Many years ago, my grandmother Jessie Christensen Morgan was living in a care center in Salt Lake City. At that time, I was attending the University of Utah and had just acquired a new portable reel-to-reel tape recorder.
I took the opportunity to visit her with my tape recorder and record some of her life events. As far as I know, that one recording is the only one made during her lifetime. One of the most memorable stories tells of her birth in 1893 in St. Johns, Arizona. Here is a short excerpt:
Question: Were you born in St. Johns?
“Yes. Born in St. Johns, Arizona, right on the floor. Mother and dad just had the one room, and the front door and the back door were just right across. And there came up a big windstorm and thunder and rain, and it blew the doors open, or one door open and mother got up to shut the door, and she fainted, and I was born right there on the floor, and when dad got there with the midwife, I was laying there trying to get my breath in the rain.”
There is nothing that elicits more of an emotional response than hearing the recorded voice of an ancestor that has long since passed away. When thinking about our family history, how many of us have wished for a brief interview with one of our great-grandparents or an even more remote ancestor? I am sure some of us wish we had a recording of our parents. With all the new digital technology available, making a memorable recording of a living relative is easy. The hard part is taking the time and making the effort to do the oral interview.
Oral history can be funny or tragic, but it is always extremely interesting. The setting for an oral history might be as informal as a family gathering where the grandparents tell some stories about their lives. The setting could also be semiformal where the person making the recording has an appointment and has a prepared list of topics. In either case, the person conducting the interview session needs to be prepared to capture the narrative. It is not enough to simply record a story or history. There needs to be a plan as to how the recording is to be preserved and shared with family members.
There are a number of websites that archive oral histories. FamilySearch.org has moved decisively into preserving oral histories as part of the Memories app. Audio files in both MP3 and M4A formats up to 15 MB can be uploaded and preserved on the website for free. Depending on the quality of the recording, usually measured in the sample rate and bit depth, 15 MB could be about 15 minutes of recording or less. Using my present Sony digital recorder, I can usually get about 10 minutes or so of recording when I hit the limit of 15 MB. If you have a longer file, it would need to be partitioned into smaller segments to be stored on FamilySearch.org with the present limitations.
Ancestry.com, another large online genealogy website, allows users to record an audio file and attach the file to their Public Member Family Trees, but there is no direct provision for uploading a prerecorded file. You would need to purchase the very full-featured genealogy program from Ancestry.com and its Family Tree Maker to upload a previously recorded file. Likewise, MyHeritage.com has a provision to incorporate audio files uploaded by its popular and free genealogy program, Family Tree Builder.
Working with audio files can be quite technical. There are presently at least 30 audio file types. Those specified by FamilySearch.org are the some of the most common, but it may be necessary to specify the type of file created or stored to make the file generally accessible to other family members.
There are many websites that provide general guidelines for oral interviews. Here is a list of some of the most common suggestions:
1. Make sure you are familiar with the operation of your recording equipment.
2. Obtain permission to conduct the interview and, if you intend to publish the interview, get permission in writing.
3. Before beginning the interview, have a good idea of the topics you wish to cover.
4. The interview should take place in a relaxed and comfortable place.
5. Don’t be limited by your questions. Allow the person to tell the story and answer in his or her own way.
6. Avoid questions that ask for a "yes" or "no" answer by using open-ended questions.
7. Listen carefully to what the person is saying and respond to the flow of the narrative. Do not change topics just to get through with the interview.
8. Take the time to follow-up with another session or two if the interview does not feel complete.
9. Make sure the interview is preserved and provided to family members.
There are extensive online resources for conducting oral history interviews. Here are some helpful links:
James L. Tanner has more than 32 years of experience in genealogy. His blogs are Genealogy's Star and Rejoice, and be exceeding glad... . He presently serves as a missionary at the BYU Family History Library