say on yet,
I don't know anyone.
1: Well, may, may I as moderator say that this is a very interesting discussion,
but perhaps there's some more directly program oriented questions here. Uh,
you know, no, I don't mean
8: we thought in all our glory,
the Thermo colleges could come out as a pioneer.
We put in a proposal from humanities foundation over two years ago.
We had a computer programming thing. We figured out we could,
we have a computer on our campuses, but go handle us.
We propose that we become a center for the United States. For Earl Hinton,
his print manuscript, and that anyone, any, uh,
researcher could, uh, uh,
write into us and had a feed and we could get, uh, the interview. He,
the, uh, title number of pages, the status of the interview,
I think 80.
He were into this program at rather fantastically won't cough.
We had it all, all written out. I can send you the topic,
send me it got turned out, send me.
I just don't get it. You know,
I realized I was very frustrated because it seems to me this is the answer.
If a fellow is getting a doctorate, you just can't afford,
overlook oral history. If it's an engineer, you know,
18th century something or other. And even then you can't.
1: In other words,
this was a proposal for a computer store of what is available in oral history.
He's
8: the, uh, fender, a computer storage center
of all the good things, oral history management. So this would be managed,
but for my [inaudible] would not, uh, go into the uh,
stove not transcribe, uh,
where any man could write in either by name topic and you name it, uh,
and say, and we would get a printout for him saying, this is,
uh, where, where are you go to say this poor soul.
I'm a writing every garner on history program in the country.
Do you have something on this? Then in addition,
what our proposal was at each institution, you know,
like Columbia and tau and the bigger one would have an institutional memory
within been this. And we would provide them with a total, you know,
print out of what, what's going and this would be a bank,
a computer bank. I feel in the long run, this is the answer, maybe I'm wrong,
this is this lady made, you know, have better answers to that.
But we couldn't get into first base. Of course,
money was disliked that at that point.
And I feel highly frustrated about,
cause I think we had a really good thing going. We had it all worked out,
we worked, we have an extra expert that I'd graduate school.
We have an excellent computer on our campuses and big enough to cope with this.
And uh, you know,
maybe they're on history association to undertake this and be this organization.
Maybe you should,
you should do this and maybe you can tell where to go to get the finding this
target.
1: Well there've been a lot of murmurs I know in the association about some sort of
a central, uh, this thing. But this, no,
well that's right. It's much more flexible
8: so that it would be self sustaining once it was started because each,
each program wouldn't be willing to pay in a,
just a basic amount in order to get all I have that information.
And this would be nationally and even perhaps international.
So that is the how far,
1: you haven't tried to submit this to an either.
8: I can try. We've been told even try again out there.
I'm on the committee now, so go ahead and
[inaudible] I don't have any idea how they'd react,
but I certainly wouldn't know what the library of resources council via a good
place to try this began
[inaudible] I meant the humanities was this, this was a tool.
I mean it was not an, you know, you follow the pitch.
Okay. [inaudible] study.
We call it core or cork or something. You mean most of the time of this,
the Claremont oral history research center or something. But what would our,
our goal was to have one plot or everything was fed in and you could,
and I, and I reached her. She could write and say,
what do you know about Hiram Johnson? Or what do you have on,
uh, the ex parents sex pay? I'm just thinking of things we know about it.
And then this printout wouldn't come out and he would pay, say for the printout.
And this felt like I said, okay, I got to go to Wayne state. I gotta go here.
I gotta yeah,
I'll do that instead of this parcel writing a hundred different programs.
Maybe you know,
6: he can't afford to overlook something, but he can.
Well, here's a thought for bass and him,
7: I think it's a very uh, pertinent.
6: We went all the way down the line of that. We really haven't an Merced out.
I have a great proposal. Can we get a copy? I don't have a with me.
I have someone from the Mayo. I certainly will.
7: Any other questions or comments? Yes.
Where are you going to put the sheet of paper and where we want to write our
names?
6: Oh, uh, I have a ninth tablet here,
just like to put your name up. Good.
[inaudible] love any moral support or otherwise
we happen to be in the fortunate position of having some expertise right,
right there in the graduate school. Really good expertise.
So we had a programming if something that seem feasible and I worked out and up
in the fire interview and got a fantastic number of keywords where I think,
you know, someone could really, really find what they were looking for,
political literary, anything.
So I really think there's a way to go, but I could see,
I, I you people in the more tech I take it, most people here are,
are specifically science oriented or this kind of thing.
You probably could work out your own bike, maybe would help you. Um, we're,
we're pretty general.
7: Well that's the Joel problem. Each specialty,
are they going to go off on their own little [inaudible]
6: with the two comments over here about this isn't a satisfactory experience
because the
selection of people and uh, handling and repositories,
this is the perennial for all this brief question. This isn't commerce. So this,
this is the one that comes up every time. I think no matter what is revealing.
I have always noticed that reference librarians very patiently sit by and
someone specifically asked them to show their,
7: try to stay to show their abilities.
And so I invite mrs Custer to come further on these problems,
which have I suspect long been solved on indexing, etc.
6: Well,
the first place I think has a very good idea.
I was reluctant really to it to accept our own ms chain transcripts into a Hank
catalog that was part manuscripts collection.
0: Mmm.
6: I was told that the association didn't
5: and get had the meetings or wanting to push money through something that's your
idea of which would lean forward individual interviews and indexed to them.
So I really in agreement with you that I think people do need something that
will give you every interview.
He and [inaudible] are working on it so that that is done through my catalog and
it's really not the whole picture for you I think. But yeah,
but it is something that is now in progress and is as well a satisfy a certain,
to a certain degree, the material that you collect.
As far as indexing goes, we, uh, in my program and in our publication,
we still do a manual indexing in death.
I'm not about to go into a, uh,
automatic equipment because I don't believe that it's been worked out.
[inaudible] but really, um,
balance is what you get out of it that you can use on campus to do manually
anyway. I don't know. Does that answer all right.
2: No. Although one, supposing one wanted, uh,
take up a reference librarian to serve as a consultant,
presumably as a volunteer or at very low professional fees.
How would one go about giving me one location in this country where just one
light to get the name? Uh, that is a roster of uh,
what shall I call it, those doing freelance, uh, professional,
those doing freelance consulting. As long as reference librarians,
where's one get the roster non pattern. Well,
start at any level, any financial level.
You can start with the level of, I should say,
is there a national association of reference librarians?
Is that the space to start and ask them for their roster? Our attendance,
9: you get a name and [inaudible] CRL.
Mr. Ross Warren may have a letter a, the literature,
one oral history regarding science and for historians and in general is not as
abundant as it is with manuscripts.
I should like to recommend an issue of ISIS published sometime in the 50s,
early sixties.
In 1960 the completed show ISIS was devoted to manuscript collections and
science.
I think that many of the problems which we are considering such as indexing of
oral history tapes and transcripts have something in common with manuscript
collections.
Can every part is fondant in eight sizeable manuscript collection be brought
out, Ken,
every name in an oral history interview would be brought out there or should
they, it's dr Ron [inaudible]. Um, yeah, a repository.
Both of the tape and the transcript and the
gentleman's papers.
Would there not be a lot of redundancy if these names are brought out?
Well, as I said, the information regarding oral history,
it hasn't perhaps been written yet,
but there is a lot of literature as it relates to a manuscript collections and
we've made it get some ideas that are pertinent. One that
7: if I may comment again,
we are briefly briefly one minute resonates with a typical problem with
communication and cross disciplines.
I am addressing myself to the problem of how do we get the services efficiently?
OB professional reference librarian, namely,
I asked these specific question,
how do I get a roster of reference librarians from this roster?
We throw seeds to seek someone who will give us professional advice.
They may or may not be able to go to the answer but they can guide us.
That's one discipline. And remember we do now have a big,
as far as I'm concerned that say this with all towards reality,
the problem of communicating across this lens because I got the feeling that I
had asked you that I had said the wrong thing when I had,
when you were commenting upon what I thought I had said
5: it's a problem. Try the American leverage.
7: I was just going to say the uh, membership roles of [inaudible] start quick.
9: Yes.
5: Yeah, I drafted right please questions used to wash.
I probably will try and inject visual minimal identification and I have the
feeling that oral materials have those same problems in the sense that we are
index for our specialized interests
in an oral history thing. There is that whole visit list,
Erickson's Linetix social behavior and autonomic could be indexed for if there
were issues on trained in mixers. Uh,
I think we need to work out a system that's broader than our specialty for any
non book materials in there. Gentlemen, does this sound,
9: yeah, I think it's not as large global course.
Now we're getting into the cataloguing and a subject headings.
Some of these library associated problems.
[inaudible]
5: yes. Which, um, my only question is,
do you feel as much a problem in that area as associating all his dreams very
close when he signed
the papers and wrote the document
0: should be made available.
