Phone: (212) 854-2273
Fax: (212) 854-5378
Contact: Ron Grele, Director
Business Hours: 9:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m., Mon.-Fri.
Holdings:
Columbia University's Oral History Research Office has a vast collection of over seven thousand oral history interviews that grows by several hundred interviews each year. The collection's director, Professor Ronald Grele, judges that Germany is the second most-mentioned country in the entire collection, with only the United States discussed more frequently. The collection is strongest on the period 1945-1960 and on topics related to politics, military issues, international relations, and diplomacy. All interviews available for researcher use have been transcribed.
Two publications give partial access to individual interviews and to special projects contained in the collection. One is Oral History Index: An International Directory of Oral History Interviews (Westport, Conn.: Meckler, 1990), a compendium of catalogues to individual oral history collections around the world. Columbia submitted its catalogue and is included in the volume, which depended on the cooperation of repositories for its completion.
The second relevant publication is the Oral History Collection of Columbia University, Abstracts and Indexes, published in three parts. Part I indexes about five hundred interviews, with index entries derived from the full text of the interviews covered. The entries in Parts II and III cover another five hundred interviews but use subject entries based only on the texts of the abstracts of interviews, making them less comprehensive and less useful. These same interviews are available for purchase in microform and have been purchased by some libraries around the United States. Information on their distribution is available through the Columbia University Oral History Project Office.
The material covered in Oral History Collection of Columbia University, Abstracts and Indexes is also available on RLIN.
The Oral History Research Office maintains an up-to-date card-file index of proper names listing anyone mentioned in any interview. One could search Konrad Adenauer, for example, and find a list of all interviews in the collection in which he is mentioned, with page references. This index, which is constantly updated, is available only at the Research Office.
The pamphlet, Oral History: Oral History at Columbia, 1987--1992, issued by the Columbia University Oral History Research Office (New York: Columbia University, 1992) lists projects completed or underway during that time period and provides information about the collections. Several project titles appear to offer a high probability of containing material on Germany, German-American relations, or American policy towards Germany, including the following: Aviation (including an interview with Willy Messerschmidt), Eisenhower Administration, Ethnic Groups and American Foreign Policy, International Negotiations, Marshall Plan, Nobel Laureates on Scientific Research, Psychoanalytic Movement, Radio Liberty, and World Bank.
The collection relating to the Eisenhower administration deserves special mention. The first set of interviews conducted for the Eisenhower Library are all deposited at Columbia as well as at the Eisenhower Library in Abilene, Kansas. The Columbia Oral History Research Office has subsequently added interviews that are not deposited at the Eisenhower Library, and the library has added interviews that are not deposited at Columbia.
Contact the staff of the Columbia University Oral History Research Office to obtain information on the current status of the holdings. Or consult the research office's web site.
Research Foundation for Jewish Immigration
570 Seventh Avenue, Room 1106
New York, NY 10018
Phone: (212) 921-3871
Fax: (212) 575-1918
Contact: Dennis E. Rohrbaugh, Archivist
Business Hours: 10:00 a.m.-4:00 p.m., Mon.-Fri., by appointment; closed federal and Jewish holidays
Holdings:
The oral history program of the Research Foundation for Jewish Immigration conducted 253 interviews between 1971 and 1981. The foundation has also published a Guide to the Oral History Collection of the Research Foundation for Jewish Immigration, New York (New York: K.G. Saur, n.d.).
The guide discusses in detail the background of the program, as well as its methodology and current status. The program's goal was to document information "on the social and communal history of the ,average' immigrant from Central Europe of the Nazi period." The first phase of the program concentrated on first-generation immigrants; a second phase will involve the children of these interviewees.
The program interviewed members of large, organized Jewish immigrant communities in the United States to "obtain information on this communal organizational history of the group." A second purpose was to relate this information to the individual stories of those who had participated in, aided, or observed the formation of refugee organizations.
Interviews follow an outline of predefined topics (such as the various historical stages of pre-emigration, migration, resettlement, and postimmigration) to increase their comparability and analytical value.
The foundation's published guide lists information about each interviewee, including personal data (birth date, residences, occupations), life history data (a summary of the interview contents), organizations mentioned in the interview, references (information on the interview itself, such as date, length, and interviewer), and literature (which cites other publications that reference the interviewee). An index is included in the guide.
