October 8, 2025 • 51 mins
This week, artist and Executive Director of Afro Charities Savannah Wood joins us to discuss the functional purpose of archives, why digitizing isn't a replacement for physical media, how independent Black newspapers across the country are staying afloat, and why it's so important to have a record of what our ancestors cared about in their own words.
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Speaker 1 (00:03):
Small down help from small, small human areas small. It's
so funky small those podcasts.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
So have you noticed that the rasure these.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
People really want folks to forget, which is so odd
because they think it's going to actually happen. I don't
know that it's actually really possible, but they're really about it,
about it, trying to play pretend about this United States,
not just in like the sideway stuff that has happened
in this country, but also in the people who have
been here, who have lived here, who have expanded here,
(00:46):
who have grown here. And so I'm really happy to
have Savannah Wood on the show today. Savannah is working
to create an archive of the Afro newspaper in DC
that has over three million entries and photos and pieces
of Black American history, of our existence here, of our lives.
Speaker 2 (01:11):
And I think that when we think about.
Speaker 1 (01:13):
Archives, I don't know about y'all, but I just be
thinking of something like really austere, and I want to
know more about what an archive is in the here
and now when we are seeing so much effort at erasure,
and it's not about just erasing the past, you know,
(01:35):
in terms of like these old, old old documents from
way back, but like just like the recent past. And
when I think about how much they are finding in
this process, I'm kind of jelly.
Speaker 2 (01:48):
But you know, like for me, I call myself an.
Speaker 1 (01:50):
Archivalist, okay, because I have all this stuff, and I
keep all this stuff not because I'm a hoarder, but
because I see it as like demarcations of our existence
and living. And you know, Brendan and I were talking
about how humans always want to anthropomorphize everything. We want
to make everything like a human that's seeing us back,
(02:11):
whether it's like an inanimate object or an animal, etc.
And it all ends up being about just wanting to
constantly be reminded that we're here, right, We're here, we
were here, We're going to be here.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
And that's what the archive does in such a real way.
Speaker 1 (02:25):
And I don't know if these aliens are going to
show up and are they going to.
Speaker 2 (02:29):
Look through the archives, but I know for.
Speaker 1 (02:31):
Me it helps me feel less alien when I look
through these archives and I see just how far we've
come or how far we haven't come. When I see
the different iterations of beauty of existence, it's really like
special to me. So the work that Savannah is doing
(02:53):
is going to be available I think next year, but
we have her here right now to give us some
story and to really talk to us about Baltimore and
Black Baltimore and that it's a lot more than the
wire and they have the archives to prove it.
Speaker 2 (03:08):
Let's get into it. Side effects of combatuation with Savannah would.
Speaker 1 (03:19):
Savannah is so happy to have you with us, and
y'all be.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
About to learn. We about to learn.
Speaker 1 (03:28):
This podcast did not start out as like an educational podcast.
I feel like it was more like a self help
It was a self help podcast. But at this point
we bring on folks like Savannah. We're just teaching the folks.
We're just teaching the folks. So Savannah, let's give people
some like tent poles first. So there's the African American
Newspaper's archive, There's Afro Charities, and then there's Upton Mansion
(03:51):
which will be renamed the Martha E.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
Murphy Institute or Memory Correct.
Speaker 1 (04:00):
So tell me what each of these do, how they
are interconnected, and how they all serve a role in ceasing, stopping,
challenging erasure.
Speaker 2 (04:11):
Yeah, combating erasure. Thank you. There's one more to add
to the mix, too, which is the after American newspaper Company,
which is kind of the genesis for all of this
to begin with. So, the Afro Newspaper Company was founded
in eighteen ninety two in Baltimore. My great great grandparents
purchased it in eighteen ninety seven, and our family has
been running it ever since. But they've been involved since
(04:32):
the very beginning. So that's number one. So that's one
hundred and thirty three years old this week. Congrats wen
it right, Yeah, she ancient. And then so in nineteen
sixty three, the Afronews Company established Afro Charities as a
way to house all their charitable programs, clean up initiatives,
things like that, and it's been running since then. But
(04:54):
in twenty nineteen I came back to Baltimore and revived
it as essentially the home for the AFRO News Archives, which,
as you can imagine, document the full one hundred and
thirty three years of the Afro's existence. And it's a
production file, so it's like all the photographs, most of
the articles, the original newspapers, blah blah blah blah blah.
(05:14):
So there's about three million photographs in the collection, which
gives you a sense of the scale of what we're
dealing with. And then finally, the Upton Mansion is historic
building in Baltimore that's been vacant since two thousand and six.
It's on the West Side, which is like where all
the Afros founding family had lived during their lives. It's
(05:35):
historically black, very underinvested in neighborhood. So we're rebuilding that
building essentially like it's a historic building, so we're renovating it,
and then we're building an addition and the archives will
all go there, and then we'll do all research on site,
and the Afro News Company is going to relocate, their
Afro Charities will relocate there, will have some space available
for other orgs. But yeah, it's the whole ecosystem incredible.
Speaker 1 (06:00):
You know, archives are something that I feel like archives
exist like archives for a lot of people, Like they're
just like in their own it's like in its own
little nook of knowledge. And if you don't have to
access them, I feel like a lot of people don't
know about them. They don't know where certain things show
up at how they got there. So can you just
like on a ground level, tell us what archives are
(06:25):
and who uses them? Like why, what is their functional purpose?
Speaker 2 (06:30):
Totally. I think people think they don't use archives, but
they probably do so. For instance, like if you have
ever bought a house before, the land records for that
house are probably stored in an archive for your state.
The AFRO Archives are currently located at a Maryland State
Archives facility, and in that building they have all of
the records going back to the founding of Maryland, for
(06:52):
all of the different plots of land that have been
owned in Maryland since the beginning. And so you see
the hand drawn parameters of that, you see the descriptions
of it. All of that's there, and that's how you
know that that's what your house would. Slave records be there.
Slave records are there, there's a lot, that's where my
people come from. There's a lot. Yes, So all that
(07:12):
stuff is there, Bills of sale, those types of things
are in archives. For US, newspapers typically have had something
called a quote unquote morgue, which is like when you
were writing a story, you would file it away in
the morgue once you were finished. It's like where the
story kind of like went its resting place, yes, and
where it was an internal file that was used for
(07:33):
the people who were the reporters if they wanted to
go back to a story and reference something. You know,
this is before the Internet, they had to go with
the morgue, pull up these files and be like, oh,
what did we write about this person? So that's kind
of where our collection got a mass, and that's typical
of newspapers. And so what we're doing right now is
transforming it into an archive, which has different kinds of
(07:55):
organizational structures. So for us, we just had this long
filing system that was sort of alphabetical. That's just a
to z with every single subject that was ever covered.
Oh my lord, it's a mess. There's not really like
quote unquote collections within this archive or smaller groupings. So
we have to kind of impose that on collection in
(08:17):
order to make the data fit into the system. That
is a BMF task. Thank you for understanding that. It's insane.
It's insane. So we're we're doing that right now. So
it's like, you know, we have a small team that's
working on processing the collections and they are going letter
by letter. They're currently on Jay fascinating. There are apparently
(08:41):
like seven thousand different Johnson's in the Jays. Why not,
you know, I know, so they're organizing it all, making
an alphabetical so that once we're open at our new
public research center, when people come in and they're looking
for their family member, we can actually find them instead
of having to pull like seven boxes down to try
(09:01):
to find the folder that they're looking for. So it's
a lot So who uses yes archives like professionally a
lot of people. We get a lot of requests from
documentarians people were working on movies. We get a lot
of requests from scholars who are writing books. We get
requests from journalists who are researching articles. Genealogists. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
(09:27):
yeah them the ones. Yeah, they're the ones.
Speaker 1 (09:30):
So like you know, guys, when you're watching a movie
and someone is like a sleuth or journalist is like
looking for something, and they'll go to a place and
they'll like sign in and then they'll have to give
their purse right or their bag because you're not allowed
to steal anything, right, And then you see them have
on white gloves and they're looking through some type of
(09:54):
old text Like those are archives. That's what the archives are.
If you are Game of Thronesian when Sam went to
Old Town with the meisters, that was the archives of
Western ros y'all, and that is how he was able
(10:15):
to solve the mystery of the skin disease.
Speaker 2 (10:20):
That's right, that's right. The archives probably hold the answer,
you know, go ahead, Oh no, I just have a
little sidebar. This guy justin, Garrett Moore from the Melon
Foundation sent me this really sweet link of Hannah Beechler
talking about Wakanda Forever about Black Panther. She's the production
designer and apparently she was designing what the city would
look like. She started with the Hall of Records because
(10:42):
she was like, what would it be like for this
black society to know everything about their history? And wouldn't
they put that right in the middle, wouldn't they revere it?
So if you think about that too, like that's kind
of a beautiful idea of like the Hall of Records,
this centralized place where you can come and see anything
you want to know about all the history of this place.
And that's kind of what we're building. Well, and it's
(11:03):
so necessary.
Speaker 1 (11:04):
So you know, help me contextualize for folks why this
is necessary beyond simply just because we have all this stuff,
we need.
Speaker 2 (11:11):
To organize it. Yeah, I mean, okay, so this is
combating erasure to begin with, the reason why the black
press even exists in the United States is because the
mainstream white press was not covering black issues, and if
they were, they were covering it with a very specific
perspective that was never going to show us in a
(11:31):
beautiful light, right, And so the first black newspaper that
ever comes about, that's their whole mission statement, is like,
we want to speak for ourselves, we want to plead
our own cause. For far too long others have spoken
for us. So that's the legacy that the Afro emerges
out of. So first of all, you wouldn't have these
records if it weren't for the Black Press. They might
(11:51):
be in small family collections. They might be in an
institutional archive labeled under quote unquote Negro slaves, you know,
Like that's where you would find your people, is maybe
in those types of boxes. It might be like negroes
from Missouri, Oayn, you know. But if you come to
the it's like a mass grave of records exactly. That
(12:15):
is a perfect analogy for it. So what's very different
about the black press is like you had to have
all these details in order to go to print, So
you had to know the person's first and last name.
Typically they would include the age. They probably would include
their address, even back in the day, which I find
to day to be crazy because of how ier surveilled,
but it was a little different, and then oftentimes there
(12:36):
would be a lot of information about what the image
was also showing. And so you have all this amazing
information and data about people going back to the late
eighteen hundreds in this collection, and they're filed under their names,
or under the organizations that they were a part of,
or under like the events that they were at, so
you have so much specificity. So if you're looking for
(12:57):
Black people throughout history and you want to see us
reflected in a way that actually addresses our full humanity,
then the black press becomes so important for that record.
If you want to see historical events documented from a
black perspective, the take is going to be different from
what the white newspaper is saying. So if you want
(13:18):
to have an understanding of what black public opinion was
at a particular time, the black press is very important
and you'll get, you know, whatever the publisher put out,
but you'll also get letters from the to the editor
rather in the next week of people being like I
didn't like how you wrote that, you know, So, like
the discourse that exists there is also really important for
understanding just like what's going on intellectually at this time
(13:40):
for black people, and you won't get it anywhere else.
