About the Oral History Series
Introduction...
Welcome to the Columbia College Library's Oral History Series. The interviews in the collection were originally recorded between 1949 and 1992, primarily through the Introduction to Oral History course taught at the college by history professor Richard L. Dyer. Through the generous support of the Wise Family Charitable Trust and the Columbia College Foundation a digitization and transcription effort began in 2007 to preserve the collection and make it available to a wider audience. The bulk of the digitization and transcribing work was done by students, particularly, Sandra Lascari, Ariella Megory, Alden Sawtelle, Nicol Gaffney and Judith Bennington. Without their efforts this project would not have been possible. In addition, the database and online interface that make this collection available over the Internet was created by Columbia College Online Services developer Jake Beck.
For the foreseeable future this project will be a work in progress as we continue to make more of the collection available online and transcribe additional interviews. We also hope to identify photographs of all the interviewees to include with the recordings. The interviews in our collection provide a vital link to the history of our community and I encourage you to share them with anyone who might be interested. Please feel free to contact me with any questions, comments or suggestions.
Brian Greene Columbia College Librarian
Background... By emeritus faculty member and founder of the Columbia College Oral History program, Richard L. Dyer
In 1962, Professor Richard L. Dyer received his Master of Arts degree emphasizing Western American History from California State University, Los Angeles. In 1969, Dick joined the faculty at Columbia Junior College. While a member and officer of the Tuolumne County Historical Society, he associated frequently with many "old timers." In order to preserve the rich heritage of the Mother Lode, he organized the College's Oral History program, one of the first among state junior colleges. The first interview was with businessman Charles "Mac" McKibben in May, 1971.
Visits and telephone contacts with university oral historians in southern and northern California helped establish the Mother Lode and Introduction to Oral History courses. The Oral History Center was organized in the early 1970s. It included interviews by Dick and his students and copies of interviews from the Tuolumne County Historical Society, Yosemite National Park and community historians. The library collection, now numbering more than 200 interviews, features the post Gold Rush era of the southern Mother Lode by "old timers."
Some of the library collection includes interviews (30 minutes to 9.5 hours) and folders with topical outlines, photographs and interviewee documents. The interviews of college "plank holders" (original staff and Yosemite Junior College administrators) by Dick records reminiscences of the formative years of the college.
Originally, the Oral History program was to be a part of a Mother Lode Studies Center, an interdisciplinary academic curriculum of regional core courses for students during their traditional studies and local teachers studying for college incremental school credit during special summer seminar.
Richard L. Dyer Summer 2009
