 Hi everybody, this is Ashley with DAV and I am so lucky to be joined today by Cary Ward from the Veterans History Project. Cary, it is always such a joy when our paths cross. For those of you who may not be familiar with Cary, she's a longtime friend and supporter of DAV. She actually worked with the DAV air show for a long time. So, you know, Cary, can you tell me a little bit about what you do and what the Veterans History Project is for those who may not be familiar with it? Sure. So I am a liaison specialist with the Veterans History Project at the Library of Congress. We are underneath the umbrella of the American Folklife Center and our mission is to collect, preserve, and make accessible the firsthand interviews and narratives of United States military veterans from World War I up through current conflicts. So you're probably very familiar with the statistic from the Department of Veterans Affairs that there's something like 19 million veterans that are living in the U.S. today. Each and every one of those veterans has a story to tell. So part of what my team gets to work on is to help individuals and organizations across the country to sit down with the veterans and Gold Star family members in their lives and communities and get to know what their full experience was like. We have step-by-step instructions that are outlined in what we call our field kit and we even provide draft questions to help understand the full arc of what the veterans life was like. And understanding that not everybody is going to love to be on camera or even recorded via an audio device. We also have a couple other ways that somebody could choose to participate. So we also accept unpublished memoirs. We have collections of original photographs, letters, even two-dimensional pieces of artwork and other military and historical documents. And the big thing is that the stories don't just sit on the shelves at the Library of Congress accumulating dust, but rather they're used on a regular basis by the researchers, students, and most importantly by the future generations who will have access to these firsthand stories of veterans and Gold Star family members who had a front row seat to these historical opportunities. We are coming up, as you know, to our 20th anniversary and we are pretty proud of the fact that we have amassed over 110,000 different collections thus far. And a lot of those collections have content that's available online at our website, which is loc.gov. So if somebody is interested in looking at how they could participate or if they want to know a little bit more about World War I diaries or combat sketches or even a chaplain, if they want to hear a little bit more about what their experience was like, they can head to our website and hear directly from them. So as you know, Carrie, I actually have done my own Veterans History Project recording. I've become an interviewer and I interviewed a good friend of mine who I served within the military, another woman veteran, and I think it's so interesting when you talk about the different volumes that you have and how many people have actually contributed. And you get a sense of, you know, what their experiences were like and I think that that's such a valuable connection that we can make. But one piece that I think that we'd like to talk about here is kind of that missing link is the story of women veterans. Can you talk to me a little bit about, you know, how many women are participating or if there's a need for that? I mean, women are making up roughly 10% of the veteran population right now. Is that something you're seeing reflected in the collection that you have right now? I'm so glad you asked that. You're right. Unfortunately, our collections do not mirror the national percentage. Out of those 110,000, approximately 7,000 of those are stories of service from women. And we know that that 10% right now is going to continue to grow. I think projections are 14% in the next 10 years. So we're really aware of the fact that this is a deficit in our collection and we're making efforts to reach out to women to encourage them. But also to reach out to individuals who know women veterans to encourage them to share their story. And again, it doesn't have to be via oral history. It could be whatever it is that they're comfortable with, but we think that it's really important that we have a more accurate representation of the different individuals who make up our national history. And can you talk to me a little bit about, you know, why that's so important? I mean, we're thinking about what that experience reflects and being able to go back and look at these unique experiences. Can you tell me just from your own perspective why you think it's so important to have, you know, more women veterans voices? Sure. So I mentioned our 20th anniversary. I know you have your centennial. It's also the centennial of the 19th Amendment adoption to the Constitution. And even though women have had the right to vote for 100 years, they weren't officially recognized as full-fledged members of the military until right around World War II. Despite the fact that they had been serving, some of them disguised as men since the Revolutionary War. And one of the things that we hear pretty frequently from all veterans, but especially from women veterans, is they feel like they didn't do enough or their story isn't important. They feel like it's just kind of boring. And I'm always kind of surprised by that because to most of us what they did is pretty exceptional. I feel like your life is always going to feel a little bit boring to you because you've lived it. But when you look at it from a different perspective, you can see how much you've actually done and how much you can actually educate others who may be considering a similar career path. I was thinking about this the other day and I was thinking, you know, where would we be without the stories of Deborah Sameson? If we had no idea that she had gone out there and crazily fought in disguise, then would we have continued to try to build on that? I feel like women's roles in the military has evolved so much over time and I feel like future generations consistently are standing on the shoulders of those who came before them. And so I think it's really important for women veterans to try to leave a blueprint of what it was that their