So that's why this archive in particular is super important.
But black archives more generally that are like created by
and for black people are so important for just understanding
like a fuller scope of history.
Speaker 1 (14:01):
I just feel like there's not enough energy committed to
wanting to understand the fuller scope.
Speaker 2 (14:09):
Yeah, yeah, from some people. We're on the other side,
so we get people all the time who are like, well,
I can't believe you have the you know there, We
just get the exciting yeah yeah, yeah, which is skewing
my perspective on it, but obviously, like in a mainstream way.
Speaker 1 (14:23):
Well know, what I think is also cool about what
you have is the feelings, you know, because like history,
like you can read a history book or watch a
documentary and a lot of times it's just giving you,
you know, the facts or a version of the facts,
but it's really going to be like a dotted timeline
of this and then this and then this and then this,
(14:44):
and you know, sometimes they may have you know, somebody
commenting on it. But what I love about these archives
is that it is a snapshot of a time, and
I find myself in this era really wanting to use
those snapshots to try to give some type of frame
(15:06):
of reference of like where to go from here, you know,
Like I like, I would love to go see the
archives of literally anywhere that had a dictatorship descend upon it.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
Yeah, and then the question is will they still exist,
you know, because that's what gets attacked first, right, I
mean not first necessarily, but kind of no. But yeah,
all of their information centers.
Speaker 1 (15:34):
I mean, didn't Trump already do some weird shit with
the archives in DC?
Speaker 2 (15:39):
Absolutely, And you think about it, they're holding the record
for the country. And so when all that stuff went
down at his house where they came in and took
the records out, this isn't the first term and they
were like, you were not supposed to have these here.
These are classified documents that it should not be at
your house. And they found them like yeah, we're not
in the bathroom of mar Lago. Uh huh. Those are
archivists who were like, like, these are our records. So
(16:03):
he had it out for them.
Speaker 1 (16:04):
So when you say they're holding the record for the country,
can you tell me more about that.
Speaker 2 (16:09):
Because business records and we think of it as like
the cultural things because those are the types that's why
I tend to go looking for. But it's also business records.
It's like the email exchanges, the call logs, what actually
is going on. Those types of materials are what gets
stored in archives. So for us, we have a bunch
of business records. Also, whether or not we make all
(16:30):
of those to the public, it's going to be on
a timeline because there's still an existing business here that's
a private owned business. For the United States, it's not
a private owned business. But there are security issues, right
trying hard is how to make it though they really run.
So there are like you know, there's classified documents though,
but those documents, those things there's usually a retention schedule
(16:51):
that's put in place where different organizations or units of
the government have a timeline within which they're supposed to
transfer things to the archives in order for them to
be or for longevity for our country's history, you know.
But yeah, he's attacking all the information and knowledge centers,
the places where we can hold the record of what
has happened here so that you can spin it into
(17:11):
something else in the future and say, oh, no, that
didn't really happen. Do you go to school to be
an archivalist? Absolutely? Yeah, Yeah, there's a whole science for archives,
and so we have one person on our team who
has completed their training for that. So she's the lead archivist.
Got it, got it. So that's kind of for building
the structure of like how does the data need to
be structured in order so it's like searchable, applicable for
(17:34):
all of these different types of archival applications that exist.
So she does a lot of the systems building in
that way and creating processes for the team. Once you
have that in place, it's the type of thing where
it's like you just need to be a very thorough
detail oriented person and you can step into the role
if you have the structure already there. So she's leading
(17:54):
that part, and then we have people that we've even
trained to work in the collection. So we had a
fellowship program going for a while where we brought people
in to learn how to do this work and to
do it with a collection that's super interesting.
Speaker 1 (18:07):
What are some things You've discovered Sammy things.
Speaker 2 (18:13):
There's so many things. And it sucks because now that we're, like,
I don't know, six years into my tenure here, I'm
more on the admin side, so I'm further and further
away from the actual collection. But in the earlier days,
when I was just me like roaming around these halls,
I would just pull boxes off the shelf. And one
day I was looking for something for a researcher and
I'm looking through this fox and I just see a
(18:35):
folder that's called Homosexuals. And I was like, well, what
the hell is that? I need to know what this is.
So the labeling caught my eye first, and I opened
it up and it ended up being like all of
these gorgeous images of drag balls all up and down
the East Coast, from like the nineteen twenties to the
(18:55):
nineteen thieves. Gorgeous. You know, some body must have come
in later and put that label up, which homosexuals is hilarious.
Just what am I going to open this fold of to? Fine? Okay,
but the photos are amazing. And then it also just
like opened up this whole history that I had no
idea about. I didn't know drag balls went back that far.
Speaker 1 (19:16):
That's why I was like, wait, what, yes, yes, and
are these black people in drag balls?
Speaker 2 (19:21):
Yes, yes, I know. And so since then, you know,
we've had people reach out specifically about that. I think
the Johnson Publishing Company Archives just put out a blog
post about finding some of these photographs and their collection also.
So it's this type of thing where it's like you
don't even know that it's there until somebody is handling
these materials and helping to make them discoverable. But like,
that was a huge revelation for me. That one was big,
(19:43):
very major. And then one of our team members, she's
not with us anymore, but she's Liberian and she's always like,
you know, speaking of what happens in a place where
you don't have autonomy over your own things. In that case,
there's a civil war, and she talks often about the
fact that records are no longer in existence. You have
to really piece together these archives because there is no
(20:05):
central archive for this. And so what she found while
she was processing the collection were these like photo albums
that somebody at the AFRO had put together of visiting Liberia.
I think it was in the thirties, and so there's
like Mary McLeod bethoon in there, like there's all of
these really beautiful images that somebody like went on this trip,
took these photographs, came back and compiled them into a
(20:27):
photo album and it's just on the shelf. Nobody knew.
Speaker 1 (20:32):
Bruh, right, wild, Why are we so hype about these
types of things?
Speaker 2 (20:37):
Like you and I are both like what could you
know like some of the history, but then to be
able to actually hold it, yeah, And then to think
about somebody like putting their time into making sure that
the names were documented, that the images were compiled like
they thought it was important. So that also makes me
(20:57):
feel like, well, damn, I gotta like honor the labor
that for me too, you know, it's like somebody put
a lot into this with the limited resources that they had,
So how am I going to take it to the
next level?
Speaker 1 (21:08):
I feel like because also like humans, like we just
kind of like depending on your belief system, Like okay,
I'll put it this way, there is no proof of
where we came from, Like we have beliefs, but there
is no like empirical proof, And so I feel like
archives like give us a sense of grounding in that
we were here before you were here, you know. And
(21:29):
like I remember when I was eleven, I made a
very distinct decision to write down every day what I
did on my calendar. And I remember saying, someone's gonna
want to know, Like I don't.
Speaker 2 (21:44):
Know who I thought I was, but at eleven, I said,
someone's gonna want to know what I was doing that.
Speaker 1 (21:51):
And I did this for like four years, and I
have the calendars, and you know who the someone was me.
Speaker 2 (21:56):
I wanted to know what was it? And it'll be
like went to see Jurassic Park.
Speaker 1 (22:04):
Like that was it was the action, Yes, that was
the like action of note for that day.
Speaker 2 (22:10):
I'm stills for journals from my ancestors in these collections.
I'm still looking because I'm just like, what were y'all thinking?
You know, it's like we get the public statement, yes,
you know, we get the public statement in their actions, but.
Speaker 1 (22:23):
Like why I keep a journal and what I said
not always exactly facts. Facts like my mom found my
grandmother's journals, and she found my grandmother's Bible and she
had it restored. She was able to get it restored
because it was like falling apart. But in one of
(22:44):
the journals, my grandmother's talking about Palestine.
Speaker 2 (22:47):
Hm.
Speaker 1 (22:47):
My grandmother was like super dupid devout Christian, like writing
scripture on the walls of the house, like I just
remember wow through the house, like.
Speaker 2 (22:55):
Why you're blessed.
Speaker 1 (22:58):
Yes, I was get in trouble for whistling in the
house because she was like, yeah, making angels cry.
Speaker 2 (23:03):
And I was like, you're just taking this too far.
Speaker 1 (23:05):
But in her journals, like she talks about how you know,
one palatine is free, like this will be a huge
impactful thing that like impacts the entire earth. This is
in sixty eight, This is right during like the sixty
seven borders and the Ntefada. And I find it just
like we're talking about the archives in the context of
(23:27):
like this formal company, but your family you have like
your own archives, like as people like we have our
own archives. Yeah, Like can you speak to just kind
of the yeah, speak to that ancestral who that you
just gave.
Speaker 2 (23:44):
There's so much. There's so much, I mean, it does.
Everybody has something. I hope. I hope you're holding onto
something from your lifetime, from your parents' lifetime, from their
parents' lifetime that speaks to who they were because it
is a record of like you were here, this is
what you cared about, this is what you did. For
you to find that journal of your grandmother's It's like
I can only imagine what that felt like for you
(24:06):
to be as outspoken as you are about pales side
and then to see that this is like this is generational,
This isn't something new. It's beautiful, you know, it just
gets a sense of recognition and like helps you understand
who you are in the world, how to be grounded
in it, and how to just stand firm in that
understand it, you know, like that knowing one of the
things that I mean, there's so many oofs in it, right,
(24:28):
Like one of the things that has shifted because of
the work that I'm doing now is like I put
a date on every single thing that I'm writing, because
I find stuff and I'm just like, well, when was this?
What's the context? Like what's the here? You know, like
I want to know in my journals al right on
the front page, like this is the journal preceding? This
is this color? And is this? And then I'll like
leave all those places for like the journal after is this,
(24:49):
because you know, if somebody where to find this and
did care, Like, I'm going to help you out a
little bit so you don't have to do so much
of this work, you know, just infusing it with a
little bit of that, just to help out the researcher
to come. But one of the things that you know,
I'm so blessed with, frankly, is that the people that
I come from had an engine to tell stories. Like
(25:11):
they created this newspaper company to tell the story. So
there's less imagining that we have to do because they
told their own history. Now I will say occasionally I'll
go back and read it and be like, now, what
is the embellishment here? Really, I'll be like, A, I
don't know about all? Okay, you know, was there a
(25:33):
personal connection? You know? Just like I got questions. But
it's just a gift to be able to have a
record of like what did y'all care about?
Speaker 1 (25:40):
That record of what right? What did y'all care about?
I still have my movie tickets stuff from set it
off because you care because I cared.
Speaker 2 (25:55):
And you know what, So.
