Randolph-Macon College issued the following announcement on July 16
As the Randolph-Macon community looks optimistically toward the future, it is apparent that the COVID-19 pandemic will forever be part of Randolph-Macon College’s story. As part of our story, it will be told by the Flavia Reed Owen Special Collections and Archives located in the McGraw-Page Library, which collects and preserves the history of the institution.
The Archives features documents and artifacts from college life, as well as personal narratives that illustrate how members of the Randolph-Macon College community experienced important moments in its history. The Library team is now asking members of the R-MC community to tell their stories from this pandemic as part of an important project that will be available for future generations.
The Archives
The Archives at Randolph-Macon College has collected and preserved materials related to the College since it was chartered in 1830. It has the original College charter, Trustee minutes from 1830 to the present, and the deeds to the College’s current property in Ashland.
The collection also includes less formal documents, such as letters written by students that have been gifted by their families, stories told in the pages of the Yellow Jacket Weekly student newspaper, and Yellow Jacket Annual yearbooks that capture life on campus during times of peace and war.
Artifacts also help to illustrate college life. Would you like to know what students experienced at Randolph-Macon College as a student in 1850? (They had to provide their own firewood!) Or how our Yellow Jacket mascot has changed over the years? (A lot!) The Archives contains several versions of the beanie that all first-year students had to wear for many years, as well as a scrapbook created by a student who attended in 1911, capturing fraternity parties, dances, studies, and time with friends. “My favorite items are the older college-branded souvenirs,” notes Laurie Preston, Head of Reference & Special Collections. “We have a box of women’s hatpins with the college seal on them for students to give to Mother and a smoking pipe with a logo for Father, not gift items you’ll find in the Campus Store now!”
Finally and importantly, the Archives preserves stories for the future so that anyone interested in the College can know what it was like to attend or work at Randolph-Macon College at any point in its history. This work includes interviews conducted with faculty, staff, and administrators when they retire from the College as part of the Macon Memories project, allowing these interviewees to share whatever meaningful experiences of the College they choose. Likewise the Living Legacies project focuses on interviews with alumni in an attempt to capture the student experience at R-MC over time, and the One Ashland, Many Voices project provides perspectives on R-MC’s role in the Ashland community.
Stories of the Pandemic Project
As part of that goal to capture the stories of the College, the Archives is now collecting stories from all members of the R-MC community – students, faculty, staff, alumni, parents of students –that illustrate experiences during the coronavirus pandemic that began in Spring 2020.
Library Director Nancy Falciani-White says they hope to capture answers to questions like what was it like to have courses suddenly all online? To have to wear a mask every time you went out in public? What was it like to remain on campus as one of the few students who did stay last spring, or what was it like to suddenly go home? To miss out on the traditions of being a senior in Spring 2020 or a traditional first-year experience in Fall 2021? What was it like to live through history in this way?
“We want your stories, in any way you would like to share them,” says Dr. Falciani-White, Director of the McGraw-Page Library. “You could create a video or audio recording of yourself telling your story, write a description of your experience, or send us pictures that capture your experiences since spring 2020.” Falciani-White emphasizes that it takes numerous stories to capture the experience of an historical event like the coronavirus pandemic, and anything you share, no matter how inconsequential you may think it is, becomes part of the larger story of Randolph-Macon College during this remarkable time.
Please visit https://library.rmc.edu/covid19 to learn more about this project, read the informed consent document, and share your materials.
If you have questions, please contact Dr. Nancy Falciani-White, Director of the McGraw-Page Library.
Original source can be found here.
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