experiences were. To use this as an opportunity to have a voice and to share the good, the bad and everything in between to help empower future generations. That's an excellent point. I mean, as a woman who served, I can really connect with that. I feel like it's something we always look back in the past and think of the women who helped pave the way for us to get where we are today. And really where the things that even the women that are serving today and breaking these glass ceilings and these barriers and special forces and things like that. That story is going to be just as important and valuable as the women that served back in World War II and as Deborah Sameson. So it's really, I think, just so important that we continue to collect those stories and encourage women to share their experiences. Do you have any personal favorites that you might share with us? Things that, you know, if somebody hadn't taken the time to share their story, to record their oral history that we may never have known. Do you have any stories like that you could share? Well, I listened to yours the other day. Oh, no. That was a lot of fun because, you know, we've known each other for a while. And so there were a lot of things that I had no idea about until I sat down and listened to your story, which I thought was pretty fun. But honestly, it's a little bit like Sophie's Choice when you try to choose a favorite. I feel like every day I'm discovering something new. Some collection speaks to me for whatever reason. As a Marine, I'm sure you'll appreciate. And as an aviator, I know one of my favorites in the collection is Jane Kim, who had served as a backseater. She was a weapon systems officer. And so she flew in the backseat of F-18s for Operation Injury Freedom and Operation Iraqi Freedom, so 2002, 2003. And I think she brings a really unique perspective. But then I also really love the story of Alice Dixon. And Alice had served during World War II in the Central Postal Directory Battalion, sorting mail. She was over in Europe and she speaks to the fact that her role was not one that she saw importance with immediately, but understanding that these letters, these packages were really a lifeline for a lot of the folks that were on the frontline. She wanted to make every effort to make sure that they would get there to the original recipient. Sometimes she had to do a little bit of detective work because a lot of times people would use nicknames or, you know, put something kind of cutesy on there. So she had to do a little bit of detective work to make sure it would get to the appropriate person. And one time she speaks about the fact that she came across a little bit of contraband. She found some alcohol that had been shipped over and she didn't know what to do with it. So she of course went to her supervisor and showed that she had found this little bit of alcohol. And when she went back to the battalion, the ladies there scolded her and said, we would have taken care of that for you. So it's just, you know, you get these little gems in there, these little kind of funny ones. And we do have some really remarkable stories of groundbreakers like Commander Darlene Iskra, who was the first female commander of a U.S. Navy ship. And then we have some stories of individuals who maybe had some harder times like Wendy Taines, who opened up about her struggles with post-traumatic stress and how she's been able to take what she's experienced to help others who are now experiencing things that are similar to hers. It makes that history really to me come alive. And just those little details just make it so much richer and so much easier, I think, to kind of connect on a human level with the stories of World War II. We really don't live in a time that we can imagine what it's like to be in that situation or to be overseas in war-torn Europe. So for me, it's just so interesting and invaluable to have that on record and to hear those voices from the past. So I know back in 2002, Veterans History Project was asking, you know, as far back then, asking women veterans, defense workers, entertainers, wartime volunteers, and home front supporters to also record their personal stories. So I'm curious, is that something that is still going on? Are we still looking for those folks to preserve their oral histories as well? That's a really great point and you have a good memory remembering that. We did previously encourage the stories of men and women who had supported the war efforts. Our legislation did change in 2016 and so we've actually replaced those stories right now with the Gold Star Families. So we are now asking immediate family members to participate. We have a different subset of questions and we have a different subset of guidelines, but we do ask for immediate family members of a member of service who passed away as a result of their service to consider sharing their legacy through their memories at our National Library. I had mentioned our website, theloc.gov. I'm just going to take this real quick opportunity for anybody who isn't interested in conducting these interviews or interested in participating by sharing their story to reach out to us via email at bohp.loc.gov so that we can make sure you're all set up from that. Now it doesn't mean we're not interested in those other stories. We certainly are, but as we're not able to accept them anymore with the Veterans History Project, we have worked with some really remarkable alternate repositories and our website does have a full list on there, but feel free again to email us at the bohp.loc.gov. So we can find a good, forever home for these memories. I would imagine too that we're talking about specifically like, you know, we talk about homefront supporters. If it's a spouse, I mean, could it be, you know, oh, well, I have some letters that my spouse wrote to me while I was deployed or I mean, those could be part of a collection too, right? Absolutely. Absolutely. There was a woman I was working with just yesterday who was speaking about her uncle who unfortunately had passed away during World War II and she has a whole series of photographs, letters of all sorts of items that she's looking to donate because we do have a remarkable preservation and conservation lab and she wants to make sure that they are properly preserved so that her daughter and her daughter's family will