Speaker 1 (25:57):
During the pandemic, I was staying with my mom for
like three months, like at my childhood home, and I
came across these diaries from when I was like, I
think it was like fifth grade, sixth grade, seventh grade,
and they didn't have a lot of entries, but the entries,
every entry was like I mean, I guess that says
(26:19):
something because that means that I felt the need that
I needed to write this down, like and I would
say ninety percent of the entries were about like my
father in some shape wear form. And I remember I
was seeing someone at seeing as a strong word. I
was trying to detach from someone I had a very
(26:39):
toxic interaction with the time, and I was talking about
it and he was like, oh, it was your dad
and I was like, what was my dad?
Speaker 2 (26:47):
And he was like that's what YO said and this
came from as a child. And I was like, stop
knowing me. You're like will and that that's what you're
here for. That's what you're here for.
Speaker 1 (27:02):
I took that into my next therapy session and had
like a breakthrough that I had no idea that we
were trying to get to for five years, but that's
when I found out I was codependent.
Speaker 2 (27:11):
And she was like, oh, finally, geez, you know, I
think this is why we get into these relationships though,
because there's appos to teach you something. I like to
tell myself that that's is why, Yes, I learned that.
Speaker 1 (27:23):
I learned about that there are different particular roles for
drug dealers.
Speaker 2 (27:28):
Did you know this?
Speaker 1 (27:30):
Like everybody is not simply just like a drug dealer,
Like there's cooks, there's corner boys, of course, but like
there's also like people who are like the bookkeepers.
Speaker 2 (27:39):
There's an ecosystem. It's a whole ecosystem.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
But I guess, like you know, whenever I have seen
these operations on TV, like we just see like violence
and it's like.
Speaker 2 (27:49):
A wire not on the why plug for the wire,
but it is I'm here, so I have to stay.
Speaker 1 (27:56):
Like I had no idea that there's like specific people
who are just I mean, I guess this makes sense
for you know, what was that show.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
With Walt What was the show with the Breaking Bad?
Breaking Bad? Like there's chemists but I know that for
like that.
Speaker 1 (28:10):
But he was like, no, like there are people who
are good at cooking in a way that does not
kill people. And I was like, what do you mean?
And he was like, because you have to cut the drugs.
They're too pure for a lot of folks that have
been like taking crack or whatever, like you have to
cut it, and if you cut it wrong, someone will
overdose because their body can't handle that. A lot of
(28:34):
people are functional addicts, so they're only they need the
drug to actually be a certain level or else their
body can't handle it.
Speaker 2 (28:42):
Who how did I get here? Ah, we can talk
you about them. I'm just sorry.
Speaker 1 (28:53):
No, we've got here because I was saying that I had.
Speaker 2 (28:55):
An ex who I learned things from. I learned things
about myself, and I learned things about about the world.
About the world. We have to know this.
Speaker 1 (29:02):
Wow, where do you feel like archives exist in a
world that is so increasingly AI driven, that is so
increasingly tech driven, digital driven? You know, I remember doing microfiche,
you know, it was like the way that you accessed newspapers.
And like somebody listening just now heard me say that,
(29:24):
and it's like, is that a la boobu?
Speaker 2 (29:25):
You know what I mean? Like, is that a pokemon?
I only learned what a la boobo is because I
have nephews. Thank you nephews. I actually don't even really
know what a la boobo is. To keep it in
many what is it? It's like a little stuffed animal
on a keychain and they're creepy little gremlin looking things.
But why exactly ferbies, beanie babies, you know, same concept. Okay,
(29:45):
collect them all. Yeah, okay. So microfiche, if we want
to talk about it, is like basically a reproduction of
the newspaper. It's like you take an image of it
and it's on film and there's an enlarger for it,
and then you can read it that way and like
puls the film through and you can look at it
and that's that. And actually, so most of the Afronews archives,
(30:07):
like the actual newspapers, we're on microfeche and have been
digitized from that and are actually searchable publicly, which is
a big thing that people don't really know. Yeah. So
if your library subscribes to proquests, for instance, they have
this thing called Historical Black Newspapers, and the AFRO is
one of the papers on their way, the word search
is going all the way back to the eighteen hundreds. Amazing.
(30:29):
It's a huge Yes, So there's that, but there's so
much emphasis on digitization and actually, like one of the
things is that people just assume that if you digitize it,
it's stable and please talk. That's not real, not real.
And so in this like a hyperd digitized, undigital world,
(30:50):
like one of the things that we get asked so
often by people who are interested and potentially funding the
work or just want to know what we're doing, is like, well,
are you have you digitize everything? Yet? Are you digitizing everything?
And I'm like, first of all, there's three million photographs
in this collection. Second of all, know you know, like
who's doing that? And it's a great like backup for
redundancy because obviously physical materials are you know, the perishable,
(31:15):
they're vulnerable, Let's say yes, But it's not a replacement
for those things. And I think that's something that people
don't really get. But there are ways that we are
using digital tools and even AI tools to help unlock
the archives. And so one of the products that we
did a couple of years ago was like a pilot
digitization project. We took a sample of photographs and tried
(31:35):
digitizing the fronts and backs and like building a little
staging database for the data because I told you, there's
like all this amazing data in there. There's the addresses,
the names, like all of this stuff that if you
can pull it out. You could start mapping these images,
you know, you could do all of this really beautiful
data visualization work using the materials from this collection. So
what happens if we try to do this? What happens
(31:56):
if we can like use AI to read the bats
of the photos and pull out the caps information. So
instead of this image that has let's say, like Rosa
Parks and three other people in it filed under just
Rosa Parks, if all the other names are listed in
the caption, then we can use AI to read the
back of the image and search the other names. So
if it's your auntie who's in that picture with Rosa
(32:18):
Parks and we're looking for her, we can search her
name and it'll come up instead of us just being like, sorry,
we don't have anything for you, you know. So those
ways in which like we can use AI to help
us make the collection more discoverable. So we're thinking about that.
But there's also we've been working with young people in
the collection too. One of our partners in Baltimore is
(32:38):
this organization called MUS three sixty and they have a
program called New Generation Scholars and in their Young Artists
Archival Fellowship, these folks come in and they're you know,
I have to I have to do it because I
remember the name yea artists Kival Fellows. When they come in,
(32:59):
they're like whoa, what this is real? You know, they're
just like shocked because there's so because of the expansiveness, yeah,
the expansiveness, and because there's so much that they're consuming
that's digital where it's like oh I can.
Speaker 1 (33:11):
Oh yeah right right right, like that becomes a whole
other experience. Like I can hold a camera that's not
also a phone, it's a camera, it's.
Speaker 2 (33:23):
The whole thing. I can hold a discman. One of
the fellows found an image of her great great grandfather
in there, like on accident. No, she was looking for him,
but we had it, you know, and she was but
we have I've never seen this image before. And she's
holding it her hand, you know, and she's like sending
a text and sending it to her mom. You know
(33:44):
what I mean. It's just like yeah, yeah, yeah, you
need that experience also, and you need to know that
like there has been an organization, there's been an institution
in this city that gave a shit, that still cares,
that cares about your family, that thinks that your story
is important, that wants you to be well documented, and
(34:06):
that wants your story to be told.
Speaker 1 (34:14):
I mean, tell me about the beginnings of the newspaper,
because it had to have started at a time when
it was illegal, not necessarily illegal.
Speaker 2 (34:22):
And Baltimore is an interesting city too. Maryland's an interesting case.
Speaker 1 (34:26):
Yeah, Like I mean, Frigeri Jeglis talks about like being
enslaved in Baltimore, and he was like, you know, it
wasn't really like it was like slavery ish.
Speaker 2 (34:34):
That's essentially how he refers to it, which is all
the while. Yeah, he's like, I had a great talie
in Baltimore. I mean, it's strange. So this little fact
that I learned when I'm back here that I never
learned growing up here was apparently Baltimore had more free
black people before the Civil War than any other place
in the country. Oh, which I think is fascinating. I
do too, And it also I think starts to tell
(34:56):
you something about like why Baltimore might be the way
it is today. How was Baltimore today? What I'm just saying,
We've been free and they've been trying to police freedom
for a very long time, and so anytime you have
a large free black population, there's going to be forces
that are trying to like circumscribe that and make it
not so. And so we've had all of this like
(35:16):
wheeling and dealing back and forth trying to maintain that freedom. Okay,
So the founding of the paper, most of these things
were coming out of black churches. So it's like you
got the main institutions. Black churches are a big one.
So it's actually this guy, William Alexander, he was a reverend.
He founded this paper called The Home Protector in eighteen
ninety nine. It became the Afro American in eighteen ninety
(35:38):
two when he got some other investors in there. And
we think at around that time my great great grandfather
was involved as a printer for the paper, but he
was definitely publishing something called the Sunday School Helper out
of a nearby church. And then the newspaper got bought
up by these other businessmen who had like a feed
store and some other stuff, and the rest of the
business was tanking, and they started pulling things out of
(36:00):
the Afro in order to cover other businesses, and ultimately
the whole thing went under, and so my great great
grandfather borrowed money from his wife and bought the name
and the printing press at an auction and revived the
paper and it's been running ever since. Then. Does it
still run now?
Speaker 1 (36:19):
Yeah, like you used to put out stories now yeah,
I mean I don't personally, but yeah no, But I
mean like the paper does.
Speaker 2 (36:24):
Yeah, I mean every day it's afro dot com. And
then the other thing is they have a physical product
too that they send out weekly, so you can get
it anywhere in the world. They will send it to you.
Speaker 1 (36:33):
What well in that regard, I mean, when we're seeing
the really obvious fascist takeover of mainstream media, I mean
it was already sideways, but now it's like completely pointless.
Speaker 2 (36:47):
Where does AFRO go from here? I mean, I think
it's a really good question. I try as hard as
I can to stay in my lane, which is in
the archives, because there's already so much to do over there.
But it's always in an independent newspaper company. It's always
been a family owned newspaper company, and so you know,
there's the same challenges that any other news organization has
(37:09):
in terms of trying to make sure that there's enough
advertising funding, that there's enough diversity in the business model,
that there's money coming in from other places, there's all
of those issues. It's always been a very small team,
except you know, back in the heyday, which was like
right before desegregation. So I think they're just trying to
continue that and like also banding together with other legacy
(37:30):
black papers across the country. So they founded a couple
of years ago this consortium called Word in Black that's
like ten different papers from across the country working together
to publish stories and get national reach and to get
new advertising dollars. In that you can say we have
this national reach because we have this consortium. So they're
working on cooperative economics wherever they can, and you know,
(37:53):
just trying to make it work.
Speaker 1 (37:55):
Speaking of work, you said that you came back to
this work and nineteen and that you came back to archives,
So like what brought you into that space?
Speaker 2 (38:05):
M eh. I did not expect her that to be no, no, no, no, no,
it's great. I had been working in arts organizations in
Chicago and in LA and in both of those places,
Chicago first and then Los Angeles, both of those places,
we were doing work with archives. So it was like
creative interpretations of archives, artists working with archives, that kind
(38:25):
of thing. And then at some point I was just like,
you know what, I wonder if we have one.
Speaker 1 (38:29):
We probably got an archive, right, I'm over here with
these people archive.
