Storytellers
Moving Forward Often Starts by Looking Back
I am a lover of stories and people and small towns. Hence, I am a rural community developer.
How does that connect? Let me tell you a story…
Recently, I spent an afternoon moderating a meeting full of people old enough to be my grandparents.
I loved it (and them).
A sharing of wisdom.
I may have been helping lead the conversation, but the real leaders in that room were the ones who understood far more about the impact of World War II, the stock market crash, the Dirty ‘30s, broomcorn, and the American Agriculture Movement than I ever will, because they lived it.
Why is this important? Not just because they have intrinsic value as people (they certainly do), but because their story is my story. And not just my story, but the story of the community I am passionate about keeping for generations to come.
As a community developer, it is easy for me to stumble into the fallacy that development means putting the past behind us. Moving forward is certainly key in helping communities like mine survive; just as important is to know what path we are moving forward on. We can’t know this without understanding where we came from. Without opening up our past and becoming familiar with it.
How? I’m sure there are many options, but in my community, we've taken a very literal approach. When I was still in school, with the help of our superintendent, a bit of grant money, and this special collections library, we, the students, were trained to conduct oral history interviews. We bought the cameras and recording equipment, we went through our phone book, and we found our story tellers.
We sat them down in kitchens and living rooms and libraries and started a conversation. Some of them were camera shy and some of them were people shy, but as they saw our interest, they opened up. It’s amazing what happens when you take even 20 minutes of your time to show people you genuinely care.
Today, several years later, we have seen our community come more alive than it has in years. Young students are taking time to learn from wisened elders, and in turn, the elders are seeing young students as community assets, not liabilities. These same students are choosing more and more to return home after college, instead of leaving their small town roots in the dust of a once-fading history. They are bringing new skills and talents and jobs, and slowly, we are revitalizing.
This, to me, is where community development starts. The story of a generation, well-shared, becoming the back-story of the next generation as they move the place we call home into tomorrow.