Use of the interviews is restricted to the interview transcripts. At the time of the publication of the foundation's guide, eighty of the 253 interviews had been transcribed. Most of the interviewees have released their legal rights to the interviews. The interviews range from thirty minutes to six hours.
Researchers must submit a written application for permission to use the collection, and the foundation will release interviews only to researchers whom the foundation's board considers qualified. Photocopying of transcripts is not permitted.
State University of New York - Buffalo
University Archives
Buffalo, NY 14260
Phone: (716) 645-2916
Contact: Archivist
Business Hours: Contact the University Archives
Holdings:
The University Archives at SUNY - Buffalo contain two lengthy transcribed interviews with Professor Georg Iggers and his wife Wilma Iggers on their childhoods in Germany, as well as contacts with historians in the Federal Republic since 1961 and the German Democratic Republic since 1966. Professor Iggers is a well-published and established historian of Germany and German historiography.
The interviews are available in transcript form, but they are not indexed.
Phone: (919) 682-9319
E-Mail Address: coakes@acpub.duke.edu
Contact: Cheryl Oakes, Librarian/Archivist
Business Hours: Contact the Forest History Society
Holdings:
The Forest History Society has completed over 250 oral history interviews since the early 1950s that deal in some way with forest or conservation history. At least one interview is related to Germany: a sixty-page interview from 1969 with Richard P. Plochmann, who was associated with the University of Munich. Plochmann discusses family history, World War II, forestry issues, and other subjects.
Contact the Forest History Society for information on the entire collection, finding aids, and access and usage.
University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill
Manuscripts Department
Wilson Library, CB#3926
Chapel Hill, NC 27514-8890
Phone: (919) 962-1345
Fax: (919) 962-4452
E-Mail Address: rashrade@email.unc.edu
Contact: Richard A. Shrader, Reference Archivist
Business Hours: 8:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m., Mon.-Fri.;
9:00 a.m.-1:00 p.m., Sat.
Holdings:
The University of North Carolina has substantial oral history holdings, including the large Southern Oral History Program. While the project's focus is mainly on the American South, relevant interviews can be found among its various series.
For example, the series on Piedmont Industrialization includes interviews conducted during the 1970s with Americans of German ancestry in that area. Interviewees include men and women who were factory workers, farmers, and teachers.
Although interviews do not include either indexes or tables of contents, a finding aid and a master index are available that will facilitate a search for specific subjects or names. Interviews are available in both tape and transcript formats.
The Southern Oral History Program maintains a useful set of web pages.
Phone: (614) 593-2715
E-Mail Address: mccabe@ouvaxa.cats.ohiou.edu
Contact: Doug McCabe
Business Hours: Contact Archives and Special Collections
Holdings:
The Archives and Special Collections at Ohio University is the repository for the Cornelius Ryan Collection. Ryan is the author of The Longest Day, A Bridge Too Far, and The Last Battle, all of which deal with World War II.
The Ryan Collection contains all the research files for these and other works, Ryan's personal library, and memorabilia. Research files contain documents, questionnaires, interviews, accounts, diaries, maps, tapes, and photographs. The collection contains files on 398 German soldiers and civilians. Of these files, 315 are interviews, 172 are questionnaires, and sixty-six are dictaphone belts or cassette tapes. There are also fifty-one accounts and diaries from Germans.
Contact the Archives and Special Collections for information on access and business hours.
University of Akron
Archives of the History of American Psychology
Akron, OH 44325-4302
Phone: (330) 972-7285
Fax: (330) 972-6170
E-Mail Address: jpopplestone@uakron.edu
Contact: John A. Popplestone, Director
Business Hours: 7:30 a.m.-4:00 p.m., Mon.-Fri.
Holdings:
The Archives of the History of American Psychology at the University of Akron holds a small oral history collection donated by Dr. Ulfried Geuter. Dr. Geuter interviewed nine exiled German psychologists for his work on the status of psychology in Germany under National Socialism, Die Professionalisierung der deutschen Psychologie im Nationalsozialismus.
Dr. Geuter conducted these interviews in 1979 and 1980, and the archives now holds the transcribed printed copies. The interviews were conducted in German.
Phone: (405) 442-3804
Fax: (405) 442-2304
Contact: Towana D. Spivey, Director
Business Hours: Vary
Holdings:
The Fort Sill Museum holds oral history interviews with two German citizens who were prisoners of war at Fort Sill during World War II. An additional two or three interviews with similar subjects have been conducted, although this material is not available for outside research until final review and cataloging have been completed. Contact the museum for the current status of these interviews. Use is contingent upon the approval of the research project by the museum's director.