Speaker 2 (38:34):
Maybe I should be working with my people archive. So
I came home and I looked and was like, oh,
we got an archive. Wow. It's massive. I mean, it's
absolutely massive. It's a huge collection. The woman I was
telling you earlier are lead archivist. She's been doing archival
work for more than twenty years. And the one thing
that she always tells people is like, the main challenge
(38:55):
with this collection is just its size. She's like, I've
worked at all these different types of institutions, but this
is the first one where I've dealt with a processing
project of this size. Like it's massive. Why is it
so massive? Is it just time a century of like
collecting all this stuff? You know? Like I tell people, like,
imagine you're in your house or like you've been in
(39:16):
a family home for decades, Like your attic probably looks crazy,
your basement probably looks crazy. And then you imagine, like
this is a company that's putting out papers several times
a week for decades out of five different offices. They
were in Richmond, DC, Baltimore, Newark, Philadelphia. You know, you
just collect all this stuff. There's all these photographs, there's
(39:38):
all these notes, there's all these like memos going back
and forths not email, the facts back to the physical.
You know, it's kind of wild. So the record's all there.
Speaker 1 (39:48):
I mean, what would you say is the biggest effort
of a rasure that you're witnessing right now of black folks.
Speaker 2 (39:55):
There's so many, There's so many. I mean, I think
it's one that this slight comes to mind. Yeah, one
that to mind immediately is just like taking black history
out of schools. Yeah, that's number one. And I think
there's I've always been in a family that has prioritized
teaching us our history outside of school anyway, and I
think a lot of black people have had that kind
(40:18):
of situation. But it's like we just got to spread
it out the whole, like each one teach one situation.
It's like we got to just continue to pump that
information out as much as possible in our networks, in
our communities, wherever we find them online. However, that's the
most egregious, honestly, at.
Speaker 1 (40:33):
This point, I feel like everyone should be coming to
black history classes. Yeah, there's we need to know our history.
But I'm also like, yam phones need to know our history.
Speaker 2 (40:42):
Oh absolutely, absolutely, because otherwise, like you don't even know
who you was with, and I don't just being white people, no, everybody, Like,
in order to even understand what this country is, you
have to know our history. There's no way around it.
And so to just take it out altogether, I'm like,
so what are we learning here? Like this is American history?
Like this is it? It's it.
Speaker 1 (41:01):
Like I did an interview with a sister who runs
the NEUAK Caribbean page on Instagram, and we were talking
about just how so many Caribbean people just don't know
the Black American experience, like the uniqueness of the Black
American experience. And I feel like these archives and these
spaces of black people telling their own stories, right, like
(41:24):
black people also like having their own reactions in their
own words, is so silence.
Speaker 2 (41:30):
It's quieted and it's homogenized.
Speaker 1 (41:34):
I feel like even when we see it in film,
et cetera, it's like a compilation of Okay, we read
twenty five of these letters to the editor and this
was kind of like the average response.
Speaker 2 (41:45):
Yeah, yeah, I mean and that's what else are you
going to do in that kind of set? No, but
I guess what I'm saying is like we lose nuance. Yeah,
oh yeah, that's I think one of the biggest benefits
of having an archive is that the nuance is everywhere.
You know, it's everywhere. Anything that you pick out of
a box. It's like you can care whatever you want
is in there.
Speaker 1 (42:04):
So let's go to our Patreon only segment and I
would love to hear from you. What are some archives
that you would like to explore that you may not
have explored or that you have explored, and how did
they shift or how do you feel like they will
shift you. So we're get to get into that with
our guests.
Speaker 2 (42:24):
Savanna on when we go over to the Seal Squad.
I am of a mind.
Speaker 1 (42:35):
That I do not call myself a quarter. I call
myself an archive balst.
Speaker 2 (42:41):
A collector.
Speaker 1 (42:42):
Maybe yes, well, because I feel like some people would say,
like you just have a lot of stuff, and I'm like,
but none of this stuff is like gratuitous, Like I
think it's neat to be able to see like my walkman,
my discman my, you know mini disc players like that
to me feels because I don't know about you, but
(43:03):
I feel like for a lot of Americans, history like
ended at the end of the seventies. It's like the
concept of history doesn't extend to the eighties and the nineties.
That's history. Like the old school station is playing week right,
I know, that's like.
Speaker 2 (43:19):
Everybody with the two thousands. I'm like, that feels like
it was the end of a time for me, Like
that's a time where it's like, Okay, everything ended in Yes,
nineteen seventy is as far back as it is. We're
all still thinking it's thirty years ago. We're all still
thinking its thirty years ago.
Speaker 1 (43:34):
Meanwhile, like peplam shirts and statement necklaces at the club's history.
Speaker 2 (43:41):
Okay, I hope.
Speaker 1 (43:42):
So what is the connectivity between like libraries and archives
if at all?
Speaker 2 (43:50):
Yeah, I mean, people have a cute acronym called GLAM
that's like gallery, library, archives, museum. So it's like information
sciences people who work in that field. But libraries are
primarily for books, and then archives are primarily for other
kinds of documents. Is it often though, that the two
exist together? Yeah? Yeah, Like For instance, a lot of
(44:11):
libraries will have a special collections area, and the special
collections are the archives. That's what the special collections is. Hey,
they're hiding from you in plain sight.
Speaker 1 (44:21):
Yes, Like when Hermione wanted to find a book on
the dark Arts, she had to go to the special collections.
I mean, I feel like there's oftentimes like these secret
professions that people don't know about that they would actually
love doing. And that's what archive Like, that's what would
(44:41):
you call it? Information studies?
Speaker 2 (44:43):
Yeah, information studies, Information sciences.
Speaker 1 (44:45):
Yeah, yeah, Like I've never heard about no shit like
that information sciences.
Speaker 2 (44:50):
Neither me either. I stumbled into this like an oblong way.
I came in through art, so I had to find
my way here. How did you get there through art?
I was working at Rebuild Foundation in Chicago, which is
founded by this artist, the Estergates, and he does a
lot of work with archives, so he somehow collected this.
(45:12):
The University of Chicago was offloading a bunch of these
like glass lantern slides that they had, so it's literally slides,
but it's on glass, and they're in these huge filing
cabinets and they're like, we've digitized these we don't need
these anymore. They're heavy, they're taking up space. Let's get
rid of them. He was like, these are beautiful art objects.
I will collect them, and ended up having to like
reinforce the floors of his home in order to put
(45:33):
these things in because they were so heavy. But he
started just making these collections of like interesting things. So
this was the Art History Department slide collection. So there's
all of these really interesting slides, you know, And so
as an artist, I was working there and we started
doing activations with some of the stuff that he had.
So it's like, oh, well, let's see what we can
make from these slides, let's see what we you know, whatever.
(45:54):
Just like making up stuff as a way to bring
people in and get them interested in what the collections are.
That was one thing. And then you know, I worked
on this collection of like racist memorabilia that one couple
had been collecting for forty years because they were trying
to take things out of circulation initially, and then they
realized that that was going to never happen because there
was so much of it, and so instead they started
(46:16):
collecting things that ended up being a way of understanding
the racist imaginary in America because it's like who would
come up with this shit? Yes, and who would take
their time to make me objects by hand and then
market them and like create a whole industry around this.
So it's a fascinating collection. But I first got into
(46:37):
archives by documenting that with a couple of other artists
that were on the team and creating a catalog for it,
so that whole collection, the glass Lantern slides. And then
he got the Johnson Publishing Companies Library, so the library
that used to be at Ebony and Jet. Oh, he
was able to get that. So that's all now in
(46:57):
this building that's the Stony Island Arts Bank on the
south out of Chicago, and those collections live there and
they're activated by people all the time. So that was
like my artistic way into archives is Essence in there.
I don't remember because I didn't really work on them,
because there was an Essence magazine where Common had crochet
pants on and he yeah, there was effectively sponged and
(47:20):
scrubbed this from the Internet, and I know it exists.
Is not possible.
Speaker 1 (47:25):
I'm telling you, it was a whole era.
Speaker 2 (47:30):
We were all there for it. Come close, soom babe,
we were there. Okay, then there was the light damn
that we were there. We were there. Yeah. They did
the song together for the.
Speaker 1 (47:45):
Water Chocolate, Yes, like one for chocolate, and then they
did the song together for Brown Sugar soundtrack, and he
had on the crochet pants in that video and y'all
trying to convince me it didn't happen, and I feel
gas lit and I need to go to an archive.
I also think that's a really good use for an
archive too. It can really clear up some gaslighting.
Speaker 2 (48:04):
Absolutely, when you said that, I was like, ooh, I'm
putting on my back block. Yat, No, it happened. I'm
telling you what happens. We believe in your kives. I
believe it.
Speaker 1 (48:15):
So do you have any projections of when the archives
would actually open to the public.
Speaker 2 (48:19):
Yeah, we're under construction right now and it looks like
end of twenty twenty six is when the construction will
be finish. We'll have a little bit of time in
between there, and then hopefully we'll be open to the
public by the end of next year. Crazy, that's really soon.
It's really soon. Yeah. I mean it's been a beast
because we've been working on it since I moved back
here in twenty nineteen basically, and oh so this is
(48:41):
like light at the end of the tunnel time exactly exactly.
So it's like a sixteen million dollar project and we
have one more million to raise. Okay, so if anybody
wants to help out with that, I will gladly accept.
Afrocharities dot org. Got it. And then I'm also like
really just focused and not concerned, but like thinking about
how we make this sustainable long term. And so the
(49:04):
next goal after that is to establish essentially an endowment
for the building and two roles so that we know
that the collections are protected long term and that we
have two people there who can keep an eye on them.
So that'll be the next goal. You work, I'm working.
I'm working. That's why I'm like, I'm going to vacage time.
(49:26):
That's why i love Hollywood. Yes, yeah, we're working with it,
but it's coming along. We're almost there. The last.
Speaker 1 (49:40):
Well, thank you so much for sharing your knowledge with
us and for the work that you're doing in this
very necessary practice.
Speaker 2 (49:49):
You know, the archive space. I feel like the.
Speaker 1 (49:54):
Historical space at one point just felt like a subject,
you know, like a school subject, whereas now now more
than ever in my lifetime. It's a lifeline. It's not
simply just an information science. Like it's a life science.
And when we think about like when you go to
like a Mayan ruin and you're like, how are we
(50:17):
able to know all of this about them? It's because
like they were archiving their existence back then, they were
writing down they like made paper. Then they're like this,
how we made the paper. You know, these types of things,
And I think, you know, for where we are now,
like people, I don't know people even to think we're
going to be here forever. And I feel like I'm
(50:39):
a soul that keeps coming back, So like I'm gonna
end up coming back and being like, oh it was
on the podcast.
Speaker 2 (50:46):
I'd be like, yeah, girl, I remember, I'm hoping to
like evolve out. We just evolve me into something else,
Gonna be a trainee.
