Last weekend I had the opportunity to visit St. Philip the Deacon Episcopal Church for Parish History Day. Natalia and I had been planning the event for many weeks with help from Madeline, our main contact at St. Philips. There were 3 components to the event:
Mother Alcena, Madeline and Natalia looking at a church ledger from the early 1900s
1. Photo Identification -“Help Us Identify These Photos”: There are a lot of photographs in the collection that are not identified, so my goal for the event was to share the photographs with the parishioners and have them help me identify the people, event and date of some key photographs. I created two large posters and mounted various photographs from the collection on them. Choosing the photographs that were on the posters was a tedious process. The photographs I chose were because I thought the person or event being depicted was significant to the collection or the person in the photograph was in many photographs throughout the collection. During the event people filled out slips of paper with all the information they knew about the photograph.
Photograph Identification Posters
2. Oral History: Chris Petersen, Research Assistant in Special Collections and Archives Research Center at OSU, gave a brief talk on the basics of oral history. He also conducted preliminary oral histories with Carl Deiz and Alcena Boozer.
3. Preservation: Larry Landis, Director of Special Collections and Archives Research Center at OSU, lead the preservation and scanning station. Members of the church brought in their own personal materials to share and Larry was able to help them with preservation techniques and scanning.
I am delighted that I was able to go and speak with the people whose collection I am currently organizing. As an archivist you do not always get the opportunity to hear first hand accounts from people who are a part of the collection you are organizing. The information I obtained was invaluable and I want to give a special thank you to everyone who came and shared their story with me.
Allison Belcher (right) deciding what photographs to scan
Joe Nunn and Margaret Heil helping identify photograph
