THEIR VOICES MADE HISTORY

Press, Volume XCIX, Issue 29384, 10 December 1960, Page 10

THEIR VOICES MADE HISTORY

And Now —Tape Will Talk For Posterity [By a Special Correspondent} NEW YORK, November 30. JTVERY week-day morning Mrs Elizabeth S. Freidel . reports for work at Columbia University to* listen to the sound of history. The sound comes with a few snaps, crackles and pops, from a tape recorder, “tailor-made” to fit into a drawer of her desk.

Listening with earphones, Mrs Friedel types out the recorded recollections and opinions of men and women familiar with the events and the persons who have helped to shape America. This is the work of the Oral History Research Office at Columbia University. And the history it has so far collected from about 1000 people flows through Cabinet meetings, conventions, peace treaties, panics, big business deals, and back-room intrigue. It ranges from the inside story of a great baseball “fix” of 1919 to a prominent doctor’s recollections of author Henry James.

Captain Max Iruss tells how he survived the blazing inferno of his dirigible, the Hindenburg, as it burned at its mooring mast in 1937.

And some of tlje people who worked with Franklin Delano Roosevelt tell, in part, how the United States survived the depression.

The reason for preserving recent events in this way for the historians of tomorrow is bound up with the changing pace of our times and the speed of modern communications.

People just don’t keep diaries and write memoirs as they used to in more leisurely, bygone days. If they do write anything, it’s likely to show the broad picture.

The noted American historian, Dr. Allan Nevins, saw a way to fill what he calls “the gaps in history.” These gaps are the motives, the by-play, the reasoning, the remarks which are part and parcel of the way people make history. Nowadays the big events almost record themselves. But historians want to know

what really went on at the Cabinet meeting, what actually was promised in the political “deal,” what advice' and pressures and judgments led a President to critical decisions Many of the people who can provide these answers have neither time nor inclination to write them out. But give a man a tape recorder and a trained historian to guide him and the memories flow forth, full of anecdote and colourful comments on friends and enemies. From the trickle that Professor Nevins started 12 years ago, the flow of memoirs has reached impressive proportions. The collection, with a 38-million word total equalling the Encyclopedia Britannica, has already become a rich hunting ground for current historians and writers. Several recent books drew upon oral history records, and several major institutions have hired the office’s skills for specific research projects into aviation, and popular arts and medicine. The oral history technique, too, has aroused interest in universities and libraries in the United States and overseas. Face To Face “Anyone today must realise that he doesn’t get much of interest in his personal mail,” says Dr. Louis Starr, Columbia’s Professor of Journalism, who has headed the project since Professor Nevins retired. “People meet face to face. They jump on planes and go to see one another. They talk on the telephone. “We have lost the art of letterwriting and, with a few exceptions, of diary-keeping. Instead, we ‘contact’ people. Our history undertakes to fill some of the gaps.” ■ Two guarantees given by the project ensure that the people being interviewed will be candid and uninhibited. Each may stipulate how long his memoirs may remain secret. About half of those interviewed have allowed researchers immediate access. But some, who apparently fear that their contemporaries will live for ever, have set release dates stretching well into the next century. Few of those interviewed expect what they say to see the light of print, but an anecdote told by an advertising man was used by John Gunther in a “Look” magazine series and was reproduced nearly 20 million times. ' Co-operation Varies The co-operation of subjects varies widely. The Miners’ Union chief, John L. Lewis, refused to have the tape recorder on and would only talk as someone took notes. Senator Paul Douglas, on the other hand, stretched out on a couch and chatted amicably as. the reel ran. Many of the tapes come from people who are rarely in the public eye. But Dr. Starr believes that these people in the background of history can give a more unbiased and freer report than some of the famous men. Many events simply would not have been chronicled if it were not for oral history. Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson, for example, died suddenly when relatively young. He had written scarcely a word about his distinguished career, but only weeks before his death he taped his reminiscences for the project. Another man with much to contribute about the history of the Labour movement in the United States dictated his memoirs as he lay on his deathbed. The work of the Oral History Research Office is supported b/ Columbia University and various outside organisations, including the Carnegie Corporation of New York. It also helps to support itself

by doing special projects for paying customers, usually big institutions planning a book. The aviation project, for example, included interviews with Alaskan bush pilots, R.A.F. air marshals and men who worked with the Wright brothers. The longest memoir, amounting to 200 hours, of tape or 6000 pages of typescript, was by Frances Perkins, Secretary of Labour under President Roosevelt. A cross-index system reveals 350 references to President Calvin Coolidge and one to Australia’s Prime Minister, Mr Menzies. This came from America’s wartime Vice-President Henry Wallace, and will not be revealed until Mr Wallace’s death. He. is now an active 72. The Columbia project has not gone unnoticed in Australia; but nothing comparable is being done. Instead, Australian historians seem to prefer to “wait and see” how Columbia’s work goes. According to Sydney University’s Professor of History, Professor J. C. Black, it is a “tremendously costly” business. But even if finance were available to start such a project here, he would not be enthusiastic. “At this stage -we’d do better to use any finance available for the preservation of such documents as we can get our hands on,” he says. “We must, of course, watch Columbia very closely. Then, if they seem to have overcome many of the problems associated with something of this nature, we could make a start.” What problems?

“First, one must be- careful to select people who aren’t determined to put over only their own views—views which might not be historically valuable. “Second, the people who are being recorded are only those who are regarded as important by present-day historians. “In 25 years, we may find that they should have been asked to talk on some entirely different subject—or that they needn’t have been asked to talk at all. “But we’ll still have to watch this project. The Americans will tell us exactly how it’s going. They always do in matters like this.”