Thank you all very much.
[inaudible] [inaudible]
[inaudible] I'm sure you've got enough.
[inaudible] [inaudible] well, I see the tape recorder has
10: been turning in order not to keep it waiting,
we may have [inaudible] well starts putting something on the real so the
transcribers won't have to wait half a day to come to a voice.
Uh, I thought, uh,
we start as a panel if perhaps this should be a kind of thinking out loud about
anything that's on your mind and a
habit daily, loosely structured, so to speak.
Uh, I can again,
with a few general comments on oral history problems.
Is that what the program said? We've been talking about the problem,
basic problems, basic problem.
That immediately reminded us of money and we don't want to spend the whole time
talking about money. It's not supposed to. We leave that aside for a moment.
The next course can be advanced problems and [inaudible] next year,
uh, the easy division,
I think Joel Crow for his pointed this out in a Google article about oral
history.
He wrote in the American historical association newsletter a couple of years ago
about the Dallas project
is it seems to be the AU or oral history.
It can be divided into biographical or special project approaches.
I think in recent years there has been more and more interest in special
projects such as those we heard about this morning.
I would like to put in a small pitch. However,
for the biographical approach, I don't think that they're mutually exclusive.
I think they ought to go on at the same time if possible.
And certainly the day the biographical should not be overlooked in our fever of
enthusiasm for special projects, whether they have McCarthy projects,
Indian projects or black studies projects or any of the other wonderful ones
that are underway. Uh,
one reason I feel this way is that you get a lot more cooperation from a person.
Maybe he's talking about himself than you do if you're asking him what he had to
do with the McCarthy campaign,
probably unless he was so involved in that.
But his whole life experience went into it,
which I'm sure is the case in some instances. But, uh,
another reason is that point that was made earlier also is that one needs to
know the style of the person in order to evaluate or what did he,
what he's given you.
And nothing does that better than a biographical project.
So I hope that some of our enterprises around the country will give some thought
and attention to the possibility of doing major biographical projects with some
of the major people living in their areas.
Sometimes we're asked how we function at Columbia.
And I think the easiest way to explain it is sort of like a trade publisher.
How's on the one hand, a series of special projects,
Harper's new American nation series we'll say. And on the other hand,
he's got his eye out for opportunities. He's an opportunist.
He's ready to sweep in and catch Douglas MacArthur,
but he's going to write his memoirs if he can.
He's also looking for things that come in over the transom, so to speak. Uh,
and we have quite a few suggestions come to it coming to us over the trance.
And then some of them are excellent. Some of them,
like the 90 scripts that come in over the transcripts over the transom is up.
Publishers are best forgotten about, uh, all of the same.
This dual approach, I think has some merit.
Uh,
I'm going to ask each of mine and colleagues as ina Douglas from [inaudible] on
graduate school on, I'm like Alice Hopland,
Pennsylvania state university.
I have to comment on their projects and any thoughts that these random remarks
might've stimulated before we throw it open to
all the rest of you. All right.
We are again represent the park Korea approach. We,
our project was 62
emphasis or dry
11: stuff. Douglas a Daron is no longer with us, a very well known historian.
And the fact that we had coming to our faculty,
a man named John living who was a doctoral student of Alan Nevin.
So we had mr Nevin kind advice and help after he was teaching at our institution
last year. Uh,
we are part of the history department. It was Claremont graduate school.
We put our final products into our joint library serving the six colleges and
several affiliated institutions in Claremont.
We have been dependent on donations or private institutions were not budgeted
either through the library or through the history department.
The initial impetus was given to some generous donations by board members and
then a few other interested parties.
We then come into the fortunate a category of special projects by virtue of a
lovely grant from the Luce foundation. That so happens that Henry Luce,
his parents were trying to missionary and Claremont has a large,
very large group of retired missionaries,
many of whom served in China. So we are trying to
interview these people. We're fighting time. We lost two people,
but luckily we had interviewed him. Um,
we're trying to do the interdisciplinary in nature where when you, uh,
in all of our interviewing we use faculty members as much as possible.
I do some interview in particular regional history, but uh,
ours are more focused interviews. They're not just general biographical.
Once we first start with the nature of a person's lack of,
we're tending to focus in on one thing. Uh,
this has been an interesting experience because we felt it had a social
anthropologist to Asian studies specialist,
social psychologist and uh,
an anthropologist education sitting in with us.
And we've gone over some interviews and I've got some new insights into the
whole business of the, Oh, we also have a professor of English, ah,
who has used this technique and his book, his example of sitting upstairs,
it's called American Paris. So the ex Patriot Perez,
very interesting book.
He uses this technique and his research and writing everybody from Henry Miller
to Virgil Thompson. And he sat there and looked at this manuscript and says,
my God, there's a novel in this thing. And the anthropologist says, my Lord,
look what happened to this woman. She went to her.
So nothing happened to her.
She was a fundamentalist and she didn't know people were massacres were
happening and everything was happening.
She was told me and change burn environment.
What we're trying to find out is what was the impact of Western civilization as
symbolized by the missionary movement or Christian movement, uh,
on a highly civilized the country in terms of the emergence of modern China.
So this is, uh,
the nice thing about special projects as you often have money in order to do
them. Uh, we also have, uh, done the history of the Bolsa Chica gun club,
which is, uh,
so far this is a monograph would hope to make it into a book.
This is a very well known highly elite gun club on the Pacific coast and which
Henry honey cookbook.
I remember many multimillionaires were members and then they had the misfortune
of discovering oil on the land. And uh,
so this is a fabulous story and it's really quite fascinating and I was as much
a part of the history of our area. Uh, we started on another project on uh,
Polish Jews who escaped the persecution for it.
So those are the three only three things we've really been terribly specialized
in. Other than that, I would say we're target of opportunity people.
We have contacts through our board,
members of our various colleges within the greater well within Southern
California with prominent people.
We are trying to do the institutional history of our colleges.
We have the problem with original real group plan of colleges in the United
States, a certain called federalism, but it can be called an R D
it's an Oxford type idea. And it's new enough that we can,
we can recall we're getting people,
we're getting the real story and who was the stinker when in town,
where and who still is. And this is I think,
terrific because there was a really good book on the history of our institution
eventually in otherwise it's faculty research their interests,
uh, graduate students,
doctoral students or so this is the way we do business.
We're very lucky cause I think we have excellent expertise and what we do.
10: And uh, one point I'd like to make, uh,
we've been trying to think of what we could do that would be especially, uh,
in addition to trying to feel your questions and getting you to help,
help us answer some of the questions. Uh,
and it occurred to me that it would be much easier if we had complete confidence
that everybody had read all three proceedings of the previous meetings of this
organization. Because we, for one thing I would like to deal with,
we're building on what we've done in the past and I'm not milling treading water
and doing the same sort of thing every year,
all over again and for another because I think there's really some informative
and helpful material in those proceedings. For example,
for these smaller institution that is considering whether oral history will fit
into its scheme of things. And it round referred to page 72,
I think it is of the third, uh, national colloquium and they want it in Lincoln,
Nebraska that knocks Mellon share where he got not only his own program,
several other smaller programs, uh,
persons connected with him to describe the background and the absolute making
potatoes of how they got going or where the money came from,
how they had the man power comes from. And I think that's a,
that's highly useful material for those of you who are wondering about how do
you get going and, uh, don't know where to turn.
Another thing that I think is useful, even defy, uh,
referring to something I wrote myself is financing oral history in the second
national colloquium, which I boil down a very discursive, uh,
attempting to address, uh, in, uh,
about three or four pages at the very back of that one.
And there are all sorts of other things in those proceedings.
The first one itself is quite a fascinating one when we just republish our oral
history at Arrowhead. So I commend
12: those to you and I hope that some of us can build on the information that we've
derived from preceding meetings.
What would you like to tell us about your project or about oral history in
Germany? Well,
we can see this as a show and tell operation for all of us to share their
various problems in our own shops. And so I'll just
limit my remarks to the why's and how's of the oral history project that can
state and contrast to in its project and also to Columbia's project.
Ours takes a very narrow approach and I think that this might be applicable to a
number of small places because as you are well aware,
the process of oral history is extremely expensive.
When we start to analyze the costs of this as we did in Nebraska,
we discover that the cost ranges from $3 and 50 cents a page to $9 a page to
produce a single page of transcribed copy and uh,
therefore, or a small project.
I think you need to maintain very close control over what you are collecting and
justify it. In terms of right now at Penn state,
we began with an archival collecting program in the department of labor study to
collect the archival records of various trade unions intensively.
And when we began to do this,
we discovered two things in the archives business.
As I'm sure you all are well aware, it's either feast or famine.
