The Goose Hill Neighborhood Association held its monthly meeting on Oct. 26 featuring Marietta Carr of the Schenectady County Historical Society.
Members of the Goose Hill community were informed that they can attend collaborative events with the Society and the N.A. while sharing their own experiences living in the neighborhood.
On Nov. 9 at Grems-Doolittle Library, members of the community can sign up for a three minute oral interview which will be recorded, where they can talk about their memories and stories about growing up in the community.
Then on Nov. 14, members of the community can bring their old photos and documents to be scanned into the Schenectady County Historical Society’s own library.
Goose Hill Historical Society Fall Events. Photo courtesy of the N.A.
In addition, the N.A. and Carr discussed the African American Historical Records Project at the Historical Society.
The African American Historical Records Project
Marietta Carr is the Society’s librarian focusing on Schenectady’s African American Historical Records Project.
The African American Historical Records Project will create an online catalog of historical records within the Black Community in Schenectady.
“Our goal is to identify where those records are, what condition they are in, and how researchers can access them. We hope the catalog and the records uncovered during the project will become a foundation for future research, preservation, and education,” Carr said. “African Americans have been part of Schenectady since colonial times, but their presence, activities, and experiences are significantly underrepresented in the collections available to the public in repositories like SCHS.”
While acknowledging that churches, community organizations, black-owned businesses and individuals have their own historical collections, the catalog will connect those isolated collections and make them visible and available to the public.
Kids playing in a neighborhood. Photo courtesy of Unsplash.
The events mentioned previously, are just two examples of the catalog collecting those historical collections. While the AAHRP is a county- wide project, Goose Hill is participating in a community-wide archive project as well.
“Kristine Moore and I talked about the AAHRP and the importance of community archives. She then asked if I would be able to help with a Goose Hill community archive project,” Carr said. “My understanding is that her interest stemmed from seeing the local Images of America books and wanting something like that for Goose Hill. We had a follow-up conversation and developed the concept of the Goose Hill project, using some of the aspects of the AAHRP as an example.”
Anyone looking for more information on the African American Historical Records Project or would like to participate in the survey should contact Carr at 518-374-0263, option 3, or email her at librarian@schenectadyhistorical.org.
