Thousands of stories live in Northern Lower Michigan, dating back to the Ojibwe villages on the shore of the Great Lakes, to the French fur traders, the revolutionary war, logging and railroads and shipping. The old-timers are eager to tell you about all the changes the region has undergone. And things are still changing, as the area that has traditionally been a summer destination struggles to accommodate a sharp rise in the year-round population, which in turn puts unprecedented pressure on the lakes and landscape that draw people there in the first place. There is a vigilant push to preserve the region’s natural resources, and along with it an effort to preserve the region’s history.
For the past two years, I have been working with the local library to collect some of the thousands of stories in the area. To date, our efforts have concentrated on two forms of stories: oral histories and printed documents. A team of volunteers has been recording interviews with many of the area’s long-time residents. In additional to gathering oral histories, the library board has been soliciting historical documents from the local community, including birth certificates, real estate contracts, maps, photographs and postcards.
Our goal is to build a comprehensive digital archive of these stories in whatever form they happen to take — be they interviews, documents, photos, movies or songs — and to make this archive available over the internet and through kiosks in the area. The project will not only serve as a means to display and distribute these stories, but a way to solicit even more. We hope to equip the kiosk installations with document scanners as well as audio/video recording booths, so visitors can submit their own stories. Eventually, web users will be able to submit written accounts and images (and possibly audio and video with the increasing prevalence of broadband connections in the home).