Um,
we started naturally in Pennsylvania by approaching the United steel workers in
America,
which has its home offices in Pittsburgh and has a very rich history and its
beginnings in the state. And uh,
you're dealing with the records of a 20th century institution,
which are just massive.
They're thick forest material and the steelworkers halfway for us,
they tried to give all of their archives and material to Penn state.
This means all of the records from the international office,
all of the records from altering the eight district offices and all of the
records from over a thousand locals.
So that
this meant that there had to be some guideposts or scholars into that mass of
material. Moreover,
and we discovered that the records of trade unions are massive in one thing.
So they're very sparse and another in that the minutes of meetings,
press releases and so forth. It's good.
It's very well pointed out this morning by Lea bull.
Don't really tell the story. You're also dealing with a group of people,
many of whom are unlikely to write memoir.
You're also dealing with an institution which by its very nature has many people
at lower levels who have played significant roles.
And so we felt that an oral history project,
even though it did involve this kind of expense,
would be worthwhile if we were very careful to limit ourselves,
not the recollect material which existed in abundance elsewhere in a printed
record.
And if we were very careful not to allow ourselves to collect pages after page
of an elderly gentleman's reminiscences about the good old days or the bad old
days is more typical of it, of youth with a trade unionist.
Um,
we began Ben with a grant from the United steel workers to supplement their
deposit of their archives.
And this has been important for a small project because it means that right at
our home institution we have the records available to us so that we can do
relatively good research.
The steel workers have been generous in, in, in,
in a number of respects. Not only have their time and their money,
but they also have been generous in the sense that they did not want to do this
project.
The reason that they approached the university was because they didn't want a
house organ type result.
They wanted to have the objectivity which they hoped could be provided by a
university doing the job.
So they have not put any restrictions on us at all in terms of who would we
interview, what questions we would ask or what we would do with the results.
There's a famous newspaper
remark about not doing it yourself
as far as our interviewers are concerned. Uh, like Claremont, we make, uh,
take advantage of faculty staff at the university,
professor of labor history and professors in industrial relations and economics
to do our interviews for us.
We have recently narrowed this project approach even finer so that you can,
you can see that we really believe that there is more value to be gotten for the
dollar and in being, in being focused.
And by that I don't mean to say that we don't do audit or biographical
interviews, we do, but, uh,
we also as a part of that go to a person with a particular distinct approach.
To give you an example of that,
we have a sub project going right now on the role that the general council has
played in the union.
There are three general councils to the United steel workers.
They're all fill living and we are going to them and focusing ourselves
specifically, you know, on the question,
what did you see as your role as general counsel to a union where you merely
giving advice? Where are you making policy?
Where are you deliberately expanding the entire body of labor law?
If so, how did you go about this?
And here we have a comparison between three gentlemen have very different style
with this respect. Uh,
another sub project which we have is on my melon smelter workers who have
recently become a part of the steelworkers and they have a very colorful history
that is very much tied up with the whole West, uh,
Western Federation of miners and the industrial workers of the world.
One thing we're going to try and I have my fingers crossed is a series of more
than one interview on this,
which I will get together with three or four of these people and do a joint
interview. I'll have to let you know next year how that works out.
But I can tell you one thing I'm sure of, it's going to be a problem
idea of multiple interviews.
10: Just before we throw it open to questions,
I would like to make one little point that you are in remark about a per page
expense suggests. I don't
think that big should be terrified by how expensive oral history is.
Seems to mean. If there's a,
well that has a way and you can pretty much a to pile up the cliches and cut
your clause [inaudible] circumstances. Uh,
a small historical society.
I can operate with volunteer interviewers as we have already ascertained more
than once and you don't have to transcribe [inaudible] way or you can use
volunteer transcribers. Why did they come along?
Columbia has been fortunate, uh,
from time to time when I see a volunteer interviewer of ours sitting right over
there, they adore Fred Cooper, uh,
in having people who are interested enough in helping us. So they,
they do marvelous work. Believe me, mr Cooper's interviews have been splendid.
Uh, so one shouldn't think of it.
Oh, just beyond our capability because we don't have the money.
If you've got people who have no imagination drive,
they'll help you for free sometimes. Uh, and uh,
you can make out,
I think people hear about Columbia and Cornell and Penn state and Claremont and
think that the vast something are poured into oral history by these
institutions. Uh, what did it work true? Ladies and gentlemen, they do not,
uh, uh, flooded us with money. Oh,
15% of our income comes from the university and the rest we have to raise
ourselves. And this is the case with many others, various
proportions of the Chi. Uh, but I do think it can be,
uh, a flexible thing.
I don't think we want to scare away people by telling them that oral history is
terribly expensive operation.
13: Uh, it should be entertained. Questions on, uh,
subject matter on technique,
financing? Uh, first of all, and suppose we try a
subject matter. Anybody got
ideas for oral history projects or pending ones if they want to talk about
around the table? Lily? Yeah,
it's a matter of joint interviews that Alice just brought up.
There's a strike to the familiar us because we have,
and considering this
particular aspect of your orchestration process and technique,
or we are going to try it for the first time. Uh, also,
uh, a little background in 1933,
a Navy general order established the fleet Marine force. This time,
the whole concept of what Marine operations should be changed from the sex
petitionary force concept to amphibious warfare.
And at this time, a, uh, a Chronicle, perhaps just a little bit earlier,
although, uh, began the study of the developmental vamp.
Every amphibious warfare doctrine, uh,
a disaster deliberately had, uh,
frozen in the minds of many military thinkers and tacticians, uh,
the idea that, uh,
such a type of operation was doomed to failure from experiment inception.
Anyway, a group of the best thinkers in the Marine Corps,
very brilliant young Marine officers,
let's put together the schools down there we'll put together,
were put to work to develop this a doctrine. Next few years they came up with a,
a, a concept which we use exceptionally as you know, in the Pacific. And they,
uh, world war II and it's still a basis for a Marine Corp
8: com today. Well,
we have in the Washington area a number of retired general officers who,
uh, uh, uh,
were involved with the development of this doctrine and, uh,
they have all been interviewed individually.
That's our hope and idea to get them around a table.
We haven't decided what is going to be a workable number. Uh,
how are we going to handle it?
10: Well, I think mrsK made a very telling point about that
yesterday, last night. Well this morning,
I can't remember any case. In discussing the McCarthy project,
she said there was this difficulty that a one personality would invariably
overshadow the other Q and a. This left two and a half.
The people in the room at least. Yes.
6: Uh,
I was doing the history of an organization and I got pulled because of the
organization together and then I just threw in a question and kept out of the
way and it was amazing. They agreed on nothing.
They said they might not have said it
10: [inaudible]
6: in arguing what had happened during that particular administration who had
started it and what had happened,
it was all about him and interviewing any one of them individually.
10: I suspect that the
advantages and disadvantages of this come out nicely balanced.
I can see where Mara would have difficulty because of this.
Christopher [inaudible].
I'm going off on tangents without being able to bring them back and on the other
hand I can see I like to stimulate one another. As you say,
bring out things that they never thought of a previous.
Well, doesn't that really depend on the group?
I was thinking that if you got three lawyers together,
I think the same thing what happens is getting four presidents together,
but possibly if you've got four miners together who weren't very verbal in one
turned out to be more verbal than the other, you get the situation described.
Bottom of McCarthy, uh, investigator, that one did dominate.
So it might be a matter of what group of three of four you were interviewing
FAFSA and topic about Victor's comparatively little data during which to base a
judgment or Gary,
just one comment you're quick.
Have you ever tried to transcribe one of these group interviews here?
It's a real problem. Control. It wouldn't be the problem identification.
You have two people that's not too bad, but if you got up to three,
it's a little bit rough and then more than that,
I know it can be a nightmare in our costume.
I ended up this, the research staff
6: at the end of the convention to get their reflections on their view of what went
on and I discovered that it was very difficult that you structure this sort of
thing. And so if you can structure it, for example, I have, I
2: took each person sitting that you were working with this committee, uh,
tell me about your committee and the rest of you. Wait, we'll come.
We'll make the circle. And after we'd gone through this sort of thing,
then they each had an opportunity to contribute any after fossils.
And we did this for about three hours a night and got some of the best material
that we got all summer. And it is difficult to transcribe.
13: You're multiplying these variables,
literally multiplying them every time you bring another person in.
Because Brown may be a how to stop such a reference for Smith that he's little
sir echo in his presence or on the other hand,
he may feel so down on Brown that everything he says is colored by the mere
presence of the man. And that how you don't know this
[inaudible]
2: well, if one of them says something in love, and over here it says, Oh,
I don't agree with that at all. The way I saw it was this and this.
Sometimes it's very helpful to arrest him to chip in. Yeah. As they saw it.
I think you may get a little closer to something like what happened.
