Oral history and this university (originally Sangamon State University) grew up together. Both gained institutional standing as products of the turbulent 1960s, which called for drastic reforms in historical methodology and higher education. It should therefore be no surprise that the practice of oral history flourished on the campus of an upstart university that welcomed new ideas and encouraged entrepreneurialism.

This comfortable convergence helped define the purpose and shape the modus operandi of SSU's Oral History Office, which was established in 1971, during the university's first academic year. As practiced here, oral history became an extension and expression of the school's educational mission. Innovativeness permeated both, as did a commitment to serving both the community and the region. An emphasis upon public affairs research and study also characterized both, as did an egalitarian outlook, creating a people's history for a people's university.

Perhaps the Oral History Office's most distinctive feature was its heavy dependence upon a student staff of interviewers and editors. This, too, drew upon the university's commitment to experiential learning as a centerpiece of the curriculum. The project's co-founder was James Krohe, an enterprising graduate assistant. Thereafter a succession of gifted graduate students comprised the staff of student employees, graduate assistants, and grant-funded personnel. It is fitting here to acknowledge the extraordinary contributions made by Barbara (Bobbe) Herndon, Kay MacLean, Kathryn Back, Kitty Wrigley, Horace Waggoner, Linda Jett, Judith Haynes, Francie Staggs, Lee Nickelson, Marilyn Huff, Sandra Luebking, Peggy Boyer Long, Tim Jones and Kay Bush. They were my professional collaborators at every stage and on every task, from building and managing the collection, to conceiving and conducting grant projects, to offering community workshops, to writing a popular oral history textbook, and to teaching an advanced course. Many of them deservedly earned careers and freelance stature either in oral history or a related vocation.

Another early and steady source of help was a cadre of community volunteers who performed many vital services. Meriting special recognition are Byron Booth, Eugenia Eberle, Florence Hardin, Glenn Kniss, Margaret Munn, Jo Saner, Genevieve Toigo and James Williams.

For nearly 25 years I taught a graduate course in oral history method. Its hallmark was my insistence that students produce and process oral histories of significant technical quality and substantive import to be accessioned in the permanent collection. Consequently, most of the 1,200 interviews, 3,000 tape hours and 100,000 pages represented in this catalog were created by students, an impressive testament to experiential learning. The 200 students who were our unpaid interviewers, transcriptionists and editors also deserve recognition for their collective enterprise.

From the beginning we chose project topics that could most benefit from eyewitness documentation in central Illinois and beyond. Accordingly, we sought and received grant and contract funds to document such subjects as ethnic groups, coal mining, minority and women's history, agriculture, local commerce and labor, historic preservation, World War II, and state politics and government. This last project, under the rubric "Illinois Statecraft," became our most ambitious and celebrated effort. Therefore, the university's oral history holdings, reinforced by duplicate sets donated to Lincoln (Springfield Public) Library and the Illinois State Historical Library, comprise a large body of unique historical evidence.

The true measure of a source collection, however, lies not in the quantity produced but in the extent used. It is premature, after only 25 or less years, to make a definitive judgment on this larger issue, but already there are citations and quotations from these oral histories in dozens of serious books and articles. In a few instances the memoirs made a study feasible and were the principal date source. Oral histories of Springfield's African-American citizens even were introduced as trial evidence in a successful federal lawsuit challenging the city's electoral system. If these early results are indicative, the UIS oral history collection promises to be of substantial and enduring value.

When I resigned as director in 1988, plans already were underway to redirect our energy somewhat from simply building a collection to cataloging and transferring it to an appropriate archival facility. Both of these vital steps have occurred over the past five years.

Under University Archivist Tom Wood the collection is in good hands. He also deserves credit for designing and supervising the production of this invaluable and comprehensive catalog. On behalf of the thousands of  narrators and interviewers whose incalculable contributions are now more visible and accessible, I extend congratulations and thanks to Tom and his assistants.

Years ago my student colleagues and I wrote an oral history manual entitled From Tape to Type. With the release of this impressive catalog we might substitute the phrase, "From Tape to Type to Tome."

Cullom Davis
Founding Director, SSU Oral History Office
Professor of History Emeritus
June, 1996
 

Table of Contents | Dedication | Foreword | Introduction | List of Projects
Acknowledgments | Abstracts of Transcribed Memoirs
Appendix | Index | Index of Interviewers