The HistoryMakers and Chicago Public Library Celebrate African American History Month and Announce Free Access to Nation's Largest African American Video Oral History Archive

Pictured are the HistoryMakers in attendance at the event.
Pictured are the HistoryMakers in attendance at the event.

The HistoryMakers and Chicago Public Library Celebrate African American History Month and Announce Free Access to Nation's Largest African American Video Oral History Archive

February 2, 2017 - Deputy Mayor Andrea Zopp

joined Chicago Public Library (CPL) Commissioner

Brian Bannon and The HistoryMakers Founder &

Executive Director Julieanna Richardson today to

kick off the start of African American History Month

and announce CPL's offering of The HistoryMakers

Digital Archive free of charge. Since 1999, The

HistoryMakers has been recording African American

oral histories to refashion a more inclusive record of

American history. The HistoryMakers is committed to

preserving and making widely accessible the personal stories of

African Americans-both well-known and unsung. Offering the

most significant recording of past and present African American

influencers, The HistoryMakers is a vital online resource for the

city's students, educators and researchers.

Chicago Public Library is the first public library to of fer patrons

unlimited access to the extensive HistoryMakers video database

of interviews with more than 1,700 African Americans. By the end

of 2017, the collection is slated to house 2,700 interviews of primary

source material. Full remote access to the entire

HistoryMakers database through the CPL website (with a library

card) is slated to start this spring.

"There isn't a better way to kickoff African American History

Month than providing Chicagoans access to the experiences of

African American heroes through The HistoryMakers digital

archive," said Deputy Mayor Zopp. "This is an innovative partnership

that makes firsthand accounts and untold stories available

to the public for the first time. I'm honored to be included in

this historic archive alongside so many influencers and unsung

heroes. I encourage every resident to view the oral history of their

favorite author, artist or newfound hero."

"The hallmark of public libraries is the availability of resources

to everyone. HistoryMakers is such a valuable resource, that in

its entirety has only previously been available to students or

researchers," said Brian Bannon. "We are thrilled to make these

digital archives available to the public so Chicagoans can use

this rich resource through CPL."

"I want to applaud

Chicago Public Library

Commissioner Brian Bannon, and the City of Chicago, for making

this significant contribution to the citizens of Chicago," said

Richardson. "This is the same Digital Archive that has been

licensed by 18 of the country's top-tier universities-including the

University of Chicago and Northwestern University. It is thanks to

the vision and foresight of Brian Bannon that The HistoryMakers

Digital Archive is now available to Chicago Public Library

patrons."

The HistoryMakers is only the latest addition to CPL's rich collection of African American history and bibliographic records. The

accomplishments and experiences of some of the region's most

influential African Americans are preserved and presented via:

"The Vivian G. Harsh Collection of Afro American History and

Literature: The largest repository of African American history in

the Midwest is located in an 11,000 square foot wing of the

Woodson Regional Library (CPL's south regional library-closed

for construction until late 2017). Notable archival collections

include The Congress of Racial Equality, Chicago Chapter;

Timuel J. Black, Jr. Papers; and the Rev. Addie and Rev. Claude

Wyatt Papers.

" Rev. Clay Evans Archives: In February 2016,

Mayor Rahm Emanuel and CPL announced that the African

American pastor and founder of Chicago's influential Fellowship

Missionary Baptist Church would be donating his archives to

CPL. The collection, which documents Rev. Evans' 50 years of

leadership, his civil rights commitment and work with Dr. King, his

pioneering radio and television broadcasting

and his contribution to Gospel

music, will be featured in an exhibit

coming in late 2017.

Anyone with internet access can visit

the archives at www.thehistorymakers.

com and read more 2,000

HistoryMaker biographies. Over a 17

year period, 500 of those interviewed

for The HistoryMakers Collection came

out of Chicago, including President

Barack Obama, while he was still an

Illinois State Senator; CPL board member

and early education expert

Barbara Bowman; and CPL board

president and Johnson Publishing

Chairman and CEO Linda Johnson

Rice.

About The HistoryMakers

The HistoryMakers, a 501 (c) (3) national

non-profit organization headquartered

in Chicago, Illinois, is dedicated to recording and preserving the

personal histories of well-known and unsung African Americans.

It is the largest video oral history archive of its kind, and the only

massive attempt, since the WPA Slave Narratives of the 1930's,

to record the African American experience in the first voice. In

2014, The HistoryMakers Collection became a permanent part

of the Library of Congress. To date, the organization has interviewed

over 2,700 HistoryMakers, with the goal of creating an

archive of 5,000 interviews (30,000 hours) for the establishment

of a one-of-a-kind digital archive. The HistoryMakers Digital

Archive-which makes the entire collection accessible and

searchable online-has users in 51 countries across the globe

from Afghanistan to Norway, Nigeria and China. For more information,

visit The HistoryMakers website at www.thehistorymakers.

com and The HistoryMakers Education page at

http://www.thehistorymakers.com/education.

About Chicago Public Library Since 1873, Chicago Public

Library (CPL) has encouraged lifelong learning by welcoming all

people and offering equal access to information, entertainment

and knowledge through innovative services and programs, as

well as cutting-edge technology. Through its 80 locations, the

Library provides free access to a rich collection of materials, both

physical and digital, and presents the highest quality author discussions,

exhibits and programs for children, teens and adults.

CPL received the Social Innovator Award from Chicago

Innovation Awards; won a National Medal for Library Services

from the Institute for Museum and Library Services; was named

the first-ever winner of the National Summer Learning

Association's Founder's Award in recognition of its Summer

Learning Challenge; and was ranked number one in the U.S.,

and third in the world, by an international study of major urban

libraries conducted by the Heinrich Heine University Dusseldorf

in Germany. For more information visit www.chipublib.org.

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