Students Join Community History Project

Seven Knox College students have joined a research project coordinated by the College's Seymour Library, to chronicle the history of Galesburg's African-American community. 

"I've always liked hearing the oral history," said Meghan Gaynor, one of the students. "I can remember being younger, sitting at the table during holidays and listening to my grandmother and her friends talk about what it was like in the 1950s and being fascinated by it."

The 18-month project, "Struggle and Progress: Documenting African-American History in Galesburg, Illinois," is supported by a grant to the College from the National Endowment for the Humanities.

The students are Zachary Ferris,  Meghan Gaynor, Leslie Hernandez, Hannah King, Ellen Lipo, Karen Lynch, and Sarah Pawlicki.

The students are working with staff from Seymour Library to make digital copies of photos and other documents, and to collect information about the items from local residents. The first of several "community digitization days" was held Feb. 27 at the Carver Community Center.

The event drew several dozen items, including extensive family photo albums, from local residents Gayle Pacheco, Karen Ford-Kelley, and Imogene Allen.

"I brought photos and materials from my family history, which includes Allen Chapel AME Church and Second Baptist Church," Ford-Kelley said. "It's an opportunity to preserve things, to get them documented."

Ford-Kelley's personal archive was so extensive, the scanning will take more than one day, according to Laurie Sauer, project director and Information Technologies Librarian at Knox's Seymour Library. "One of the documents is the Mortgage Burning Program from Second Baptist Church in 1945," Sauer said. "It was a week-long celebration, and the printed program contains lots of names of people who celebrated with the congregation."

Gayla Pacheco brought a picture from 1931 of her grandfather and his co-workers at a railroad tie plant in Galesburg. 

"Gayla could identify only her grandfather," Sauer explained. "Most of the men in the photo are African American, and it's our hope that once we get the photo online, other people may come forward to help us identify them."

Future events will include more community digitization days, public lectures, events and exhibits in 2016 and 2017.

Photos above and below: Students and library staff scan photos and documents and gather information from local residents.