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Re: [Fwd: [BuffaloHistory] Recollections of slaves placed online by library]



Hi,

We've been getting a lot of messages letting us know that the url in the
article is incorrect.

The Correct url is http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/snhtml/snhome.html The
printed version stuck spaces between the period and put a dash between am
and mem.

Danna Bell-Russel
NDL Learning Center
Library of Congress

On Sat, 21 Apr 2001, Sharon wrote:

> HI Folks,
>
> Looks like the Library of Congress has given us another gift. Here
> are slave narratives from the WPA interview project which are now
> online.
>
> The American Memory Project can be seen at:
>
> http://memory.loc.gov/
>
> Read the article below from the newspaper in Buffalo.
>
> Sharon Centanne
>
> -------- Original Message --------
> Subject: [BuffaloHistory] Recollections of slaves placed online by
> library
> Date: Sat, 21 Apr 2001 12:40:06 -0400
> From: "ccb" <ccb@acsu.buffalo.edu>
> Reply-To: BuffaloHistory@yahoogroups.com
> To: <BuffaloHistory@yahoogroups.com>
>
> Hi,
>
> The following article was in the Buffalo Newspaper on Friday, April 20,
> 2001.  Thought it might be of interest to some.
>
> Lynn
>
>
> Recollections of slaves placed online by library
>
>                   By JOEY HOLLEMAN
>                   Knight Ridder Newspapers
>                   4/20/01
>
> COLUMBIA, S.C. - The Library of Congress has opened an online window to
> the
> disturbing, yet illuminating tales of former slaves gathered in a
> federal
> project in the 1930s.
>
> Once found only in musty volumes in research facilities such as the
> South
> Caroliniana Library at the University of South Carolina, these
> narratives
> now can be called up with a simple click as part of the library's
> American
> Memory project.
>
> The Web site, which went online March 30, can be found at
> memory.loc.gov/ammem/snhtml/snhome.html.
>
> Nearly 2,000 former slaves, including hundreds from South Carolina, were
> interviewed from 1936 to 1938 in the Federal Writers Project, a
> make-work
> program that was part of the Works Progress Administration.
>
> The narratives filled 33 volumes and nearly 10,000 pages. Now all of
> that
> work can be found online.
>
> But be forewarned - history can be offensive. The n-word crops up in
> many
> places. The stories use dialect that would draw protests if used these
> days.
>
> The narrative from Charley Watson of Winnsboro, for example, explains
> the
> slave work day like this: "Us worked de can and de can't system. In de
> mornin', when it git so you can see, you got to go to work and at night
> when
> it git so dark you can't see you ceasted to work."
>
> But, as stated in the original 1941 introduction to the compilation, in
> spite of the limitations, the narratives "remain the most authentic and
> colorful source of our knowledge of the lives and thoughts of thousands
> of
> slaves."
>
> In the online version, you can call up the volumes by state. Interviews
> in
> South Carolina fill four volumes and more than 1,000 pages. The names
> are
> listed alphabetically.
>
> You can also search by subject. For instance, 10 of the narratives
> mention
> baseball. While the main focus is slavery and the period immediately
> after
> it, some of the conversations wandered to the more contemporary period
> of
> the Depression.
>
> USC history professor Mark Smith, who has read all the volumes, said the
> narratives allow readers "to get some sense of the texture of slave
> life,
> refracted through memory."
>
> Smith said they are more useful as a picture of folk culture and beliefs
> than of how slaves were treated.
>
> The authors, both white and black, were instructed to reproduce in
> writing
> the spoken language of the people they interviewed, and the dialect
> reflects
> that.
>
> One of the more interesting entries is one of three written by
> African-American Augustus Ladson. He interviews Elijah Green, who was
> born
> Christmas Day in 1843 and had an incredible store of memory nearly 90
> years
> later.
>
> A personal servant to Lt. William Jones, Green witnessed the Battle of
> Richmond and explained the tactics to his interviewer. He bragged of
> winning
> a $1 bet with a white man years later because he knew the name of the
> man
> who fired the first shot on Fort Sumter.
>
> Green said he helped dig John C. Calhoun's grave with a certain joy in
> his
> heart.  "I never did like Calhoun cause he hated the Negro," Green said.
> Green talked of a slave owner named Mr. Ryan who had a private jail on
> Queen
> Street in Charleston. "He was very cruel; he'd lick his slaves to death.
> Very seldom one of
> his slaves survive a whippin.' "
>
>
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>

A posting from the Archives & Archivists LISTSERV List!

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      In body of message:  SUB ARCHIVES firstname lastname
                    *or*:  UNSUB ARCHIVES
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Or to do *anything* (and enjoy doing it!), use the web interface at
     http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/archives.html

Problems?  Send e-mail to Robert F Schmidt <rschmidt@lib.muohio.edu>