Speaker 1 (50:54):
I mean, I think we all kind of have our
own version of archives, and black folks, we really really
need to make it our business to keep record.
Speaker 2 (51:06):
So thank you in multiple places and tell somebody about
it too. That part
Small down help from small, small human areas small. It's
so funky small those podcasts.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
So have you noticed that the rasure these.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
People really want folks to forget, which is so odd
because they think it's going to actually happen. I don't
know that it's actually really possible, but they're really about it,
about it, trying to play pretend about this United States,
not just in like the sideway stuff that has happened
in this country, but also in the people who have
been here, who have lived here, who have expanded here,
(00:46):
who have grown here. And so I'm really happy to
have Savannah Wood on the show today. Savannah is working
to create an archive of the Afro newspaper in DC
that has over three million entries and photos and pieces
of Black American history, of our existence here, of our lives.
Speaker 2 (01:11):
And I think that when we think about.
Speaker 1 (01:13):
Archives, I don't know about y'all, but I just be
thinking of something like really austere, and I want to
know more about what an archive is in the here
and now when we are seeing so much effort at erasure,
and it's not about just erasing the past, you know,
(01:35):
in terms of like these old, old old documents from
way back, but like just like the recent past. And
when I think about how much they are finding in
this process, I'm kind of jelly.
Speaker 2 (01:48):
But you know, like for me, I call myself an.
Speaker 1 (01:50):
Archivalist, okay, because I have all this stuff, and I
keep all this stuff not because I'm a hoarder, but
because I see it as like demarcations of our existence
and living. And you know, Brendan and I were talking
about how humans always want to anthropomorphize everything. We want
to make everything like a human that's seeing us back,
(02:11):
whether it's like an inanimate object or an animal, etc.
And it all ends up being about just wanting to
constantly be reminded that we're here, right, We're here, we
were here, We're going to be here.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
And that's what the archive does in such a real way.
Speaker 1 (02:25):
And I don't know if these aliens are going to
show up and are they going to.
Speaker 2 (02:29):
Look through the archives, but I know for.
Speaker 1 (02:31):
Me it helps me feel less alien when I look
through these archives and I see just how far we've
come or how far we haven't come. When I see
the different iterations of beauty of existence, it's really like
special to me. So the work that Savannah is doing
(02:53):
is going to be available I think next year, but
we have her here right now to give us some
story and to really talk to us about Baltimore and
Black Baltimore and that it's a lot more than the
wire and they have the archives to prove it.
Speaker 2 (03:08):
Let's get into it. Side effects of combatuation with Savannah would.
Speaker 1 (03:19):
Savannah is so happy to have you with us, and
y'all be.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
About to learn. We about to learn.
Speaker 1 (03:28):
This podcast did not start out as like an educational podcast.
I feel like it was more like a self help
It was a self help podcast. But at this point
we bring on folks like Savannah. We're just teaching the folks.
We're just teaching the folks. So Savannah, let's give people
some like tent poles first. So there's the African American
Newspaper's archive, There's Afro Charities, and then there's Upton Mansion
(03:51):
which will be renamed the Martha E.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
Murphy Institute or Memory Correct.
Speaker 1 (04:00):
So tell me what each of these do, how they
are interconnected, and how they all serve a role in ceasing, stopping,
challenging erasure.
Speaker 2 (04:11):
Yeah, combating erasure. Thank you. There's one more to add
to the mix, too, which is the after American newspaper Company,
which is kind of the genesis for all of this
to begin with. So, the Afro Newspaper Company was founded
in eighteen ninety two in Baltimore. My great great grandparents
purchased it in eighteen ninety seven, and our family has
been running it ever since. But they've been involved since
(04:32):
the very beginning. So that's number one. So that's one
hundred and thirty three years old this week. Congrats wen
it right, Yeah, she ancient. And then so in nineteen
sixty three, the Afronews Company established Afro Charities as a
way to house all their charitable programs, clean up initiatives,
things like that, and it's been running since then. But
(04:54):
in twenty nineteen I came back to Baltimore and revived
it as essentially the home for the AFRO News Archives, which,
as you can imagine, document the full one hundred and
thirty three years of the Afro's existence. And it's a
production file, so it's like all the photographs, most of
the articles, the original newspapers, blah blah blah blah blah.
(05:14):
So there's about three million photographs in the collection, which
gives you a sense of the scale of what we're
dealing with. And then finally, the Upton Mansion is historic
building in Baltimore that's been vacant since two thousand and six.
It's on the West Side, which is like where all
the Afros founding family had lived during their lives. It's
(05:35):
historically black, very underinvested in neighborhood. So we're rebuilding that
building essentially like it's a historic building, so we're renovating it,
and then we're building an addition and the archives will
all go there, and then we'll do all research on site,
and the Afro News Company is going to relocate, their
Afro Charities will relocate there, will have some space available
for other orgs. But yeah, it's the whole ecosystem incredible.
Speaker 1 (06:00):
You know, archives are something that I feel like archives
exist like archives for a lot of people, Like they're
just like in their own it's like in its own
little nook of knowledge. And if you don't have to
access them, I feel like a lot of people don't
know about them. They don't know where certain things show
up at how they got there. So can you just
like on a ground level, tell us what archives are
(06:25):
and who uses them? Like why, what is their functional purpose?
Speaker 2 (06:30):
Totally. I think people think they don't use archives, but
they probably do so. For instance, like if you have
ever bought a house before, the land records for that
house are probably stored in an archive for your state.
The AFRO Archives are currently located at a Maryland State
Archives facility, and in that building they have all of
the records going back to the founding of Maryland, for
(06:52):
all of the different plots of land that have been
owned in Maryland since the beginning. And so you see
the hand drawn parameters of that, you see the descriptions
of it. All of that's there, and that's how you
know that that's what your house would. Slave records be there.
Slave records are there, there's a lot, that's where my
people come from. There's a lot. Yes, So all that
(07:12):
stuff is there, Bills of sale, those types of things
are in archives. For US, newspapers typically have had something
called a quote unquote morgue, which is like when you
were writing a story, you would file it away in
the morgue once you were finished. It's like where the
story kind of like went its resting place, yes, and
where it was an internal file that was used for
(07:33):
the people who were the reporters if they wanted to
go back to a story and reference something. You know,
this is before the Internet, they had to go with
the morgue, pull up these files and be like, oh,
what did we write about this person? So that's kind
of where our collection got a mass, and that's typical
of newspapers. And so what we're doing right now is
transforming it into an archive, which has different kinds of
(07:55):
organizational structures. So for us, we just had this long
filing system that was sort of alphabetical. That's just a
to z with every single subject that was ever covered.
Oh my lord, it's a mess. There's not really like
quote unquote collections within this archive or smaller groupings. So
we have to kind of impose that on collection in
(08:17):
order to make the data fit into the system. That
is a BMF task. Thank you for understanding that. It's insane.
It's insane. So we're we're doing that right now. So
it's like, you know, we have a small team that's
working on processing the collections and they are going letter
by letter. They're currently on Jay fascinating. There are apparently
(08:41):
like seven thousand different Johnson's in the Jays. Why not,
you know, I know, so they're organizing it all, making
an alphabetical so that once we're open at our new
public research center, when people come in and they're looking
for their family member, we can actually find them instead
of having to pull like seven boxes down to try
(09:01):
to find the folder that they're looking for. So it's
a lot So who uses yes archives like professionally a
lot of people. We get a lot of requests from
documentarians people were working on movies. We get a lot
of requests from scholars who are writing books. We get
requests from journalists who are researching articles. Genealogists. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
(09:27):
yeah them the ones. Yeah, they're the ones.
Speaker 1 (09:30):
So like you know, guys, when you're watching a movie
and someone is like a sleuth or journalist is like
looking for something, and they'll go to a place and
they'll like sign in and then they'll have to give
their purse right or their bag because you're not allowed
to steal anything, right, And then you see them have
on white gloves and they're looking through some type of
(09:54):
old text Like those are archives. That's what the archives are.
If you are Game of Thronesian when Sam went to
Old Town with the meisters, that was the archives of
Western ros y'all, and that is how he was able
(10:15):
to solve the mystery of the skin disease.
Speaker 2 (10:20):
That's right, that's right. The archives probably hold the answer,
you know, go ahead, Oh no, I just have a
little sidebar. This guy justin, Garrett Moore from the Melon
Foundation sent me this really sweet link of Hannah Beechler
talking about Wakanda Forever about Black Panther. She's the production
designer and apparently she was designing what the city would
look like. She started with the Hall of Records because
(10:42):
she was like, what would it be like for this
black society to know everything about their history? And wouldn't
they put that right in the middle, wouldn't they revere it?
So if you think about that too, like that's kind
of a beautiful idea of like the Hall of Records,
this centralized place where you can come and see anything
you want to know about all the history of this place.
And that's kind of what we're building. Well, and it's
(11:03):
so necessary.
Speaker 1 (11:04):
So you know, help me contextualize for folks why this
is necessary beyond simply just because we have all this stuff,
we need.
Speaker 2 (11:11):
To organize it. Yeah, I mean, okay, so this is
combating erasure to begin with, the reason why the black
press even exists in the United States is because the
mainstream white press was not covering black issues, and if
they were, they were covering it with a very specific
perspective that was never going to show us in a
(11:31):
beautiful light, right, And so the first black newspaper that
ever comes about, that's their whole mission statement, is like,
we want to speak for ourselves, we want to plead
our own cause. For far too long others have spoken
for us. So that's the legacy that the Afro emerges
out of. So first of all, you wouldn't have these
records if it weren't for the Black Press. They might
(11:51):
be in small family collections. They might be in an
institutional archive labeled under quote unquote Negro slaves, you know,
Like that's where you would find your people, is maybe
in those types of boxes. It might be like negroes
from Missouri, Oayn, you know. But if you come to
the it's like a mass grave of records exactly. That
(12:15):
is a perfect analogy for it. So what's very different
about the black press is like you had to have
all these details in order to go to print, So
you had to know the person's first and last name.
Typically they would include the age. They probably would include
their address, even back in the day, which I find
to day to be crazy because of how ier surveilled,
but it was a little different, and then oftentimes there
(12:36):
would be a lot of information about what the image
was also showing. And so you have all this amazing
information and data about people going back to the late
eighteen hundreds in this collection, and they're filed under their names,
or under the organizations that they were a part of,
or under like the events that they were at, so
you have so much specificity. So if you're looking for
(12:57):
Black people throughout history and you want to see us
reflected in a way that actually addresses our full humanity,
then the black press becomes so important for that record.
If you want to see historical events documented from a
black perspective, the take is going to be different from
what the white newspaper is saying. So if you want
(13:18):
to have an understanding of what black public opinion was
at a particular time, the black press is very important
and you'll get, you know, whatever the publisher put out,
but you'll also get letters from the to the editor
rather in the next week of people being like I
didn't like how you wrote that, you know, So, like
the discourse that exists there is also really important for
understanding just like what's going on intellectually at this time
(13:40):
for black people, and you won't get it anywhere else.
