By Rick Geffken
Photo by Rick Geffken
By Rick Geffken
Monmouth County history is more than a collection of dusty old books, tattered letters and fading black and white photographs sitting in boxes or stacked on shelves. A new oral history project by the Monmouth County Historical Association (MCHA) aims to show that the lives of people and events happening to all of us today are worth preserving for future historians.
The project got underway Dec. 23 when its originators, MCHA colleagues Dana Howell and Joe Zemla, sat down to speak with Harriet Bernstein and Luisa Paster to record the married couple’s story of their successful 2008 lawsuit against the Ocean Grove Camp Meeting Association. Bernstein and Paster had been denied permission to get married in a civil union ceremony at the Methodist community’s boardwalk gazebo. A New Jersey judge ruled against the Methodist organization.
The idea for the oral history project began six months ago when Howell, a research librarian at the MCHA, was intrigued by the concept during one of her archivist certification classes. “We realized there was a deficit in our holdings that needed to be addressed, namely the lack of more culturally diverse stories,” she said. “The MCHA has a treasure trove of historic gems spanning several centuries of history. We just thought it was time to broaden the cultural scope to make our offerings more relevant to a wider audience.”
She began brainstorming the idea with Zemla, an associate curator at the Freehold-based organization. He did a quick survey of the MCHA holdings. “We’re obviously strong in 18th and 19th century collections but lacking in others,” he said. The timing of the oral history project fit nicely with the MCHA’s new strategic plans for renewing its mission to preserve and celebrate the history of Monmouth County for everyone. President Linda Bricker enthusiastically endorses the idea. “This project fits that objective so well,” she said.
“We knew we were going to have to be very proactive to accomplish our goal of diversification,” Howell explained. “Often we’ll get calls about donations that start with, ‘I don’t know if this is old enough for you guys, but…’ ”
As it turned out, Bernstein and Paster contacted Howell after she had reached out to Garden State Equality, a statewide LGBTQ advocacy and education organization. The recent December interview with the couple was conducted at the MCHA-owned Covenhoven House in Freehold. Although the 1738 Dutch colonial-style home was chosen for its privacy, the setting made for a nice contrast with the 21st century Monmouth County zeitgeist Bernstein and Paster represent. Future interviews will be conducted at MCHA headquarters or other locations convenient to participants.
The four-channel video recorder technology used for the interviews is unassuming, which encourages candor from the interviewees. The interviewers themselves have an informal conversational style which puts participants at ease right away.
The two MCHA staffers are hoping to do one recorded interview per month. Now that the project has started, Zemla believes “it will become self-sustaining after a while” as people come forward with interesting accounts of events in their lives. These will be catalogued and added to the organization’s 70 Court St. library in Freehold, and eventually posted on the MCHA’s website.
The long-range plan for the MCHA oral history project is to include a wide variety of groups, interviewed in phases, such as the long-established African American community, the more recently arrived Hispanic community, senior citizens and the Jewish community, especially for stories their grandparents have passed down from World War II. Others on the wish list are military veterans and survivors and families of victims of the 9/11 terrorist attack of the Twin Towers who will be visiting New York for the 20th anniversary next year.
Howell said they are open to ideas. “We’ll continue to record stories from all the previous groups as we move through each phase. After that, we’ll continue the program to include pretty much anyone who has an interesting story to tell.”
The MCHA will accept oral histories collected by other people to add to its collection as well. Anyone interested in contributing to the oral history project can use the special email address: digitalarchives@monmouthhistory.org. Howell and Zemla can also be reached via the MCHA website monmouthhistory.org or at 732-462-1466.
This article originally appeared in the Jan. 9, 2020 print edition of The Two River Times.
