Beaver Island Michigan

Joe Moore has been digitizing our Oral History VCR tapes. As he works through the stacks, he has been posting on 'New's on the Net'.

The Print Shop will have a DVD of each video available for viewing as well.

Enjoy the memories, and Thank You Joe.

Many thanks to Joe.

And please let us know when the DVD's will become available. I want a copy of the Mary "Bert" McDonough interview. And I know of someone who wants the Jewell Gillespie interview.

A big thanx to both Joe and BIHS for helping promote BI. We need more promotion of tourism to reverse the downward spiral of the Island. Hope others get on board. There are lots of people with good suggestions along with myself.

I am only, so far, creating video data files using the DVDs as the storage medium for the data. I haven't taken the time to actually create a playable DVD for a DVD player since it takes so long to create that.

Perhaps that can happen in the future when all the tapes are completed, but right now the reason is to preserve the historical interviews done by Robert Cole. The VHS tapes are degrading, so I'm working to get them converted to digital before anything is lost.

Joe Moore

Joe -
Thanks for the clarification. I had tapes on my mind. Had breakfast this morning with Sue Oole from BIHS and we discussed ways to promote BI and one was tapes. Especially tapes of businesses, museums, points of interest, etc. that can be shown on the Emerald Isle while crossing so visitors know where to go, what to see, where to eat, etc. when they arrive. There seems to be some resistance to do so which we hope to over come by gaining the support of businesses and the public. We would recommend you do 5 minute segments at each location that wants to participate along with directing people to the Community Center for further information. No commitments, things are still in the early planning process but have lots of interest thus far. This would hopefully be a program with BIHS input and contribution but come under the direction of some yet to be named group.
It's going to take everyone with creative ideas to overturn the direction the Island appears to be headed.

Many thanks to Joe Moore for taking the time and effort to digitally preserve these vital oral history interviews. Of the interview subjects I captured on those VHS tapes recorded 25+ years ago, most if not all have since passed away. I'd like to give credit to former BIHS Director Shirley Gladish for initiating that archival effort in collaboration with the BIDL and the Library of Michigan, circa 1990.

There is a wealth of island lore within the BIHS oral history archives, recorded by local, state, and national historians going back to the 1930's. It was the long-time vision of Bill Cashman, myself, and others dedicated to the preservation of island history that these archives would eventually be digitized and made publicly accessible in their entirety. Joe's current archival work on these materials helps bring that hoped-for goal a significant step further toward realization, by keeping the contents intact from the ravages of time.

In a sense, oral history is like money in the bank: the more time passes, the more value it accrues. And though the recording technology (and the admittedly amateur efforts of this interviewer) may look and sound unsophisticated to present and future audiences, these recordings stand in many cases as the only visual and audio glimpse of the memories of a people who defined a time and place unique to regional and national culture. As the island passes through it's own changes over the generations, may these archives hold some of the essence of who we were.