I think the important thing here would be the focus.
I was doing a work on the organization of the American Academy of psychoanalysis
and I got the founding fathers to sit down together.
The topic wasn't how did this organization get started with that topic?
They did go around and have this interaction.
I think the important thing there wouldn't be the setting up of an initial
question then leaving the group themselves but
not quite in the same vein, but I fought.
I'd get her up and make it very short in the subject field.
Of course you've got the research problem,
the documentation and I just wanted to let everybody know that we have I think
more tonnage of documentation if nothing else in the air and space field than
any organization I know of a fair share has organized.
I brought a few sheets here that those who are interested in interviewing in the
air and space field are always welcome to take water and contact us if we can be
of assistance. I can't do all your research for you.
We can point the way that doesn't take too much and you want specifics,
pack it down. We'd be very pleased to have people come in.
We've got copy equipment. You can use yourself.
Tom over the happy to help.
11: I'd like to speak to this question and look at both sides of the car and because
we very often have used both techniques, if you're looking at our bibliography,
you see we'll have,
we've had multiple interviewers take an Upton Sinclair,
nobody intimidated Upton Claire. So no problem.
And uh, we had a professor of English, we had a professor,
a political class,
we had a doctoral student in California quantics and we had our head librarians
and they all sat around for three different sessions.
And this was tremendous because these were the facets of his life.
And here's a case now everybody says, Oh, this is the book. You know,
you don't have more than one on one.
I think it's a very much a decision you make about the situation.
I have recently done another interview in which, uh,
I went around for a long pretty well to run the machine.
We had a man who has had a continuing relationship with our whole college
development there.
We were interviewing a man who was instrumental in the founding one of our
colleges. He is elderly, very sharp and alert,
but the other person served to give him his specific,
the continuity also said things he would never have said otherwise.
So out of this we got two great interviews really.
We got things that I was the one man we've never gotten otherwise.
And out of the other man he, he,
we put some steel in his back phone before we went into the look.
We don't want to go off his story. We want, you know, what,
what really happened. And so I think that this is a very,
very individual kind of decision and I wouldn't be scared of it at all.
I think if you got the right person at the right time and you feel it's right,
do it. I don't, I don't think there was a general
12: I w I would like to underscore what Enid has said.
It's all benefit and talk to us about the importance of preparing for interviews
and I agree completely that the better prepared you are,
the better interview you're going to get.
But I would like to add that it's been our experience that you also have to
study the subject,
the interview as well as the area of his knowledge in a more traditional and
intellectual fashion.
And by that I mean studying him as a person and the kind of environment and the
kind of thing that he's going to respond to.
And we try wherever we can to match an interviewer with an interviewee who is
going to where there's going to be in rapport and where they're going to be able
to talk to each other and situations.
Some people are much better interviewed in their homes,
other people are in much better interviewed in an office situation or removed
from their office situation.
And rather than take a kind of a subtle approach to this,
what we've started to do is to have an initial kind of intake interview with the
person in which we ask them directly all of these questions we ask them,
you know, where would they feel most comfortable about conducting the interview?
Would they like to have a resource person from their own staff there?
And incidentally,
that has often worked very well where you're interviewing a person who has had
leadership responsibility and he may want to bring someone in.
You're going to talk to him about the civil rights activities as a union,
for example. And he has been the officer who was responsible, but nevertheless,
he may have someone on his death whom he would like to have presence.
And this has proved to, in the several instances where we've done this
2: very richly rewarding in terms of a product
that was understanding.
I'm reminded of your emphasizing read importance of flexibility and location
though
subarea Subar interview EAs who have requested that they come in to Columbia to
pick interview because they don't want to do it at home with their wives.
0: [inaudible],
2: maybe it's a little lobbyist on that vendor view,
but a procedure we follow that we have a captive audience leave,
interviewed each individual and then interviewed them.
Can you generalize about the quality of the results? Uh,
we,
we did get some things out of the group interview that we didn't get out of the
individual interviews because like someone would
bring up a collection. Uh, again,
not getting into people leave for people in our case, military of equal right.
It doesn't require them to be done otherwise.
The camera talks from the captain lift. Uh, they can't, they won't know.
It wasn't quite that way. When I was there.
We were talking about three different period of time and the same position and
they did bring up
a very small matter in transcription, uh, multiple conferences,
multiple interviews, a technique which is work. Uh, the facilitator,
the voice. I got the patient take the sound,
sound effects off noises and the player during the interview when people are
talking or at least when they have the short cause and it helps the transcriber
identify the voice. If you have a prearranged code. Is it true to the code?
Why when this works especially well is when people are talking together and you
can tell the transcriber which two people are talking and she can often figure
out knowing who they are, what is more likely that say,
and this helps them,
but it's still a much more difficult Proctor solution to that. Our program,
we don't have enough money so I get to do it and I know who's talking
0: because you were there
[inaudible] I didn't catch the smell. What, what function
2: do you know the kinds that go, you know,
clung and then another that goes [inaudible] and then when the guys talking or
they show us boys,
you can throw that in on your own mind and it facilitates the person who's
transcribing will know that the code for that boy.
0: So you've got a little bell here. Well actually you have a lot of bells
[inaudible] process of transcription.
2: It's going to become a parent that you're going to have no difficulty
distinguishing with some boy Burnett's temple office,
0: salvation army for,
2: well that one works.
It works fast actually. As I said, when people are costing simultaneous,
both caulking, which who they are and this is
because everybody's gone.
Has anybody thought about using a stereo machine where you could use the second
track and he just taught her a and yeah,
well it's becoming less and less. Why are you sending these things?
Keep going down and contrast everything else which are cheap as long as you have
something as a beef that indicates they both start the secretary [inaudible]
14: I should like to uh, ask, uh,
just what attention is paid to the preparation of the interviewer in eh,
in digging into the gold mine of the one whom he is going to interview.
Uh,
after I graduated from professor Star's office,
first being interviewed and then you're recording.
I had to draw upon my experience of years as, as uh, in trial work.
You know, you have two kinds of lawyers.
There are some with a great inspiration and make great speeches in the
courtroom. And the other,
Apollo is a very modest kind of fellow who uses perspiration and prepares for
trial. The problem, Mesa good speech and the other funnel wins the case.
2: Now when you prepare for trial,
you will know immediately that either your client and the [inaudible], what
14: they bring to you,
mistaken ideas of what's important.
And it's a tough job to dig from them.
Some of the very important facts that they have hidden inside.
And so if a man, a woman has hit a limb to his story
down lead you, if you work and prepare,
you may find some of these nuggets. But if you just go at them,
they may tell you something very nice. Interesting.
That and the fancy recollections of all superficial things that you've had to
begin and get from them.
Some of the very deep facts of life that they have lived,
which really a history.
And I think that those who do recordings have a greater responsibility to
prepare it, to understand the person,
the see penetrate and find out if you can dig in from them.
Something that, that, that they don't mention you.
They mentioned Upton Sinclair.
It's so happy that I know one of his close,
close friends and every now and then this friend mentioned something about Upton
Sinclair, which uh,
maybe just embroidery with 4.0 biography and sometimes a very vital it Storic
FAC. And uh,
there would be room for a school for,
or a class for the development of the cross examiner if you please the,
the one who digs in to get the facts because it's so hard to learn the facts in,
in, in any workup life that we have. And that, uh,
they, I agree, I have a great respect for those who do your interviewing
11: or with some clerk. It wasn't a problem because he's terribly articulate man.
And uh, I'm sure it said the same thing me in times two. Uh,
but we felt that we had to have a person there who knew his novels that,
and so the question Rosemary [inaudible] very specifically like,
where did you get that experience and why did you think that and what did you
say to petty Roosevelt? And you know,
you just couldn't go walk in and not know an awful lot about him.
And to come out with anything that was different from what he's been just
saying. Generally.
13: I just asked a Soto chai, I was talking to her,
she never did any transcribing herself because we're going to have to find
somebody to transcribe this tape. I don't think we [inaudible] ourselves
[inaudible] to be quite an operation.
So I guess justice to the first place I should say that the person preceding me
was Mrs. Eaton Douglas preceding her.
It was mr Theodore Cooper. If anybody can remember who spoken before,
Mr. Cooper,
you might tell a tape so the transcriber can have that much of a clue.
Well, let's proceed. But let's identify ourselves.
I don't like to do it and slows things up, but I think it's better than the nod.
2: Uh, my name is Alan Jones that I would like to comment on. Uh, uh,
what the professor said here.
We had the fortunate experience of interviewing a physicist, uh,
an outstanding physicist of the 19th 20th and 30th in the forties and 50s and so
forth.
It was a problem to find anyone who could communicate in such a field as this is
an interviewer.