So that's why this archive in particular is super important.
But black archives more generally that are like created by
and for black people are so important for just understanding
like a fuller scope of history.
Speaker 1 (14:01):
I just feel like there's not enough energy committed to
wanting to understand the fuller scope.
Speaker 2 (14:09):
Yeah, yeah, from some people. We're on the other side,
so we get people all the time who are like, well,
I can't believe you have the you know there, We
just get the exciting yeah yeah, yeah, which is skewing
my perspective on it, but obviously, like in a mainstream way.
Speaker 1 (14:23):
Well know, what I think is also cool about what
you have is the feelings, you know, because like history,
like you can read a history book or watch a
documentary and a lot of times it's just giving you,
you know, the facts or a version of the facts,
but it's really going to be like a dotted timeline
of this and then this and then this and then this,
(14:44):
and you know, sometimes they may have you know, somebody
commenting on it. But what I love about these archives
is that it is a snapshot of a time, and
I find myself in this era really wanting to use
those snapshots to try to give some type of frame
(15:06):
of reference of like where to go from here, you know,
Like I like, I would love to go see the
archives of literally anywhere that had a dictatorship descend upon it.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
Yeah, and then the question is will they still exist,
you know, because that's what gets attacked first, right, I
mean not first necessarily, but kind of no. But yeah,
all of their information centers.
Speaker 1 (15:34):
I mean, didn't Trump already do some weird shit with
the archives in DC?
Speaker 2 (15:39):
Absolutely, And you think about it, they're holding the record
for the country. And so when all that stuff went
down at his house where they came in and took
the records out, this isn't the first term and they
were like, you were not supposed to have these here.
These are classified documents that it should not be at
your house. And they found them like yeah, we're not
in the bathroom of mar Lago. Uh huh. Those are
archivists who were like, like, these are our records. So
(16:03):
he had it out for them.
Speaker 1 (16:04):
So when you say they're holding the record for the country,
can you tell me more about that.
Speaker 2 (16:09):
Because business records and we think of it as like
the cultural things because those are the types that's why
I tend to go looking for. But it's also business records.
It's like the email exchanges, the call logs, what actually
is going on. Those types of materials are what gets
stored in archives. So for us, we have a bunch
of business records. Also, whether or not we make all
(16:30):
of those to the public, it's going to be on
a timeline because there's still an existing business here that's
a private owned business. For the United States, it's not
a private owned business. But there are security issues, right
trying hard is how to make it though they really run.
So there are like you know, there's classified documents though,
but those documents, those things there's usually a retention schedule
(16:51):
that's put in place where different organizations or units of
the government have a timeline within which they're supposed to
transfer things to the archives in order for them to
be or for longevity for our country's history, you know.
But yeah, he's attacking all the information and knowledge centers,
the places where we can hold the record of what
has happened here so that you can spin it into
(17:11):
something else in the future and say, oh, no, that
didn't really happen. Do you go to school to be
an archivalist? Absolutely? Yeah, Yeah, there's a whole science for archives,
and so we have one person on our team who
has completed their training for that. So she's the lead archivist.
Got it, got it. So that's kind of for building
the structure of like how does the data need to
be structured in order so it's like searchable, applicable for
(17:34):
all of these different types of archival applications that exist.
So she does a lot of the systems building in
that way and creating processes for the team. Once you
have that in place, it's the type of thing where
it's like you just need to be a very thorough
detail oriented person and you can step into the role
if you have the structure already there. So she's leading
(17:54):
that part, and then we have people that we've even
trained to work in the collection. So we had a
fellowship program going for a while where we brought people
in to learn how to do this work and to
do it with a collection that's super interesting.
Speaker 1 (18:07):
What are some things You've discovered Sammy things.
Speaker 2 (18:13):
There's so many things. And it sucks because now that we're, like,
I don't know, six years into my tenure here, I'm
more on the admin side, so I'm further and further
away from the actual collection. But in the earlier days,
when I was just me like roaming around these halls,
I would just pull boxes off the shelf. And one
day I was looking for something for a researcher and
I'm looking through this fox and I just see a
(18:35):
folder that's called Homosexuals. And I was like, well, what
the hell is that? I need to know what this is.
So the labeling caught my eye first, and I opened
it up and it ended up being like all of
these gorgeous images of drag balls all up and down
the East Coast, from like the nineteen twenties to the
(18:55):
nineteen thieves. Gorgeous. You know, some body must have come
in later and put that label up, which homosexuals is hilarious.
Just what am I going to open this fold of to? Fine? Okay,
but the photos are amazing. And then it also just
like opened up this whole history that I had no
idea about. I didn't know drag balls went back that far.
Speaker 1 (19:16):
That's why I was like, wait, what, yes, yes, and
are these black people in drag balls?
Speaker 2 (19:21):
Yes, yes, I know. And so since then, you know,
we've had people reach out specifically about that. I think
the Johnson Publishing Company Archives just put out a blog
post about finding some of these photographs and their collection also.
So it's this type of thing where it's like you
don't even know that it's there until somebody is handling
these materials and helping to make them discoverable. But like,
that was a huge revelation for me. That one was big,
(19:43):
very major. And then one of our team members, she's
not with us anymore, but she's Liberian and she's always like,
you know, speaking of what happens in a place where
you don't have autonomy over your own things. In that case,
there's a civil war, and she talks often about the
fact that records are no longer in existence. You have
to really piece together these archives because there is no
(20:05):
central archive for this. And so what she found while
she was processing the collection were these like photo albums
that somebody at the AFRO had put together of visiting Liberia.
I think it was in the thirties, and so there's
like Mary McLeod bethoon in there, like there's all of
these really beautiful images that somebody like went on this trip,
took these photographs, came back and compiled them into a
(20:27):
photo album and it's just on the shelf. Nobody knew.
Speaker 1 (20:32):
Bruh, right, wild, Why are we so hype about these
types of things?
Speaker 2 (20:37):
Like you and I are both like what could you
know like some of the history, but then to be
able to actually hold it, yeah, And then to think
about somebody like putting their time into making sure that
the names were documented, that the images were compiled like
they thought it was important. So that also makes me
(20:57):
feel like, well, damn, I gotta like honor the labor
that for me too, you know, it's like somebody put
a lot into this with the limited resources that they had,
So how am I going to take it to the
next level?
Speaker 1 (21:08):
I feel like because also like humans, like we just
kind of like depending on your belief system, Like okay,
I'll put it this way, there is no proof of
where we came from, Like we have beliefs, but there
is no like empirical proof, And so I feel like
archives like give us a sense of grounding in that
we were here before you were here, you know. And
(21:29):
like I remember when I was eleven, I made a
very distinct decision to write down every day what I
did on my calendar. And I remember saying, someone's gonna
want to know, Like I don't.
Speaker 2 (21:44):
Know who I thought I was, but at eleven, I said,
someone's gonna want to know what I was doing that.
Speaker 1 (21:51):
And I did this for like four years, and I
have the calendars, and you know who the someone was me.
Speaker 2 (21:56):
I wanted to know what was it? And it'll be
like went to see Jurassic Park.
Speaker 1 (22:04):
Like that was it was the action, Yes, that was
the like action of note for that day.
Speaker 2 (22:10):
I'm stills for journals from my ancestors in these collections.
I'm still looking because I'm just like, what were y'all thinking?
You know, it's like we get the public statement, yes,
you know, we get the public statement in their actions, but.
Speaker 1 (22:23):
Like why I keep a journal and what I said
not always exactly facts. Facts like my mom found my
grandmother's journals, and she found my grandmother's Bible and she
had it restored. She was able to get it restored
because it was like falling apart. But in one of
(22:44):
the journals, my grandmother's talking about Palestine.
Speaker 2 (22:47):
Hm.
Speaker 1 (22:47):
My grandmother was like super dupid devout Christian, like writing
scripture on the walls of the house, like I just
remember wow through the house, like.
Speaker 2 (22:55):
Why you're blessed.
Speaker 1 (22:58):
Yes, I was get in trouble for whistling in the
house because she was like, yeah, making angels cry.
Speaker 2 (23:03):
And I was like, you're just taking this too far.
Speaker 1 (23:05):
But in her journals, like she talks about how you know,
one palatine is free, like this will be a huge
impactful thing that like impacts the entire earth. This is
in sixty eight, This is right during like the sixty
seven borders and the Ntefada. And I find it just
like we're talking about the archives in the context of
(23:27):
like this formal company, but your family you have like
your own archives, like as people like we have our
own archives. Yeah, Like can you speak to just kind
of the yeah, speak to that ancestral who that you
just gave.
Speaker 2 (23:44):
There's so much. There's so much, I mean, it does.
Everybody has something. I hope. I hope you're holding onto
something from your lifetime, from your parents' lifetime, from their
parents' lifetime that speaks to who they were because it
is a record of like you were here, this is
what you cared about, this is what you did. For
you to find that journal of your grandmother's It's like
I can only imagine what that felt like for you
(24:06):
to be as outspoken as you are about pales side
and then to see that this is like this is generational,
This isn't something new. It's beautiful, you know, it just
gets a sense of recognition and like helps you understand
who you are in the world, how to be grounded
in it, and how to just stand firm in that
understand it, you know, like that knowing one of the
things that I mean, there's so many oofs in it, right,
(24:28):
Like one of the things that has shifted because of
the work that I'm doing now is like I put
a date on every single thing that I'm writing, because
I find stuff and I'm just like, well, when was this?
What's the context? Like what's the here? You know, like
I want to know in my journals al right on
the front page, like this is the journal preceding? This
is this color? And is this? And then I'll like
leave all those places for like the journal after is this,
(24:49):
because you know, if somebody where to find this and
did care, Like, I'm going to help you out a
little bit so you don't have to do so much
of this work, you know, just infusing it with a
little bit of that, just to help out the researcher
to come. But one of the things that you know,
I'm so blessed with, frankly, is that the people that
I come from had an engine to tell stories. Like
(25:11):
they created this newspaper company to tell the story. So
there's less imagining that we have to do because they
told their own history. Now I will say occasionally I'll
go back and read it and be like, now, what
is the embellishment here? Really, I'll be like, A, I
don't know about all? Okay, you know, was there a
(25:33):
personal connection? You know? Just like I got questions. But
it's just a gift to be able to have a
record of like what did y'all care about?
Speaker 1 (25:40):
That record of what right? What did y'all care about?
I still have my movie tickets stuff from set it
off because you care because I cared.
Speaker 2 (25:55):
And you know what, So.
Speaker 1 (25:57):
During the pandemic, I was staying with my mom for
like three months, like at my childhood home, and I
came across these diaries from when I was like, I
think it was like fifth grade, sixth grade, seventh grade,
and they didn't have a lot of entries, but the entries,
every entry was like I mean, I guess that says
(26:19):
something because that means that I felt the need that
I needed to write this down, like and I would
say ninety percent of the entries were about like my
father in some shape wear form. And I remember I
was seeing someone at seeing as a strong word. I
was trying to detach from someone I had a very
(26:39):
toxic interaction with the time, and I was talking about
it and he was like, oh, it was your dad
and I was like, what was my dad?
