Project: The Oral History
Estimated Cost $17,000
The Great Basin’s people have a story to tell. The Great Basin National Park has a mission to preserve and interpret the cultural heritage of the entire Great Basin. With your donations, we will interview, record, transcribe, and curate the memories of elderly, living Great Basin residents for present and future generations. We will gratefully recognize donors on our website and in featured exhibits at the Park’s Visitor Center. Major donors will receive an oral history documentary video.
Project:
Since its founding in 1998, the Great Basin National Park Foundation has funded an oral history project. With small grants for recording equipment and transportation, volunteers have interviewed more than 60 elderly Great Basin residents on audio and videotape. Board members of the Foundation have provided typing services to transcribe most of these interviews.
The proposed project will expand this work and will complete about 40 pending transcriptions. The Foundation will enter into a formal cooperative agreement with the Great Basin National Heritage Area Partnership to jointly sponsor the project for 2 years. In cooperation with local universities, we will develop an Oral History Training Program for approximately ten volunteers to conduct the interviews. We will compile a comprehensive list of people to be interviewed. This list will be prioritized based on age and/or health, ethnic diversity, occupation, and historic contribution. The project will purchase the recording equipment. The project will begin in the spring of 2011.
The project’s leader, Dave Tilford, has coordinated with the Great Basin Heritage Area Partnership and several universities including the Mountain West Digital Library of the University of Utah, in order to expand the project. This Library already has collection partnerships with the University of Nevada at Reno and at Las Vegas. Five Tilford interviews are now posted on their website (http://mwdl.org/index.php/home). The Great Basin Heritage Area Partnership will be requested to provide matching funds.
Cost:
Video equipment (high definition digital video cameras) 7 @ $1,000…...$7,000
Transportation…………………………………………………………………...................….. $1,500
Transcription @$20/hr ………………………………………………………….................. $9,000
Total……………………………………………………………………………….........................$17,500