And therefore what we did first was to go and spend several hours with his wife
who told us certain things to ask him about. And then secondly,
we got two colleagues that had been at various universities with him over the
years to sit in and to ask him provoking questions about the field of the
development of physics and you get our physics, uh,
throughout his life so that they could really lead the discussion by provoking
questions to him.
And we were not really the interviewers at all because we did not,
not know enough about to do it.
10: That's interesting.
I think that's of course the great asset in special projects interviewing as
that your person as he grows along becomes well versed in the field you're going
to be begins, doesn't, you're an expert interviewer. Uh,
that's the Cooper's points have been made. Uh, not so eloquently.
Sarah and I literally hundreds of pages of transcripts of these meetings.
I think we've out of back and forth the importance of preparation and so on.
I know Crosby,
you come up against the hard reality that we do not often have the resources to
pay a person to prepare himself sufficiently. Uh,
doing these biographical projects, uh,
happened to be a little bit subversive just for a moment.
I think it depends very much on who you're interviewing,
where you have had people like Chester Bowles, I think isle or
publisher sir were interviewed by people who were innocent,
have much knowledge about them, but it didn't seem to make any difference.
These people were just what they wanted to say and they said I was in pages and,
uh,
I don't think the most [inaudible] farmed interviewer in the world would have
done anything more than perhaps correct,
correctly amount of you hear here and there,
that's their story. And they tell it their own way. And so, uh,
sometimes I lament that we don't have the people who are done all their
homework. And sometimes I think honestly,
it doesn't make such an awful lot of difference.
12: Yeah. I would like to add to what we said.
I don't mean to suggest that one ought not to be well prepared.
Uh, but I would like to make two comments about it.
Often when I do interviews, a person says, why do you want to talk to me?
What do you want me to say? Um,
and I think one of the most important things that you can do,
particularly if you are interviewing someone who is not, uh,
well versed in historical process or in the value of history,
is to spend enough time with him so that he understands why you're doing the
interview.
And this takes a certain amount of soul searching because, uh,
there are moments when I'm not quite sure why I'm doing it either.
10: But, um, so I, I think, I think that [inaudible] the
12: time spent with the person so that he understands exactly what is significant
and what would be regarded as significant about the events that he might be
describing is very important. The time.
And the other thing that I want to tell you is an atrocity story,
which has to do with the feeling that you must be prepared.
I am the only person I think, who has ever had John L.
Lewis agree to having a tape recorded interview.
And once I had that agreement with him, I panicked and I said,
you know, I'm called to be more prepared than I am.
And so I wrote to him and suggested that we put this off until the end of the
summer and I spent the summer getting myself more nearly prepared.
And in the meantime he lost his faculties and at the end of the summer was not
able to talk to anyone about this experiences.
And so I had blown up and certainly it's true that a person like that would have
clearly understood the significance of events in which he took to heart.
And really all I had to do was go and turn on the tape recorder if I had only
had enough smarts to know it.
And so I think if we all feel a tremendous time pressure because of the type of
people that very often we're interviewing. And um,
so I guess my motto is, you know,
I have done job is better than no job at all.
13: Right. I think that's very pregnant. And Dave,
when I think of our Eisenhower project, the principal, thank you, which
John, before our interview,
I couldn't quite screw up the courage to go back again to get him on some vital
white house years material.
So I think perhaps we can scare off our people if we overdo this preparation
does this. Uh, but the truth of it is
3: you don't have the money to prepare anyway.
So we have to try to make out as best we can,
13: uh, at Columbia,
certainly I'm afraid that's the reality we're up against except [inaudible]
12: John Hall. If you answer the question that allergists refer to,
what do you want to interview with me about? You're in danger.
You must because that's all you're going to get. Your,
your job is to get the other person
something and then keep jogging and you haven't felt what you get in addition to
what you thought you wanted when you started.
Then there's the typical horror story of someone apparently going off the
subject and perhaps the most Bible historical part of the interview and the long
range view when the other person says, I go, no, I don't want to hear about
3: [inaudible] cause that came up, I think [inaudible]
13: one of our in Allen Devon's appearance with the first colloquium,
he was reciting the, I think it was Dean Albertson,
who was interviewing someone and connection in the department of agriculture who
stumbled across
2: the name of Alger hiss since they, I can tell you something,
she got really take time to do that now.
0: No said Albertson. Let's get on with the business
because he was really uptight and well-prepared on his agriculture project.
2: Jack Mason, I like to
comment a little bit more.
So talk about good or bad all day one for Sandy and Jim,
you were interviewed, was assigned to that type of,
12: when I have a list of names of people that I want to go and see,
and some of them are people who have played a leadership role and some of them
are deliberately chosen kind of as surviving rank. And filers so that,
I guess it's the history has never written, you know,
they're going to have the last word because they lived the longest and are still
around. The talent's about the strike in 1919 and uh,
there was a built in bias. You know, we're going, we're,
we're not going to have the story as reminisced by those people who didn't have
the good fortune to live long enough to tell it to it.
But I do deliberately try to do some rank what I would call rank and file
interviews. And interestingly enough,
I've discovered in doing this that very often these people played considerable
role in the formation of events as they took place. They will say to you, well,
I went to Phil Murray and I suggested such and such and such and such.
Then when you do another interview and ask what was the origin of this idea,
you may find that indeed this is not just his attempt to tell the stories of
which he is the hero,
but he in fact is the originator of a particular approach.
And I would say that most of my interviews are people with people who have
played a leadership role,
but I deliberately attempt not to make it explicitly that [inaudible]
13: on the ground. The turnabout is fair play. I would like to ask Mr. Jack Mason,
who for 10 years was one of our crack interviewers,
if he would please tell us a little bit about the Naval Institute program,
which has been very modest about, you know,
we've heard about all sorts of programs and there is grinning like a Cheshire
cat in the back of the room and not saying anything now. How about that
something, by the way, you already know Carson first before I do,
let me say something, new allies and kind of, she
2: said about the advisability of having a member of the person's staff present
sometimes to the house with the interview,
but I was doing an interview under the ways he just one time where they,
a woman said, I'm standing. She insisted on having present,
not only her clip London and uniform her,
8: but also her private historian
5: [inaudible] sat back and the corner
8: and was constantly interrupted and trying to put me right at the obvious lady
was, was not in agreement,
in agreement with the direction in which my interview was going.
So it doesn't always work well at the Naval Institute has had begun the program
we began in April. Uh,
we have a certain number of the bread and butter, uh,
biographies. I'm your way. Uh, I didn't get the current time,
about 14 of them with Naval officers and some standing like we had the gun to
develop, uh, special projects as well.
I believe this area is a considerable interest. The uh,
Naval Institute is an educational house,
but it also publishes books.
And so I find myself going in this direction developing special projects and the
idea of how they book as the end result.
One we have on the way now is a book biography of Adam Nimitz.
When I first went to the Naval Institute,
I got busy on a project to interview as many people as possible who knew him in
a personal way.
The official record of course is voluminous and there's available to a BYOD,
but the personal aspects of the Atomos life, uh,
were not so available.
We've interviewed about 60 people, family and others,
and now have secured a man to write the biography.
I got the, uh,
the Admiral Nimitz his son off that center and got him to agree upon a
[inaudible]. Uh, the Naval Institute is under writing.
The whole thing is going to publish volume.
So this is one direction in which we're going.
I have another biography of this short and my, uh, for the near future.
Um, we have various other special programs.
We have one on the Institute itself, which was the first one.
I initiate it in order to get general support for my project there among the
officials present and celebrate our hundredth anniversary in 73.
So it shouldn't be useful in terms of the possible brochure or publication in
celebration of that event. I, from the personal point of view,
I'm very fond of the lady.
So I decided to have a project on the waves and I found this at developing into
a project which includes college presidents because so many of them were in this
capacity. Uh, and then there crash
2: projects or special interest.
These are very perplexing for me. I have one coming up in December,
an oceanography. I know very little about this subject. It's a new field.
As you know, we're having a symposium, not Naval Academy,
and within a period of four days we are having 11 of the outstanding,
sorry,
I think it's the end of the field from all over the world present to speak or to
act as chairman panels and what have you.
And I suddenly fall into my lot to see that all of them in our interview in a
private way is going to tax my resources first of all,
and at my interviewers as well.
So this is the direction in which we're going, but the state road cars,
it's still going to tell himself something. Biography.
13: Fascinating. Yes.
This is the first instance I know of a single institution marrying oral history
and a publishing operation at the same time. Right.
And one other [inaudible]
2: the fact that that um,
I don't think we have to worry too much about fun for this uh,
operation. Uh, somebody said to me yesterday,
well now what happens when, when, uh, my wife,
he was at Columbia,
I had hi are both interested in going to foundations for fun.