Speaker 2 (26:47):
And he was like that's what YO said and this
came from as a child. And I was like, stop
knowing me. You're like will and that that's what you're
here for. That's what you're here for.
Speaker 1 (27:02):
I took that into my next therapy session and had
like a breakthrough that I had no idea that we
were trying to get to for five years, but that's
when I found out I was codependent.
Speaker 2 (27:11):
And she was like, oh, finally, geez, you know, I
think this is why we get into these relationships though,
because there's appos to teach you something. I like to
tell myself that that's is why, Yes, I learned that.
Speaker 1 (27:23):
I learned about that there are different particular roles for
drug dealers.
Speaker 2 (27:28):
Did you know this?
Speaker 1 (27:30):
Like everybody is not simply just like a drug dealer,
Like there's cooks, there's corner boys, of course, but like
there's also like people who are like the bookkeepers.
Speaker 2 (27:39):
There's an ecosystem. It's a whole ecosystem.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
But I guess, like you know, whenever I have seen
these operations on TV, like we just see like violence
and it's like.
Speaker 2 (27:49):
A wire not on the why plug for the wire,
but it is I'm here, so I have to stay.
Speaker 1 (27:56):
Like I had no idea that there's like specific people
who are just I mean, I guess this makes sense
for you know, what was that show.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
With Walt What was the show with the Breaking Bad?
Breaking Bad? Like there's chemists but I know that for
like that.
Speaker 1 (28:10):
But he was like, no, like there are people who
are good at cooking in a way that does not
kill people. And I was like, what do you mean?
And he was like, because you have to cut the drugs.
They're too pure for a lot of folks that have
been like taking crack or whatever, like you have to
cut it, and if you cut it wrong, someone will
overdose because their body can't handle that. A lot of
(28:34):
people are functional addicts, so they're only they need the
drug to actually be a certain level or else their
body can't handle it.
Speaker 2 (28:42):
Who how did I get here? Ah, we can talk
you about them. I'm just sorry.
Speaker 1 (28:53):
No, we've got here because I was saying that I had.
Speaker 2 (28:55):
An ex who I learned things from. I learned things
about myself, and I learned things about about the world.
About the world. We have to know this.
Speaker 1 (29:02):
Wow, where do you feel like archives exist in a
world that is so increasingly AI driven, that is so
increasingly tech driven, digital driven? You know, I remember doing microfiche,
you know, it was like the way that you accessed newspapers.
And like somebody listening just now heard me say that,
(29:24):
and it's like, is that a la boobu?
Speaker 2 (29:25):
You know what I mean? Like, is that a pokemon?
I only learned what a la boobo is because I
have nephews. Thank you nephews. I actually don't even really
know what a la boobo is. To keep it in
many what is it? It's like a little stuffed animal
on a keychain and they're creepy little gremlin looking things.
But why exactly ferbies, beanie babies, you know, same concept. Okay,
(29:45):
collect them all. Yeah, okay. So microfiche, if we want
to talk about it, is like basically a reproduction of
the newspaper. It's like you take an image of it
and it's on film and there's an enlarger for it,
and then you can read it that way and like
puls the film through and you can look at it
and that's that. And actually, so most of the Afronews archives,
(30:07):
like the actual newspapers, we're on microfeche and have been
digitized from that and are actually searchable publicly, which is
a big thing that people don't really know. Yeah. So
if your library subscribes to proquests, for instance, they have
this thing called Historical Black Newspapers, and the AFRO is
one of the papers on their way, the word search
is going all the way back to the eighteen hundreds. Amazing.
(30:29):
It's a huge Yes, So there's that, but there's so
much emphasis on digitization and actually, like one of the
things is that people just assume that if you digitize it,
it's stable and please talk. That's not real, not real.
And so in this like a hyperd digitized, undigital world,
(30:50):
like one of the things that we get asked so
often by people who are interested and potentially funding the
work or just want to know what we're doing, is like, well,
are you have you digitize everything? Yet? Are you digitizing everything?
And I'm like, first of all, there's three million photographs
in this collection. Second of all, know you know, like
who's doing that? And it's a great like backup for
redundancy because obviously physical materials are you know, the perishable,
(31:15):
they're vulnerable, Let's say yes, But it's not a replacement
for those things. And I think that's something that people
don't really get. But there are ways that we are
using digital tools and even AI tools to help unlock
the archives. And so one of the products that we
did a couple of years ago was like a pilot
digitization project. We took a sample of photographs and tried
(31:35):
digitizing the fronts and backs and like building a little
staging database for the data because I told you, there's
like all this amazing data in there. There's the addresses,
the names, like all of this stuff that if you
can pull it out. You could start mapping these images,
you know, you could do all of this really beautiful
data visualization work using the materials from this collection. So
what happens if we try to do this? What happens
(31:56):
if we can like use AI to read the bats
of the photos and pull out the caps information. So
instead of this image that has let's say, like Rosa
Parks and three other people in it filed under just
Rosa Parks, if all the other names are listed in
the caption, then we can use AI to read the
back of the image and search the other names. So
if it's your auntie who's in that picture with Rosa
(32:18):
Parks and we're looking for her, we can search her
name and it'll come up instead of us just being like, sorry,
we don't have anything for you, you know. So those
ways in which like we can use AI to help
us make the collection more discoverable. So we're thinking about that.
But there's also we've been working with young people in
the collection too. One of our partners in Baltimore is
(32:38):
this organization called MUS three sixty and they have a
program called New Generation Scholars and in their Young Artists
Archival Fellowship, these folks come in and they're you know,
I have to I have to do it because I
remember the name yea artists Kival Fellows. When they come in,
(32:59):
they're like whoa, what this is real? You know, they're
just like shocked because there's so because of the expansiveness, yeah,
the expansiveness, and because there's so much that they're consuming
that's digital where it's like oh I can.
Speaker 1 (33:11):
Oh yeah right right right, like that becomes a whole
other experience. Like I can hold a camera that's not
also a phone, it's a camera, it's.
Speaker 2 (33:23):
The whole thing. I can hold a discman. One of
the fellows found an image of her great great grandfather
in there, like on accident. No, she was looking for him,
but we had it, you know, and she was but
we have I've never seen this image before. And she's
holding it her hand, you know, and she's like sending
a text and sending it to her mom. You know
(33:44):
what I mean. It's just like yeah, yeah, yeah, you
need that experience also, and you need to know that
like there has been an organization, there's been an institution
in this city that gave a shit, that still cares,
that cares about your family, that thinks that your story
is important, that wants you to be well documented, and
(34:06):
that wants your story to be told.
Speaker 1 (34:14):
I mean, tell me about the beginnings of the newspaper,
because it had to have started at a time when
it was illegal, not necessarily illegal.
Speaker 2 (34:22):
And Baltimore is an interesting city too. Maryland's an interesting case.
Speaker 1 (34:26):
Yeah, Like I mean, Frigeri Jeglis talks about like being
enslaved in Baltimore, and he was like, you know, it
wasn't really like it was like slavery ish.
Speaker 2 (34:34):
That's essentially how he refers to it, which is all
the while. Yeah, he's like, I had a great talie
in Baltimore. I mean, it's strange. So this little fact
that I learned when I'm back here that I never
learned growing up here was apparently Baltimore had more free
black people before the Civil War than any other place
in the country. Oh, which I think is fascinating. I
do too, And it also I think starts to tell
(34:56):
you something about like why Baltimore might be the way
it is today. How was Baltimore today? What I'm just saying,
We've been free and they've been trying to police freedom
for a very long time, and so anytime you have
a large free black population, there's going to be forces
that are trying to like circumscribe that and make it
not so. And so we've had all of this like
(35:16):
wheeling and dealing back and forth trying to maintain that freedom. Okay,
So the founding of the paper, most of these things
were coming out of black churches. So it's like you
got the main institutions. Black churches are a big one.
So it's actually this guy, William Alexander, he was a reverend.
He founded this paper called The Home Protector in eighteen
ninety nine. It became the Afro American in eighteen ninety
(35:38):
two when he got some other investors in there. And
we think at around that time my great great grandfather
was involved as a printer for the paper, but he
was definitely publishing something called the Sunday School Helper out
of a nearby church. And then the newspaper got bought
up by these other businessmen who had like a feed
store and some other stuff, and the rest of the
business was tanking, and they started pulling things out of
(36:00):
the Afro in order to cover other businesses, and ultimately
the whole thing went under, and so my great great
grandfather borrowed money from his wife and bought the name
and the printing press at an auction and revived the
paper and it's been running ever since. Then. Does it
still run now?
Speaker 1 (36:19):
Yeah, like you used to put out stories now yeah,
I mean I don't personally, but yeah no, But I
mean like the paper does.
Speaker 2 (36:24):
Yeah, I mean every day it's afro dot com. And
then the other thing is they have a physical product
too that they send out weekly, so you can get
it anywhere in the world. They will send it to you.
Speaker 1 (36:33):
What well in that regard, I mean, when we're seeing
the really obvious fascist takeover of mainstream media, I mean
it was already sideways, but now it's like completely pointless.
Speaker 2 (36:47):
Where does AFRO go from here? I mean, I think
it's a really good question. I try as hard as
I can to stay in my lane, which is in
the archives, because there's already so much to do over there.
But it's always in an independent newspaper company. It's always
been a family owned newspaper company, and so you know,
there's the same challenges that any other news organization has
(37:09):
in terms of trying to make sure that there's enough
advertising funding, that there's enough diversity in the business model,
that there's money coming in from other places, there's all
of those issues. It's always been a very small team,
except you know, back in the heyday, which was like
right before desegregation. So I think they're just trying to
continue that and like also banding together with other legacy
(37:30):
black papers across the country. So they founded a couple
of years ago this consortium called Word in Black that's
like ten different papers from across the country working together
to publish stories and get national reach and to get
new advertising dollars. In that you can say we have
this national reach because we have this consortium. So they're
working on cooperative economics wherever they can, and you know,
(37:53):
just trying to make it work.
Speaker 1 (37:55):
Speaking of work, you said that you came back to
this work and nineteen and that you came back to archives,
So like what brought you into that space?
Speaker 2 (38:05):
M eh. I did not expect her that to be no, no, no, no, no,
it's great. I had been working in arts organizations in
Chicago and in LA and in both of those places,
Chicago first and then Los Angeles, both of those places,
we were doing work with archives. So it was like
creative interpretations of archives, artists working with archives, that kind
(38:25):
of thing. And then at some point I was just like,
you know what, I wonder if we have one.
Speaker 1 (38:29):
We probably got an archive, right, I'm over here with
these people archive.
