Then get yourself down to the Western Historical Manuscript Collection.
Do you ever ask yourself whatever happened to an old friend? Most of us have someone or some people in our past lives we would like to find again after many years. What about your ancestors? How much do you know of your past? History is people, and history is the key to understanding the past.
They say, “By studying history, we can learn where we came from, where we are, and where we are going.” The provocative historian John Henrik Clarke once said, “The acceptance of the facts of African-American history and the African-American historian as a legitimate part of the academic community did not come easily. Slavery ended and left its false images of black people intact.”
We all must be in agreement that knowledge and awareness make people more confident and ambitious, more aware, and more successful in life. History can be awesome as we look back on the past and see the context that our ancestors in this great human family lived within. But how do we research our history? How can we connect accurately with the past?
Some great things about St. Louis and this area don’t jump out at you. You may not even find out about them until you have been on campus at the University of Missouri-St. Louis. Almost hidden in the lower level of the Thomas Jefferson Library is the Western Historical Manuscript Collection. Extensive information about almost any subject is at your fingertips.
Gary R. Kremer, executive director of the State Historical Society of Missouri and director of the Western Historical Manuscript Collection, said, “Our mission is to support the research needs of university faculty and students, Missouri residents, and the general public by collecting, preserving, and making available to them various primary source materials documenting the history of the state and the region.”
The St. Louis office concentrates on collections documenting the history of St. Louis and the surrounding area. Doris Wesley, a manuscript specialist and the author of the historical volume Lift Every Voice and Sing, with manuscript specialist Kenn Thomas, documents St. Louis’ African-American history. They have documents and papers on the region’s black community leaders, featuring some of the most important political personalities in the African-American community, including Ernest and DeVerne Calloway, Judge Nathan B. Young, and activist David Grant; “Women in the Seventies,” documenting feminist activism of that decade; the St. Louis Teachers’ Strike Project, involving the participants of the 1973 teacher’s strike; the Negro Baseball League project, a collection of interviews including one with the renowned James “Cool Papa” Bell; and the Depression era project.
Wesley and Thomas emphasize that since the early 1970s their staff has conducted an oral history program documenting many aspects of St. Louis’ past, from its labor strife to its race relations to the biographies of its greatest jazz musicians and the careers of its most well-known political activists.
William “Zelli” Fischetti, associate director of the collection, said, “These oral histories are now available online, including interviews with such notables as Singleton Palmer, Elijah Shaw and Eddie Randall.”
We must seize knowledge of our bygone achievements and successes. We must realize our fascinating personal and cultural significance, and teach it to our youth.
I can be reached by fax at (314) 837-3369 or by e-mail at: berhay@swbell.net.