And I said, well that doesn't happen with us because we,
we do happen to be fortunate enough in this field. And uh,
so far I able to finance it. I operate without ain't giving budget.
13: I don't know whether I should advertise your room number or not,
but this is the way it is now. Thank you very much. Yeah.
2: So it's New York times. I'm in [inaudible]. I have a two part.
Is there a mean or a standard? The age interview is,
I don't need one who works full time at it,
but the part time casual that you might pick up as a immediate
like have any of the towel running to the respondent or the person being
interviewed. The interviewee who has requested me did we interview,
13: we didn't have haddock experience for people who wanted
to charge us for the privilege of going down the car there.
There's a time in the
[inaudible] we need to try to explain to them what a great honor isn't.
It hasn't been offered. Sometimes the offers withdrawn.
2: He doesn't go to the park.
13: You didn't want to speak to him.
2: Yeah. [inaudible]
no,
11: we've been fortunate enough that uh, part time interviewers
have no idea what you would take.
13: I seem to be the panelist that should answer your question.
May pay a beginning interviewers $15 per hour of tape,
which sounds quite lucrative, but when you get poured on the portal time,
lugging a taper of a quarter on the subway or in a taxi, uh,
it's not terribly generous if it is contract work,
that is, if you've got a grant for it,
it goes up to 25, uh,
for the experienced interviewer.
11: [inaudible] what if a person sees the state through from first stage to the
other end entity? That's the kind of thing that you pay more than [inaudible].
13: No, we are actually withhold part of the fee.
This is something that I don't think our interviewers love us for,
but we give them, uh, we put it this way,
but we have a stake in the completion of this. And so do you, uh,
we don't very many. Uh, I bought it. Not many, but there are, some are boarded,
uh, projects.
They just never get finished because it's one thing and another,
sometimes because the interviewer has been a lax and full of Manyana is let the
opportunity go by.
So this way we are withholding a half of his pay until the whole thing is
completed and he's done the editing job.
And it also emphasizes that editing the transcript is a half of the
interviewer's task. I don't know what they want can get,
we can get away with this much longer because sometimes we're holding $1,000 in
escrow in this fashion. And, and uh, still,
as I said, the only way to get the balance was that, Hey,
I did some cases in December. Your relationship, you get paid
0: [inaudible]
11: put in the pitch for institutional research because I was away with my husband
on a sporadic or my replacement said, now I know I have a permanent job,
but I know so much about this place that can't possibly this fast for me.
13: I was saying from this piece work re, uh, problems that it's,
that our salvation army began, we had staff
paid salaries and when they, uh, interviews fell, struggle is they often do,
appointments come along and more urgent things come up in men's lives,
women's lives like cancel their appointments.
And we ourselves paying salaries for no production.
This way we can gear our production to the amount of resources available,
which varies considerably from one year to the next.
I like to get back to something you were talking about earlier and that's the
preparation for the interviews and the uh, and, uh,
selection of interviewers. Uh,
it seems to me there's several aspects. First of all, if you've got famous men,
there's enough documentation,
so the preparation is not too great except where, uh,
you have in case you mentioned Chester Bowles, I would, I,
I don't know whether he was ever asked,
but why was he forced to run as a representative against Horace Seely Brown
instead of, uh, why was he euchred out of the, uh,
candidacy for a nomination for Senator by John Bailey?
I don't know whether this could have been dug down,
whether the interviewer might've known this or not. On the other hand,
it seems to me that for the project or program such as yours,
any of the bigger programs, the selection of interviewer, uh,
as based on his, uh,
knowledge ability and his own credentials in dealing with this subject.
And, uh, as he had indicated, the, uh, professor of English, uh, interviewing,
uh, Sinclair would have been, uh,
hopefully imminently qualified to do this.
I think the problem and uh,
and scheduling interviews and, uh,
preparing for them commons when you interview obscure but important men,
uh, and then this gets to another point. How do you select them?
How do you find out about these people?
For interviewing and actually I've got program,
I'm interviewing retired general officers and we have their biographies.
We know what they commanded, uh, we know why they pretty well why,
what was the basis for this selection promotion in general, officer,
right about the people retired as colonels who were very important as chiefs of
staff or as various members of a staff or I eman who we call a tombstone BG,
who, uh,
got a combat award and wound up as a Brigadier general how to retire.
But he must've done something but we don't know that much about him and there is
where I think the real problem with structuring interviews,
scheduling interviews and occurring for the entities exist. Local
14: man, man, just give, this is one method that I used,
sat down with the man and I said, you have lived history,
you must have some very interesting recollections.
I'd like to make a list of some of them.
Tell me about some of them and he started to give me a title one.
I'll tell me another one,
another one that we've picked out about 20 different things and then we got
talking about one or two I promise you pick out the nuggets and you say,
now tell me about this thing. And then he started look span. Then he said,
I remember about something else added to the list.
The first thing I knew I was filled with guidelines that this man had given to
me, some of which he had didn't realize with history we did, we just slept,
slept that aside. But he said,
I've got an anecdote for the any subject, you, any heading you want.
But I was fortunate in having a complete a,
I don't say complete because it isn't completely Deborah now and then he had
something to the list and I they put the things that I think are important from
that. Oh, if it's not easy,
I think your method of taking a number of people,
each one from a different viewpoint is another way of digging into the goldmine.
But that there is no Royal road to Rome and that you have to use them in rubbed.
You can,
11: I think one off way important thing when you're talking to someone who's not
terribly well known. You don't know. We found the hindsight,
the China missionaries tend to override their experience and you'll find
suddenly that, Oh yeah, it's in this drawer, here's the, it'll complete diary.
Or the this is, while these are great, we add this to our archives.
But on the other hand we realized we may be getting the whole thing ready told
on tape and we should have looked at that first.
Uh, before we started asking questions. And I think this is awkward important.
This kind of gets where we're doing a lot of people who held some early
Providence jobs, but they're just not, not famous people. Yeah.
I would like to say to that, but what I do is the following,
uh,
I ride to each perspective interviewee and I asked him for a Veda.
I asked him for the kind of thing which he might give if he was gonna speak to
the Carolina's club or summary of where he's been. Um,
then I also ask him to go through his file and look at his scrapbooks before I
come. And then when I get there,
I sit down with him and I look through these things and I make the same kind of
a list of places where he has been. And I,
um, one thing that puzzles me a little bit if that is the people that do one
interview with a person because um, I, I,
I can't imagine that you could be prepared with the kind of people that you're
talking about that are not so well known that there's all kinds of books and
material about them that you could be sufficiently prepared before you meet with
them to do one interview. And that's it. So as I say,
I also do kind of an intake interview and that leads me to another point.
We've emphasized very much the scale of the interviewer.
But it seems to me,
I like to talk about these people as oral authors because they have a skill to
which is at
12: least as essential to meaningful productivity as the skill of the interviewer.
There are some people who have participated in very significant events,
but they didn't know they were significant and they are not able to describe
them in such a fashion that they can communicate to anyone else.
The rationale or the significance of the event and these people I don't see very
much point in going back to,
13: that's a good point.
I think if you had a convention of interview ease and you would quickly get the
impression opposite of what our meetings give.
Of course we are important. Of course the interview is important,
but someone help us,
the person is supposed to be doing most of the talking was a little more
important. Deacon. Uh, I think that's,
that emphasizes the importance of the preliminary interview.
So you've got the theme of the man,
let him know what you're alike and where you want to be going,
working out together and do a little planning and uh, going through papers.
Incidentally,
this is another area where we frequently fall down simply because not only is
there not time for the interview or to devoted himself to helping his subject
sort out his papers, but the subject himself,
there's not much inclined to go to all this trouble. And that's too bad.
He hasn't sometimes that works out
satisfied early on that I'm sure it's been much better if he'd gone through his
papers and other times, uh, wholly on satisfactory performance.
It might've been rescued only we could have inspired him to do a little homework
himself, uh,
if not share the papers with him and the person that's going to do the
interview. All right. Once the subject. Yeah,
2: I wondered on this subject that way more Marketo, uh,
on group interviewing and songs. Uh,
has anyone here to talk with the NASA people? Uh, maybe,
maybe the term itself is dating,
but debriefing the astronauts after deployed. I would,
I would assume this new very large interview process now. Um,
is there something that they could contribute to us here on this
kind of go back? Well, all I know is that this does take place.
We have an association with NASA and are usually able to get these tapes for the
national air and space museum.
I don't think I'm qualified to talk as a direction I may have in the room.
Oh Jean had to go by.
But Jane would be the person to just go and Swift on him. You see,
we actually are the outlet for NASA for their artifacts.
We receive all the capsules,
everything associated with the spaceflight.
Now I haven't gotten anything in my under the operation so far that are
expecting these things, certain amount of this material,
while it wouldn't be called necessarily security classified as being treated to
a degree in that direction.