Phone: (215) 925-2222
Fax: (215) 925-1954
E-Mail Address: jmhuns@chemheritage.org
Contact: Jean Hunsberger, Oral History Assistant
Business Hours: 9:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m., Mon.-Fri.
Holdings:
The Chemical Heritage Foundation has conducted approximately 150 life and career oral history interviews with chemists, chemical engineers, and chemical industrialists. Most of the interviews have been completed and are available to researchers in the Arnold and Mabel Beckman Center.
Interviewees discuss their careers, childhood, schooling, and events surrounding major career accomplishments, with an emphasis on subjects not fully illuminated in existing documentation. Each interview also places the individual's career within the context of the broader relevant discipline.
Of special interest to scholars of postwar German-American history are accounts by Gordon Cain, Charles P. Smyth, and William C. Goggins of their role in the scientific communities sent to Germany immediately after World War II to assess the status of German science.
The collection also includes interviews with German-Americans who received all or part of their education in Germany, some of whom also began their careers there. These interviewees include Theodor Benfey, Konrad Bloch, Gerhard Herzberg, and Herman Mark. As of December 1, 1996, interviews with Frederick Eirich and Paul Weisz were underway but not yet completed.
The foundation has also interviewed some Austrians-Alfred Bader, Carl Djerassi and Leo Steinbach-and one Swiss who taught in Germany, Rudolph Signer.
The oral history collection is available at the foundation in both tape and transcript formats. The collection has a finding aid, and individual interviews include both indexes and tables of contents. The foundation is creating a master index to the entire collection.
All interviews are to be transcribed and deposited in a file at the Chemical Heritage Foundation. Each file includes the original interview tapes, a reading copy of the final transcript, the original verbatim transcript, the draft transcript with comments, and miscellaneous research material. Generally, all information in the file is available for researcher use, subject to some restrictions.
The foundation's unrestricted oral history interviews are also available for purchase as transcripts, tapes, or diskettes. Research files and photographs related to the interviews can also be purchased. Contact the foundation for current prices.
The foundation also plans to post information about its oral history collection on the World Wide Web. As of December 1, 1996, general information about the center and the oral history program were on-line, as well as abstracts of six oral history interviews. These abstracts include the name of the interviewee, brief biographical and career information, and a paragraph summary of the interview contents. The abstract also includes information on the interview itself, such as its date, length of transcript, length of tape recording, interviewer name, date of completion, and whether the interview is open or restricted.
Gratz College
Holocaust Oral History Archive
Tuttleman Library, Room 200-1
Old York Road and Melrose Avenue
Melrose Park, PA 19027
Phone: (215) 635-7300
Fax: (215) 635-7320
Contact: Josey G. Fisher, Director
Business Hours: 10:00 a.m.-4:00 p.m., Tues.; or by appointment
Holdings:
The Gratz College Holocaust Oral History Archive, founded in 1979, holds approximately eight hundred audiotaped oral history interviews related to the Holocaust. Interviewees include Holocaust survivors-Jewish and non-Jewish, Kindertransporte, Shanghai refugees, and Russian military and partisans. The collection also includes interviews with American liberators of the camps, rescuers, and witnesses.
Many of the interviews are transcribed, and both tapes and transcripts are available. Transcripts have summaries and subject headings. The archive is compiling an electronic catalogue and master index of the entire collection.
The archive has supplemented the oral history collection with memorabilia such as documents, diaries, letters, and photographs. It also holds several memorial books and survivor registers.
U.S. Army Military History Institute
Archives Branch
Carlisle Barracks
Carlisle, PA 17013-5008
Phone: (717) 245-3601
E-Mail Address: mhi-ar@carlisle-emh2.army.mil
Contact: Richard Sommers, Archivist
Business Hours: 9:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m., Mon.-Fri.
Holdings:
The Archives Branch of the Military History Institute holds a number of relevant oral histories among its substantial holdings. The institute conducts an ongoing program of interviews with senior U.S. Army officers and acquires some from other sources, expanding this collection at the rate of about four to six interviews a year.
Interviews for the Senior Officer Oral History Program cover a variety of topics. Most interviewees come from various branches of the army, but some are members of the U.S. Air Force, the U.S. Marine Corps, and some are civilians.
