Voices from the days of slavery: Former slaves tell their stories

At the Library of Congress [via boingBoing]

These interviews, conducted between 1932 and 1975, capture the recollections of twenty-three identifiable people born between 1823 and the early 1860s and known to have been former slaves. Several of the people interviewed were centenarians, the oldest being 130 at the time of the interview. The almost seven hours of recordings were made in nine Southern states and provide an important glimpse of what life was like for slaves and freedmen. The former slaves discuss how they felt about slavery, slaveholders, how slaves were coerced, their families, and, of course, freedom. It is important to keep in mind, however, that all of those interviewed spoke sixty or more years after the end of their enslavement, and it is their full lives, rather than their lives during slavery, that are reflected in their words.

I've been doing a bit of research into matters of oral history. Been ripping MP3s from the audio CDs I made from interviewing my grandfather (originally recorded on cassette tapes). Great to see the conversion of old analog audio into digital (and downloadable) form (Real Audio and MP3).