be able to have a nice way to connect with that family member who had served during World War II. That's wonderful. And that kind of brings me to my next point. So during this long period of isolation, you know, a lot of us are locked in our four walls. When we do have time, not necessarily me because I have little children running around. They're always keeping me busy, but I know a lot of people have extra time on their hands. They're looking for things to do. They might be going through, you know, old boxes of military memorabilia. They might be going through a parent's, you know, box of World War II items or something like that. And like it would break my heart to think that these things would get just tossed in the trash or sent to, you know, Goodwill somewhere or, you know, that they would be lost to history. So can you talk a little bit about, you know, what some of the things that people can do while they're home right now to kind of preserve the items that they'd like to encapsulate in their personal archives? Sure. This is a really great time to take advantage of the time spent at home to do a little bit of spring cleaning, but more importantly to do a little bit of organization with a lot of these items. Whether it's your personal or your family archive, we recommend that you go through the letters. You go through the photographs. You go through the emails of your time in service or your loved one's time in service. Try to organize them and try to take as good of notes as possible. We have a really neat husband and wife pairing in our collection. And it's a very, very rich, you know, both of them has been just remarkable things. They both served and she took meticulous notes. So she gave with her photographs the year, the location who was listed in the photograph. You know, there was I think an aircraft in the background. And so she listed what type of aircraft whereas her husband unfortunately had so many photographs, but we have absolutely no idea where he is. Who's in the photo or what's going on? So this is a great time while we have that extra time to sit down and try to determine who's in those photographs. Who is this email referring to? You know, when you'd mentioned this in the letter, what does that mean? Because you want to make sure that the next person who has an opportunity to take a look at those items will know exactly what it is that they're looking at. We had mentioned the library's preservation and conservation lab. This is another excellent time to look at the resources that are available on the library's website. They can tell you how to preserve all sorts of different kinds of paper, whether it's film paper, letters, even books. So I would highly recommend that anybody who's interested take a peek at that to make sure that whatever their personal archive is, they can make sure that it does stand the test of time. Okay. So individuals have asked us, I just want to throw out, because we're doing things like this with the Zoom call, is this a good opportunity to interview people this way? It's not really our favorite, to be honest, just because you have no control over a lot of the technology. You know, we're looking today, and I believe you're close to where I am, and we've got a thunderstorm. So we could lose our internet, and that would mess up the whole interview. So we do recommend, when it's safe to do so, doing these interviews in person. However, if it's something that can't wait, we do have a really great list of best practices that can be followed for virtual interviews, and that's found on our blog series and our website, or again, we would be happy to email anybody who's interested in pursuing that. And so to touch on that, what are some of the requirements for people who actually want to start helping veterans record their oral history? What does it, I mean, I've done it, so I know, but for those listening, what does it take to become an interviewer? So what I think is really great is sometimes people, people think it's us who has to go out and conduct the interviews, and we have a very small staff. And so even though it's my favorite part of the job, it's not really what we're supposed to do. What's really great about the project is as a grassroots effort, we help individuals and organizations to sit down and conduct the interviews with the veterans in their lives. And you don't have to be a filmmaker or a journalist. The best thing you can do is be respectful of the individual who you're interviewing, be a good listener, and to follow the guidelines that are laid out in the field kit. If somebody wants to interview a veteran and they're not really sure where to start, I'd recommend that they take some time and think about who the veteran or Gold Star family member is who's in their lives or communities, and maybe try to start with that. Perfect. Yeah, and I mean, you guys give a great list of starter questions to kind of go through and guide these conversations. And I feel like sometimes you start going down this list and you can even just get off on a tangent, like follow some really interesting story that takes place and watch this incredible tale unfold. So it's pretty interesting. And I really enjoyed my time doing that. So I would highly encourage anyone who wants to get involved to take part in that. And you never know what you're going to unearth. So very interesting stuff. I 100% recommend it. Carrie, is there anything else you'd like to add? I want to kind of give you a moment to take the floor and give us any more information that you'd like to share. I think the big takeaway that I'd love to leave anybody who's watching this with is the fact that it's not hard. It's really, it's something that's pretty simple. It's really inspiring. And ultimately it does create a lasting legacy in one of our nation's oldest cultural and institutions with the Library of Congress. So I hope that anybody who is watching this would consider participating in this really important national archive. And of course we would welcome any questions that anybody has at any point in time. Feel free to visit one more time. I'll plug our website, which is LOC.gov forward slash bet. Wonderful. Thank you so much, Carrie, for joining me today. Always a pleasure to spend some time with you. Stay safe and healthy. And we will see you hopefully soon. Great. Thanks, Ashley.