13: I think most of us and our own history are aware that this, uh,
when professor Devon's began at Columbia and he had much in mind the idea of,
uh, helping the library and using oral history as a lever,
pry the papers out of, uh, some of his
respondents. I didn't work very well.
I don't think we'd have the size in recent years nearly as much as we shoved
them. Uh,
I because of the library just overwhelmed with papers and now is going to have
to build a separate facility for special collections. But, uh,
it is a thing to remember about oral history.
Obviously all sorts of artifacts as well as papers can come out of interviews,
your dear years institution to this man
who but your institution with them taking all the trouble, uh,
to capture him on tape did give him this great opportunity to leave a Mark.
You know, I have one question
and this concerns the interview on the preparation
1: after the interview was over,
you've developed a very real impression of the interviewee and it seems to me
that at time your impression is valuable and that you should record that too.
I've had interviews where I've felt that I was really,
the man was evading my questions while if you read the paper or you hear the why
would you not sure of it and that I would like very much to record that.
But I'm bothered about the propriety of my recording it and then using it and I
am going to him and saying I want you to be honest with me.
And then I'm taking this information saying I think this guy was not honest.
And I think he's old, you know, and the way you get that,
you know the questions I asked you because I think one right now,
they want to know right away when I tell you a little bit of confidential
information. Well that's juicy, but he doesn't want anybody to know it.
And so one wonders,
what's the propriety of using this kind of information and making your own view?
13: Well, I think that's a good cross to me. I actually,
some of you may remember this was discussed at length that like I don't have the
proceedings, uh, again at Arden house,
but I think if IRA had to take it because almost every aspect of this was going
into, and uh, you're quite right. It does raise ethical problems.
I don't think we have resolved. We have done this
Columbia, which may interest you.
We've had the interviewer do a tape of his own experience and not in relation to
all of his particular interviews, but the ones he remembers,
uh, commented upon. And extranet,
we have obsessed to the city and he has agreed that it should be closed, uh,
for an indefinite period. So it's always there.
At least the laws perhaps,
or if someone looks at it and 21st century can decide cricket couldn't make it
available. Uh, it will be made available.
We won't be around to have to worry about the decision. Well,
one, one rather
11: specific reaction would be to go to Concord that this was that any historian
dealing with materials written or otherwise basis this problem is that her
diaries that are phone either are, uh,
things that have been quite that various ways and you would hope the manner in
which the transcript was put together had enough in the decorator,
the material in that, for instance, how old is this person?
What were they doing at the time, you know, are all kinds of little, uh,
in there, uh, that and the way the transcript is put on paper that can really,
uh, to the good researcher telling, uh, getting some way to evaluate it.
And then he has started to have to evaluate anything that,
whether it's a document or it isn't true.
8: Yeah, I'm glad. Just punch the written word is not the guy.
I think that's a myth.
11: They exist and that's,
I don't think oral history could be some terrible problem.
13: Right? Internal evidence says after all,
if people are using the material for the most part are sophisticated scholars
and do they read autobiography and taken us gospel?
Why should all instruments objected to all the
trepidation? I cried, agreed with that.
And I think our users to sustain this point, right?
11: No barriers. You can, you know,
you really think this person was in pretty bad shape by yet.
It can be implied in that. So
[inaudible] stricken finger. I would Fredericks you up the question.
2: I am a little confused with news.
I've been hearing about how important the interviewer is,
how much homework you have to do.
But at the same time I hear some people say you don't really need very much
preparation.
I heard someone say this morning about using students as your view urge.
Uh, what is the story? I a one man operation myself across.
I'd love to have some help. And you use students,
are they relented? Well they got responded to witness.
How important are the interviewers
that that back
on our interviews with a dog we used [inaudible] the rest of our people were
most of the faculty members and staff meeting.
And I discovered that in some instances the students were done a far better job
than them. The fact that it was worth what this turned out to be. I thought,
I still think it's a matter of individuals.
And what are their students fun or their faculty members report much depends on
the person. The only way you're going to find out about this is to trial.
It doesn't much depend upon the interview. We two
interviewees resent the young kid [inaudible] well these were not quite young
kids. Well I'm talking about using students because they were older students,
students and students. Undergrad
or graduate students or
13: uh, gun crime. I think, I think Howard [inaudible] goes, it depends.
Uh, I think in the case for instance of, uh, the project there, uh,
this constitutional convention was an entirely new thing.
And I think that the inquiring mind of a good student would bring out facets and
uh, that's uh,
and they're almost a naive Tay and lack of a deep academic knowledge about the
matter. Probably would clear up certain things that uh,
and bring out certain things which now they,
a faculty member or stodgy old time [inaudible] on the other hand and a highly
structured program or a tightly knit program. Well, my own program,
I don't think, Hey, uh, a,
someone who was not prepared and capable of interviewing a retired general
officer who hasn't got a background in military history or what have you to fill
the job. Fortunately,
we are very fortunate in the preparation of our interviews by the fact that I am
made privy to the, uh,
wild jackets or that the Marine Corps during the period of time,
most of these people kept a chronological listing of assignment day by day,
month by month additional duties.
And I make a copy of this and we prepare a proposed topical outline,
which is almost a chronological review of duty assignments of the individual
interview. And we said for your help as a guy,
and of course this will tick off certain things. And then boy,
we go off in all sorts of tangents, personalities, events, situations,
which I think fill out the, uh, this is the preparation. We don't prepare.
And I don't think that you can't get a good interview unless you prepare.
But I think something like this,
it's almost say journalism has journalistic overtones.
While it's still history.
12: One incident that occurs to me is that I was,
I've had an interviewee that was rather distinguished and so I asked a
distinguished professor of labor history to conduct the interview.
Now unfortunately, this interview,
he was not going to be pushed around and much to my pleasure and surprise when I
was listening to the tape after it came back, I heard the interview, he said,
my good sir, you know, an awful lot, but a lot that, you know, it was wrong.
13: I'm sure that the rest of us haven't has the experiences but overly qualified
the viewer? No, I think I run for administrative officer of our university.
It was also prominent with the state department before he came to us.
It was doing some interviewing
and one of his subjects is simply ride or rode rough shot over everything he
says. If he wasn't even in the room,
he knew what he wanted to say and it didn't really make an enormous amount of
difference or who the interviewer was just a pair of the ears was all he asked
for. Instead, he got a mouse thrown in every once in a while. And uh,
I guess what we're trying to say is that it varies.
The oral history have a nose is not an exact science and we are up against, uh,
the, uh, many sided,
uh, versatility of the human species and all of this. Yeah,
that's how I heard this discussion for over an hour.
I like to ask the very basic question,
what is the purpose of oral history and your comments just now? Uh,
it made me glad that I did ask because written history does have a certain
standards. What is good written history? What is good history? And, uh,
after many of these conflicting questions here,
I know some people are here for the first time.
I wonder if we could have some definitions. What PIs? Oral history. Sure.
Well,
I can only suggest that you read some of the propaganda I wrote for the Marshall
foundation because I go into the, uh, the origin of the term.
Uh,
and I suggested that it probably came from a Bowery bum named Joe Gould.
That's a misnomer.
It isn't aro it's the end product is written and it doesn't history.
And I think that therefore this misnomer has this led you to say,
well, a recognition is disciplined. Uh,
early history is undisciplined.
It's throwing material from which hope history one day help to write that
history and that gallons of material that would not otherwise exist because
people have a way of dying. Well,
I heard one time about mr Fred Cooper.
Perhaps you can document this for Omega zero.
Laurie has experienced that most lawyers die in test state. Uh,
most people die without leaving a trace in their lives.
Then we are trying to rectify this to some stuff.
6: Great. Yes.
But we are going to fall in the process of creating the record for history.
Whereas in written history,
the author usually takes these raw products and comes to a logical conclusion.
13: Right.
But the analogy is not accurate between the oral history and written history is
what I'm saying. Because oral history is a misnomer.
So you have to take that analogy.
I weigh and compare it with published autobiography.
That's the easiest comparison I don't think are any discipline standards for
what makes a Lincoln step. And it was a great autobiography.
And what makes a a someone else's a Amir away. Uh,
it's the inherent quality of the, of the material.
But how can one go much beyond that?
12: No problem.
6: Say a word on that. Heroin. Jovan was directed to you, sir. The others way.
Listen, cause I didn't hear. I've heard,
I've heard reference to oral history, oral evidence, oral testimony,
oral condition, oral transmission, oral resources,
oral archive and oral authors.
12: I have answered that question when it's been asked me.
By saying that we are supplying a new source of primary data and it's no worse
than other sources of primary data,
it may be a little bit better because you do have the addition of another person
in conducting the interview who presumably is going to be watching out for
evidence of internal inconsistency in what's stated.