Speaker 2 (38:34):
Maybe I should be working with my people archive. So
I came home and I looked and was like, oh,
we got an archive. Wow. It's massive. I mean, it's
absolutely massive. It's a huge collection. The woman I was
telling you earlier are lead archivist. She's been doing archival
work for more than twenty years. And the one thing
that she always tells people is like, the main challenge
(38:55):
with this collection is just its size. She's like, I've
worked at all these different types of institutions, but this
is the first one where I've dealt with a processing
project of this size. Like it's massive. Why is it
so massive? Is it just time a century of like
collecting all this stuff? You know? Like I tell people, like,
imagine you're in your house or like you've been in
(39:16):
a family home for decades, Like your attic probably looks crazy,
your basement probably looks crazy. And then you imagine, like
this is a company that's putting out papers several times
a week for decades out of five different offices. They
were in Richmond, DC, Baltimore, Newark, Philadelphia. You know, you
just collect all this stuff. There's all these photographs, there's
(39:38):
all these notes, there's all these like memos going back
and forths not email, the facts back to the physical.
You know, it's kind of wild. So the record's all there.
Speaker 1 (39:48):
I mean, what would you say is the biggest effort
of a rasure that you're witnessing right now of black folks.
Speaker 2 (39:55):
There's so many, There's so many. I mean, I think
it's one that this slight comes to mind. Yeah, one
that to mind immediately is just like taking black history
out of schools. Yeah, that's number one. And I think
there's I've always been in a family that has prioritized
teaching us our history outside of school anyway, and I
think a lot of black people have had that kind
(40:18):
of situation. But it's like we just got to spread
it out the whole, like each one teach one situation.
It's like we got to just continue to pump that
information out as much as possible in our networks, in
our communities, wherever we find them online. However, that's the
most egregious, honestly, at.
Speaker 1 (40:33):
This point, I feel like everyone should be coming to
black history classes. Yeah, there's we need to know our history.
But I'm also like, yam phones need to know our history.
Speaker 2 (40:42):
Oh absolutely, absolutely, because otherwise, like you don't even know
who you was with, and I don't just being white people, no, everybody, Like,
in order to even understand what this country is, you
have to know our history. There's no way around it.
And so to just take it out altogether, I'm like,
so what are we learning here? Like this is American history?
Like this is it? It's it.
Speaker 1 (41:01):
Like I did an interview with a sister who runs
the NEUAK Caribbean page on Instagram, and we were talking
about just how so many Caribbean people just don't know
the Black American experience, like the uniqueness of the Black
American experience. And I feel like these archives and these
spaces of black people telling their own stories, right, like
(41:24):
black people also like having their own reactions in their
own words, is so silence.
Speaker 2 (41:30):
It's quieted and it's homogenized.
Speaker 1 (41:34):
I feel like even when we see it in film,
et cetera, it's like a compilation of Okay, we read
twenty five of these letters to the editor and this
was kind of like the average response.
Speaker 2 (41:45):
Yeah, yeah, I mean and that's what else are you
going to do in that kind of set? No, but
I guess what I'm saying is like we lose nuance. Yeah,
oh yeah, that's I think one of the biggest benefits
of having an archive is that the nuance is everywhere.
You know, it's everywhere. Anything that you pick out of
a box. It's like you can care whatever you want
is in there.
Speaker 1 (42:04):
So let's go to our Patreon only segment and I
would love to hear from you. What are some archives
that you would like to explore that you may not
have explored or that you have explored, and how did
they shift or how do you feel like they will
shift you. So we're get to get into that with
our guests.
Speaker 2 (42:24):
Savanna on when we go over to the Seal Squad.
I am of a mind.
Speaker 1 (42:35):
That I do not call myself a quarter. I call
myself an archive balst.
Speaker 2 (42:41):
A collector.
Speaker 1 (42:42):
Maybe yes, well, because I feel like some people would say,
like you just have a lot of stuff, and I'm like,
but none of this stuff is like gratuitous, Like I
think it's neat to be able to see like my walkman,
my discman my, you know mini disc players like that
to me feels because I don't know about you, but
(43:03):
I feel like for a lot of Americans, history like
ended at the end of the seventies. It's like the
concept of history doesn't extend to the eighties and the nineties.
That's history. Like the old school station is playing week right,
I know, that's like.
Speaker 2 (43:19):
Everybody with the two thousands. I'm like, that feels like
it was the end of a time for me, Like
that's a time where it's like, Okay, everything ended in Yes,
nineteen seventy is as far back as it is. We're
all still thinking it's thirty years ago. We're all still
thinking its thirty years ago.
Speaker 1 (43:34):
Meanwhile, like peplam shirts and statement necklaces at the club's history.
Speaker 2 (43:41):
Okay, I hope.
Speaker 1 (43:42):
So what is the connectivity between like libraries and archives
if at all?
Speaker 2 (43:50):
Yeah, I mean, people have a cute acronym called GLAM
that's like gallery, library, archives, museum. So it's like information
sciences people who work in that field. But libraries are
primarily for books, and then archives are primarily for other
kinds of documents. Is it often though, that the two
exist together? Yeah? Yeah, Like For instance, a lot of
(44:11):
libraries will have a special collections area, and the special
collections are the archives. That's what the special collections is. Hey,
they're hiding from you in plain sight.
Speaker 1 (44:21):
Yes, Like when Hermione wanted to find a book on
the dark Arts, she had to go to the special collections.
I mean, I feel like there's oftentimes like these secret
professions that people don't know about that they would actually
love doing. And that's what archive Like, that's what would
(44:41):
you call it? Information studies?
Speaker 2 (44:43):
Yeah, information studies, Information sciences.
Speaker 1 (44:45):
Yeah, yeah, Like I've never heard about no shit like
that information sciences.
Speaker 2 (44:50):
Neither me either. I stumbled into this like an oblong way.
I came in through art, so I had to find
my way here. How did you get there through art?
I was working at Rebuild Foundation in Chicago, which is
founded by this artist, the Estergates, and he does a
lot of work with archives, so he somehow collected this.
(45:12):
The University of Chicago was offloading a bunch of these
like glass lantern slides that they had, so it's literally slides,
but it's on glass, and they're in these huge filing
cabinets and they're like, we've digitized these we don't need
these anymore. They're heavy, they're taking up space. Let's get
rid of them. He was like, these are beautiful art objects.
I will collect them, and ended up having to like
reinforce the floors of his home in order to put
(45:33):
these things in because they were so heavy. But he
started just making these collections of like interesting things. So
this was the Art History Department slide collection. So there's
all of these really interesting slides, you know, And so
as an artist, I was working there and we started
doing activations with some of the stuff that he had.
So it's like, oh, well, let's see what we can
make from these slides, let's see what we you know, whatever.
(45:54):
Just like making up stuff as a way to bring
people in and get them interested in what the collections are.
That was one thing. And then you know, I worked
on this collection of like racist memorabilia that one couple
had been collecting for forty years because they were trying
to take things out of circulation initially, and then they
realized that that was going to never happen because there
was so much of it, and so instead they started
(46:16):
collecting things that ended up being a way of understanding
the racist imaginary in America because it's like who would
come up with this shit? Yes, and who would take
their time to make me objects by hand and then
market them and like create a whole industry around this.
So it's a fascinating collection. But I first got into
(46:37):
archives by documenting that with a couple of other artists
that were on the team and creating a catalog for it,
so that whole collection, the glass Lantern slides. And then
he got the Johnson Publishing Companies Library, so the library
that used to be at Ebony and Jet. Oh, he
was able to get that. So that's all now in
(46:57):
this building that's the Stony Island Arts Bank on the
south out of Chicago, and those collections live there and
they're activated by people all the time. So that was
like my artistic way into archives is Essence in there.
I don't remember because I didn't really work on them,
because there was an Essence magazine where Common had crochet
pants on and he yeah, there was effectively sponged and
(47:20):
scrubbed this from the Internet, and I know it exists.
Is not possible.
Speaker 1 (47:25):
I'm telling you, it was a whole era.
Speaker 2 (47:30):
We were all there for it. Come close, soom babe,
we were there. Okay, then there was the light damn
that we were there. We were there. Yeah. They did
the song together for the.
Speaker 1 (47:45):
Water Chocolate, Yes, like one for chocolate, and then they
did the song together for Brown Sugar soundtrack, and he
had on the crochet pants in that video and y'all
trying to convince me it didn't happen, and I feel
gas lit and I need to go to an archive.
I also think that's a really good use for an
archive too. It can really clear up some gaslighting.
Speaker 2 (48:04):
Absolutely, when you said that, I was like, ooh, I'm
putting on my back block. Yat, No, it happened. I'm
telling you what happens. We believe in your kives. I
believe it.
Speaker 1 (48:15):
So do you have any projections of when the archives
would actually open to the public.
Speaker 2 (48:19):
Yeah, we're under construction right now and it looks like
end of twenty twenty six is when the construction will
be finish. We'll have a little bit of time in
between there, and then hopefully we'll be open to the
public by the end of next year. Crazy, that's really soon.
It's really soon. Yeah. I mean it's been a beast
because we've been working on it since I moved back
here in twenty nineteen basically, and oh so this is
(48:41):
like light at the end of the tunnel time exactly exactly.
So it's like a sixteen million dollar project and we
have one more million to raise. Okay, so if anybody
wants to help out with that, I will gladly accept.
Afrocharities dot org. Got it. And then I'm also like
really just focused and not concerned, but like thinking about
how we make this sustainable long term. And so the
(49:04):
next goal after that is to establish essentially an endowment
for the building and two roles so that we know
that the collections are protected long term and that we
have two people there who can keep an eye on them.
So that'll be the next goal. You work, I'm working.
I'm working. That's why I'm like, I'm going to vacage time.
(49:26):
That's why i love Hollywood. Yes, yeah, we're working with it,
but it's coming along. We're almost there. The last.
Speaker 1 (49:40):
Well, thank you so much for sharing your knowledge with
us and for the work that you're doing in this
very necessary practice.
Speaker 2 (49:49):
You know, the archive space. I feel like the.
Speaker 1 (49:54):
Historical space at one point just felt like a subject,
you know, like a school subject, whereas now now more
than ever in my lifetime. It's a lifeline. It's not
simply just an information science. Like it's a life science.
And when we think about like when you go to
like a Mayan ruin and you're like, how are we
(50:17):
able to know all of this about them? It's because
like they were archiving their existence back then, they were
writing down they like made paper. Then they're like this,
how we made the paper. You know, these types of things,
And I think, you know, for where we are now,
like people, I don't know people even to think we're
going to be here forever. And I feel like I'm
(50:39):
a soul that keeps coming back, So like I'm gonna
end up coming back and being like, oh it was
on the podcast.
Speaker 2 (50:46):
I'd be like, yeah, girl, I remember, I'm hoping to
like evolve out. We just evolve me into something else,
Gonna be a trainee.
Speaker 1 (50:54):
I mean, I think we all kind of have our
own version of archives, and black folks, we really really
need to make it our business to keep record.
Speaker 2 (51:06):
So thank you in multiple places and tell somebody about
it too. That part
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