Lake County >> The Lake County Museums hold one obvious steadfast belief: history matters. And the stories people have to tell about history matter. So it was a clear course of action that they needed to spearhead a project to document last summer’s historic fires.
Once completed, the Lake County Fires Oral History Project will forever be a wealth of information on an event that changed the landscape of Lake County — both literally and figuratively.
The project began in April at the Lake County Library. Tony Pierucci, Lake County Museums Curator, led a workshop on how to conduct an oral history interview. Half a dozen people at the event showed interest in going out to record and document stories of the fire. The project grew organically from there.
“I realized the museums were in a position to actually make history work for the present,” said Pierucci. “We have the ability to not only record what was and will be seen in the future as a significant event in Lake County’s history, but also to validate people’s experiences of the fire.”
At this point, a group of volunteers and museum staff have interviewed 25 people, everyone from survivors to county officials. And they haven’t focused exclusively on evacuees. “You don’t have to have lost your property to have a valid story to tell,” Pierucci insisted.
Interviewers have been trained to approach the potentially emotionally-charged discussions with delicacy. “One of the things of being an oral historian, you need to feel privileged,” he explained. “You’re working with people’s memories and memories are very personal, especially when you’re dealing with memories of a traumatic event.”
Interviewees have been more than just receptive to the project — they’ve been grateful for the opportunity to tell their stories, especially when they’ve received some less than sympathetic comments. “People have told survivors of the fire that they should just get over it,” Pierucci said.
It may be months down the road, and those who weren’t greatly impacted by the Valley Fire may have moved on, but for many people, the wounds are only just becoming scars. The oral history project gives people a space to work through their thoughts. Some survivors may not even realize they’ve buried their emotions until the interview is over and find that they’ve unleashed a torrent of information they had been keeping inside.
“We are at once recording history but we’re also doing our part in having people process it,” Pierucci said. “It’s important people talk about it.”
The Lake County Museums are hardly the first organization to tackle a project like this. There have been multiple oral history projects since the events of 9/11, for example, which are still ongoing today. They’re not just interviews, Pierucci said, they’re catharsis and they’re healing.
The museums plan to continue the project through the end of the year, with a goal of conducting at least three times as many interviews. Once the interviews are complete, the recordings will be stored at one of the museums — probably the Lower Lake Historic Schoolhouse Museum — in an oral history depository. Copies will also be given to the libraries.
“It’s going to be a significant source of information in the future,” Pierucci said. “It will be a huge resource when someone writes about this one day.”
In addition to the oral history project, the museums are also creating a 15 minute mini-documentary driven by experiences and narrations. Unlike the oral histories, it won’t be an extended interview. Instead, the documentary will rely heavily on on-site footage, aiming to capture the essence of people’s stories.
“I figured we needed to make something that could be easily shared among survivors, Lake County residents, outside Lake County, to remind them that people are still processing, that people’s stories matter and what has to be said about the fire is worth recording and worth repeating,” Pierucci said.
In order to create the documentary, the museums received funding from the Lake Area Club Rotary Association (LACRA) and the Lower Lake Historical School Preservation Committee (LLHSPC). They also had plenty of support at the local government level from deputy county administrative officer Jill Ruzicka and Social Services director Carol Huchingson, the latter of whom wrote a letter of support for Pierucci to use while searching for funds.
The two charitable organizations were a nice fit considering what Pierccui and museum staff hope to accomplish. With their hundreds of thousands of dollars in donations, the LACRA is focused on the recovery effort. The LLHSPC places a high value on preserving history. And ultimately, those are the two biggest motivators behind both the documentary and the oral history project.
Pierucci is looking beyond the borders of Lake County as well. “I’m also hoping it will remind the rest of California, or people who followed the fires but have forgotten, the recovery effort is still underway. The emotional wounds are still raw, as are the physical ones,” he said. “As we approach the one year anniversary, the mini documentary will elicit that kind of response.”
Anyone interested in telling their story or conducting oral history interviews is encouraged to contact the Lake County Museums. Contact the Historic Courthouse Museum in Lakeport at 263-4555 or the Lower Lake Historic Schoolhouse Museum at 995-3565.
Jennifer Gruenke can be reached at 900-2019.