And uh, I, in training interviewers,
I tell them all to watch very carefully for this time to thing and not to be
timid about raising it because very often what seems to be an internal
inconsistency if you saying to a person, well,
you said such and such and now you're saying this other thing and these two seem
to conflict very often they can resolve it and you,
you therefore have something that's a little better than if you just had his
diary or if you had something that he wrote one time and then five years later
wrote something else and they seem to conflict. But I don't think that we can,
that oral history is a finished product.
And last and except where it's conducted by too sophisticated people that where
we have a benefits published interview that um,
is a virologist that we're,
both of them are sub such sophistication that the product can be presented to
them,
13: can be a final product and it can also be material for a history.
Is that right? Yes. It's rarely is a final product in itself,
but we've had a few memoirs,
so it was so obsessed,
general interest that they'd gone into
12: very little change, but that's very exceptional.
13: It must be a discipline move because it was Harold Jones just pull that chair
pointed up. We've got a jargon if I own already
[inaudible] I just did a jargon should read Luther reverend's performance at the
second, which he gave us oral author among other things.
And a great many other highly amusing variations
14: isn't the fact that whole experience of the Columbia University of office as
indicated that only a fraction of history is reduced to publication on writing.
And that the years roll by you wish that you had something,
some fact that had been preserved and the parade of the army of people who had
experiences,
which we can call the history or whatever terminology doesn't make a better
difference.
They pass on and unless they've kept a diary or some other thing that,
uh, it's lost to us now, whether the,
whether it's today or 10 years or 20 years from now,
those who were write biographies or history have not only the letters and the
diaries or other things that someone may have left,
but there was also the record a collections of people who have lived history.
I remember when Claude Bowers was writing his tragic era and there was very
little available in publications and he let people know that people wanted
information and he received cases full of original material diaries,
letters and so on.
And it was astounding the facts of life and the facts of history that were
buried in these personal letters. But no one had interviewed anybody.
No one had preserved the oral recollections.
I don't care whether they're oral or written or what, what the nomenklatura,
no one that preserved these recollections or reminiscences of the people.
So at least ours pad this,
this treasure trove upon which he was able to write this great book.
And so that decades from now,
whether they refer to the works at Columbia university oral history office or at
the all the others,
now we're doing this marvelous work throughout the country and especially if
they will be coordinated. It will be the,
the gold mine for all these biographers and historians.
We're preserving the facts of the day and yet they pulled the tomorrow.
Thank you Fred and said that they to come full circle.
I ended up viewed Claude Bowers.
Just a real short,
2: no, I look at it in our operation as a tool and the catalyst,
I'll give you an example. We contacted Jack Northrup,
ms airplane designer asking if we could interview with him. He said,
don't bother to come up. I'm getting old. My memory is poor.
It's like surprising by taking along evidence photographs,
this and that or Andy in chronological order. He surprised himself.
At least he's getting back there. Is the the catalyst approach
very successfully there. I have a comment
question to ask by yourself. [inaudible]
I have the sort of your reaction in the way. It seems to me that
you have this kind of monstrous,
it's such a voluminous amount of material and doing some research,
it seems almost impossible to get their hands on a reasonably decent job and
it's growing and growing and growing the mountains a take and then what you do
with the tape. It's a big problem. Uh, when the Robin pay,
on the other hand,
I'm a proper writer and in order to get a feel of anything,
I would have to go into interviews. My memory isn't,
and having the material on tape has really preface. But more than that,
I'm a affiliated with a film company and we put out a little slim this brackets
and it's a little promotional record for something.
Somebody and I brought it home one night and put it on the player and there was
the voice of Eleanor Roosevelt I telling you about a time she's been taken to
jail and whatever the eyes reaction,
she'd been visiting a jail and he thought she had been taking my 15 year old
daughter on the road without signature. Autograph sort of came alive.
You know, it didn't mean a thing to her before. Anything I said about Ellen,
the roads without knowing the Roosevelt flights, you know?
And that's what I think, you know, aside from all my questions,
I really think that one of the big purposes of a group like this is to try to
figure out how to get this extremely valuable and interesting and cumin material
11: used oral history materials for records or other media besides the primary
research.
What do you mean graduate and why that is
[inaudible]
well, I guess part of that,
12: the reason that we have done this is because we're in the business of labor
education and yes,
I have taken a tape which I have here with me and I think there will be an
opportunity for people to hear it tomorrow.
It's 20 minutes long and it's a compilation of bits and pieces of interview.
We have patched together with a narration and with some music such that it
illustrates the early history of the state worker's union.
We feel that there's a great deal more possibilities of doing this kind of
thing. Of course you have the difficulty of having to get the release from the
interviewee to do this and that makes an added complexity.
But you are certainly right.
It has a dramatic quality and adds a great deal.
13: I think that's very interesting. And uh,
I'm glad that you brought the tape cause on like the hair
11: probably along that line is we're now and I think most programs now we're
getting a tape of the weight. We're saying,
uh, under our, you know, where you would,
they virtually are accepting our citizens about music for educational purposes.
Now we're [inaudible] is very broad.
Like I don't know that this would qualify as say for a news broadcast or
something.
But often when you use our tapes in our public schools have the reminiscent of
childhood experiences in our communities like for sixth, seventh,
eighth graders are for high school kids that you say this free.
13: I think this you're mentioning Alice putting interspersed with music is very
important because believe me,
I don't think you can go too far with this idea simply because the ears of our
age are so sophisticated listening to radio kind of stuff,
play and television. Uh, if you suddenly had to start monitoring a tape,
you'll find yourself board's deaf 90% of the time it's to call us having a
private conversation. And uh,
therefore you have to exert very carefully and to find a little gem of banana
dove that is told, well perhaps abuse.
Like I'm going to have some more anecdote from some other boys,
but I don't think that it's going to be a major activity of oral history.
Send the big cousins the fact that the best memoirs are filled with what sir?
No of an angel called smoking rum candor and cannot be used for broadcast.
Uh, maybe they can be 50 years. Hence
2: we have started to progress in the Smithsonian on an overall basis and I've only
been there a couple of tapes paid that are distributed through radio stations.
We have drawn upon our all history and then coupled with other interviews and an
announcer and so forth and music and turned it into a very similar thing.
What you're talking about as we go to the, for instance,
I say I a a major USAF died in regard to tell his wife and daughter and also
straight as but are pretty close to him.
He's got the Clement,
not everyone is a satellite program in support of our air force research product
and our tapes are introduced,
have a two fold purpose to obtain factual data from key individuals involved
with the application of air power is out there these days because in the early
years of that there is very little written documentation extent.
So we are looking for us to study information.
Moreover we are looking for the value assessments, judgements,
opinions of these he and senior people to record and to use it.
Our evaluation of the air war over there.
13: Well I think that's very good. I've heard the word factual used a lot.
Usually when you're working with manuscripts and documents and you write
history, you can compare to see whether something really is effect.
But often people here have used the word factual recollections as if because a
person recollects or puts his member,
his thoughts on paper that these automatically become historical facts.
You know the literature of oral history,
I promise it's bullet evidence to the contrary who are a bunch of Wells there
and been aware of that problem. I think one for way, babe, all together,
this interesting Ben about radio use,
I should tell you just to give you an idea of the portion of usable material
that could come out of a project. We had a Maya burger years ago,
wrote an article about the Columbia office and Columbia alumnus named Robert
Franklin, who at Columbia written in large letters on his heart,
called me up and said,
he know this was the most wonderful thing he'd ever heard of how could he help?
Well, I said, well, you use,
it was an interviewer if you can tell me a field in which you are interested.
And he said, well, he'd like to go to the movies. So, uh,
I told him about Terry Ramsey's many others one nights and a few other books in
the movies and he became quite excited about this and started interviewing and
he interviewed, interviewed and interviewed him.
He was really a tape recorder buff about to buy the townies finished.
He was quite expert in the history of the movies because he had talked with
adults, had a talk with Gloria Swanson,
and he talked with hundreds of others about, he said to me, he said,
I'm going broke, and we weren't paying a thing.
He was doing this out of the goodness of his heart. He and his wife, uh, well,
I called a few people, and lo and behold, Westinghouse
broadcasting decided that it might be interesting to present a series of half
hour programs based on this material.
But then I think there were nice,
and you couldn't correct me whether about what 30 programs have programs that
are that many or 20 or something like that. Props, I'm thinking,
well, 25 half hour programs, but 7,000 pages.
So ladies and gentlemen isn't,
it's dependent on the amount of transcripts to be able to extract this this
little bit. I'll end the story halfway.
Westinghouse was generous enough so that he came out a little bit ahead.
0: I think it's perhaps probably break it up
[inaudible].