The collection currently contains about two hundred interviews covering World War II and the Cold War. Many of the officers served in Germany during their careers.
The institute published the Senior Officer Oral History Program Project Handlist in 1992, with an update the following year. The guide lists each interview. Entries include the names of the interviewee and interviewer, date, transcript length, and access status. Some entries also include brief notes on the interview's contents.
Most materials must be used at the Military History Institute, although researchers can borrow duplicate copies of interviews through interlibrary loan. The U.S. Army Center of Military History holds copies of open transcripts. The institute permits a researcher to photocopy up to one hundred pages in a one-year period.
Phone: (401) 841-2435
Fax: (401) 841-1140
E-Mail Address: cherpake@usnwc.edu
Contact: Dr. Evelyn M. Cherpak, Head,
Naval Historical Collection
Business Hours: 8:00 a.m.-4:30 p.m., Mon.-Fri.
Holdings:
Among the holdings of the Naval Historical Collection at the Naval War College are three German-related oral histories.
The first is with Arleigh Burke of the U.S. Naval Institute, who discusses the German General Staff and the German Foreign Office. The second is with Donald McDonald, deputy chief of staff, CO, Naval Forces, Germany, 1945-1946. He discusses postwar Germany. Both of these interviews have been transcribed and indexed.
A third interview, not transcribed, is with June Gibbs. She discusses breaking the German code during World War II as a WAVE in the Naval Communications Annex in Washington, D.C., from 1943 to 1945.
Photocopying of the transcribed interviews is not permitted, and equipment for using the taped interview is not provided by the Naval Historical Collection. Contact the Naval War College for more information.
Phone: (512) 458-2255
Contact: Mary Collins Blackmon, Curator
Business Hours: 9:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m., Wed.-Fri.
Holdings:
The Elisabet Ney Collection contains a circa 1950 interview with Mrs. Willie Rutland, curator of the museum.
Lyndon Baines Johnson Library
2313 Red River Street
Austin, TX 78705
Phone: (512) 916-5137
Fax: (512) 478-9104
E-Mail Address: tedg@redbud.lbjlib.utexas.edu
Contact: Ted Gittinger, Director, Special Projects
Business Hours: 9:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m., Mon.-Fri.
Holdings:
The oral history collection at the Lyndon Baines Johnson Library includes about two thousand interviews with approximately eleven hundred individuals. The collection totals nearly half a million double-spaced pages of text. Some interviews are not yet open to researchers.
President Johnson grew up in Texas, associating with many descendants of German settlers, both in Fredericksburg and in Johnson City. The collection includes oral history interviews that deal with this phase of his life and speak to the German element in Texas.
Many interviews discuss German-American political relations during Johnson's years in the Congress and as president, especially his visits to Germany, the visits of Ludwig Erhard and Konrad Adenauer to the United States, and issues related to NATO and economic affairs.
Some transcripts include indexes and/or tables of contents. As of December 1, 1996, the library was close to completing a subject and proper name index to the entire collection.
All open interviews are available at the Johnson Library or through interlibrary loan. For interlibrary loan information, contact Linda Hanson, archivist, (512) 916-5137, ext. 234.
Sophienburg Museum and Archives
200 N. Seguin Street
New Braunfels, TX 78130
Phone: (210) 629-1900
E-Mail Address: gertxhst@sat.net
Contact: Michelle Oatman, Director
Business Hours: 10:00 a.m.-4:00 p.m., Mon.-Fri.
Holdings:
The Sophienburg Museum and Archives concentrates on the history of German settlement in New Braunfels and German genealogy in Texas and the western United States. The archives contains documents, maps, photographs, and movies related to the founding and growth of New Braunfels and German immigration into Texas.
The collection includes nearly one thousand taped oral history interviews with community members. The archive is currently transcribing and indexing the tapes, which are available for auditing at the archives. Researchers may purchase copies of the tapes. An electronic catalogue of interviews allows researchers to search the collection.
As of December 1, 1996, the archives charged $2.50 per researcher per day for access to its materials. The staff can arrange for German translation services, also for a fee. Contact the staff for more information, or consult the Museum and Archives web pages.
Texas A&M University
Special Collections, Manuscripts & Archives
Sterling C. Evans Library
College Station, TX 77843-5000
Phone: (409) 845-1951
Fax: (409) 862-4761
E-Mail Address: trw0140@acs.tamu.edu
Contact: Tod R. Walters, Senior Library Specialist
Business Hours: 8:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m., Mon.-Fri.
