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Letter from the Vice President
Project Updates
Neighbor to Neighbor Oral History Project
Houston Neighborhood Series - Historic
Schools of Harris County
Making Contacts
Historical Community
HAM Meetups
Fundraising
Silent Auction Event
GoodSearch
Amazon
HAM Store
Call to Action
Hello HAM Readers,
For those of you tuning in for the first time, this "roughly"
quarterly newsletter is designed to tell you just a little bit about what
we have been doing here at Houston Arts and Media. While the first newsletter
described all of our projects in detail, I'm going to try to keep this
one focused on what we've accomplished since November.
Please take the time to read about the many projects we're working on
and our upcoming fundraiser at St.
Arnold Brewery on April 26th. Our need for volunteers is as great
as ever. If you or someone you know shares a passion for education and
Houston history, please send us an email. Our Neighbor to Neighbor Oral
History Project, in particular, is time sensitive, and we need volunteers
now to help us record the stories from long-time Houstonians before they're
gone.
Thanks again for reading,
Laurie Feinswog
Vice President and Secretary
Houston Arts and Media
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Projects
Neighbor to Neighbor Oral History Project
In the last few months, our Oral History Project has taken on a life of
its own. We have gathered over 40 hours of interviews with a wide array
of long-time Houstonians, and we have tripled the number of our volunteer
interviewers. We have also been working with the people at the Fondren
Library's Woodson Research
Center at Rice University to arrange for these recordings to be archived
there as well as at the Houston Public Library - Houston
Metropolitan Research Center. In the next few weeks, we will be making
our first delivery to these institutions. We are excited that we have
been offered a second home for this unique collection of stories, providing
access to a much wider audience.
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Houston Neighborhood Series-Historic
Schools of Harris County
While we have been focusing on developing a team of interviewers, and
collecting as many time-sensitive oral histories as possible, we have
continued to make progress on our Houston
Neighborhood Series of books. We will be starting with Historic Schools
of Harris County. Although we do not intend to put together comprehensive
school histories, we have already identified between 350 and 400 schools
that existed in Harris County prior to 1950, making this project at least
a two volume set.
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Making Contacts
Historical Community
We have been building our connections with other organizations in Houston
whose work is aligned with, or could benefit from our own work. We have
been working closely with Parmita Derden at the Museum
of Houston, and Betty Chapman and Bill Kellar with the new Houston
History Association. We have been helping Margott Williams with her efforts
as head of the Descendants
of Olivewood Cemetery to establish her organization. We have worked
with Kirk Farris of Art
and Environmental Architecture on the upcoming publication of the
History of Frost Town that he and Louis Aulbach have put together, and
we have been consulting with the Woodland Heights Centennial Committee
in their efforts to collect oral histories from their long-time residents.
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HAM Meetups
One of the most important things we've started doing over the last few
months is to schedule HAM Meetups, where our interviewers, interviewees,
and our contacts with the historical community can get together and just
talk about the areas that interest them most. We have had two very successful
gathering so far. The first was small, diverse, and informal, with everyone
breaking up into groups of 2 or 3 and just talking about mutual Houston
interests. At the second, we more than doubled our attendance, and it
turned into a round-table discussion. Topics so far have included the
preservation of Olivewood Cemetery, one of Houston's oldest African American
cemeteries, the issues facing the 6th Ward, documenting Houston's older
architecture before it's all gone, and more.
We'll be having one a meetup every month, and will be happy to put you
on that mailing list. Send an email here.
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Fundraising
Silent Auction Event
We are happy to announce that we have another fundraiser coming up. Please,
everyone, save the date of April 26th. It's a Thursday evening, from 6-9,
and it will be held at the St. Arnold
Brewery. Tickets are $20, and can be purchased from a member of the
board, online with PayPal, or at the door.
There will be live music, food, and, of course, complimentary St. Arnold
beer. We will be displaying a new slideshow montage of collected interviews
and photographs, and Donna Kacmar, a UH Architecture professor, will be
displaying some of the results of her students' work on the architectural
history of Houston's Ice Houses, Burger Joints and Taco Stands, a project
that aligns with our pending documentary History of Houston Beer Joints
and Saloons.
We have a nice collection of Silent Auction items again, including: Private
tour of John O'Quinn's Classic Car collection; Dinner at top Houston restaurants;
Wine packages; Autographed Sports Items; Polka lessons; Gym membership;
Golf Foursome; Golf Lessons; Fun Event tickets and much more. We'll be
updating our list of items online so you can better prepare for what you
want to wrestle people for. Also, if you would like to donate a fun/exotic/different
item for the auction, just drop
us a line.
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GoodSearch
We have recently signed up with GoodSearch, a Yahoo-powered search tool
that donates a small amount each time you use the engine. To support us
with this tool, go to http://www.goodsearch.com,
and type in Houston Arts and Media into the "Who do you search for?"
field. Couldn't be simpler!
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Amazon
As always, we want to remind you that if you do any shopping at Amazon.com,
please use the search engine on this page, or at the store.
We get a small percentage of your purchase. It won't pay for office space,
but it might cover a ream or two of printer paper, and that works for
us.
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HAM Store
We also have some nice t-shirts and other merchandise available through
our CafePress store. You can reach this directly from here,
at or through the store. They make great gifts!!
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Call to Action
We've been working non-stop for the last year, and we've made a lot of
progress. But we need your help. We need volunteers to:
- interview long time Houstonians
- interview the owners of long-time Houston businesses
- identify Houstonians with stories to tell about their neighborhoods
- transcribe interviews
- go visit with interview subjects to scan their old neighborhood photographs
- photograph historic Houston buildings, parks, landscapes, bridges,
schools, businesses, industrial areas
- do library research
- SPREAD THE WORD!!!
We also need donations of:
- digital voice recorders
- video lighting
- tripod
- and, well, money...
Thank you for your support and your interest in Houston Arts and Media…
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