Holdings:
Texas A&M University has a large oral history collection. The university has printed A Guide to the Oral History Collection of Texas A&M University, compiled by Terry H. Anderson. The entries in the guide include interviewee names, biographical notes, brief summaries of the interview contents, and dates and lengths of the interviews.
The oral history collection includes the "German Document Retrieval Project," which is focused on German methods of creating synthetic fuels during World War II and Allied use of those techniques after the war. This project contains at least six oral history interviews conducted in 1977 and 1978. Use of the interviews is limited to transcript copies, and, as of December 1, 1996, only two of these interviews had been transcribed.
The collection also includes a substantial number of interviews with individuals who were active militarily in World War II and Vietnam. One interview of note is that with Sergeant Georg Gaertner, who served in the German Afrika Korps. Gaertner was captured by U.S. troops and became a prisoner of war in New Mexico. He escaped in 1945 and remained a fugitive for decades. This 145-page interview was conducted in 1984. It provided source material for a book on the subject: Georg Gaertner and Arnold Krammer, Hitler's Last Soldier in America, (New York: Stein and Day, 1985).
The oral history collection at Texas A&M is still being processed. Contact the university for an updated list of interviews.
University of Texas - Austin
Center for American History
Austin, TX 78712-7330
Phone: (512) 495-4515
Fax: (512) 495-4542
Contact: John Wheat, Archives Translator
Business Hours: 9:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m., Mon.-Sat.
Holdings:
The Center for American History at the University of Texas has two oral history collections, the Folklore Center Archives-Sound Recordings and the Allan Turner Collection, with audio tapes dealing with cultural aspects of German-American communities in central Texas. Turner, a Texas journalist, recorded conversations with Texas musicians about German-American music from the region. One videotape from the early 1970s deals with Fredericksburg, Texas, a German-American community.
The center has a finding aid for the Folklore Center Archives and provides equipment for listening to and viewing audio and videotapes.
University of Texas - El Paso
Institute of Oral History
Library
El Paso, TX 79968
Phone: (915) 747-7052
E-Mail Address: crivers@utep.edu
Contact: Claudia Rivers, Head, Special Collections
Business Hours: Contact UTEP Library
Holdings:
The primary aim of the Institute of Oral History at the University of Texas - El Paso is to preserve the history of the region adjacent to the Rio Grande River. Current holdings of the institute include almost nine hundred interviews, for a total of over eighteen thousand pages of transcribed copy.
Interviewees include three members of the U.S. armed forces who served in Germany during World War II. Two were in the 104th Division and discuss the American raid at Eschweiler and the liberation of the Nordhausen concentration camp. The third was a prisoner of war at several locations in Germany.
The institute also holds an interview with General James H. Polk, commander of the 4th Armored Division at the border of East and West Germany from 1961 to 1963, the U.S. Commandant of Berlin in 1963, and the commander of the U.S. Army in Europe from 1967 to 1971. He was also a friend of Willy Brandt.
In addition, three interviews with Holocaust survivors are available at the institute.
The UTEP Library, Special Collections, has a printed catalogue of its oral history holdings, which includes summaries of the interviews. The institute is creating a master index, scheduled for completion sometime in late 1996. Transcripts are available on microfilm and via interlibrary loan. Researchers may also find information about the Institute of Oral History and its holdings on the World Wide Web.
Phone: (801) 378-3175
Fax: (801) 378-6708
E-Mail Address: sue_thompson@byu.edu
Contact: Susan G. Thompson
Business Hours: 8:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m., Mon.-Fri.
Holdings:
The Latter Day Saints German-Speaking Immigrants Oral History Project, sponsored by the Charles Redd Center for Western Studies at Brigham Young University, is housed at BYU's Harold B. Lee Library, Special Collections and Manuscripts. The project is focused on the experiences of Mormon German-speaking immigrants and their children in the United States. The interviews concentrate on the immigrant process, life in the United States, German-speaking church meetings, and relationships with other Americans, especially during World War II.
Ten of the fourteen interviews are actually with Swiss immigrants, who were nonetheless considered "German" by the Utah residents they encountered. The oral history interviews formed the basis of the article by Jessie L. Embry, "Little Berlin: Swiss Saints of the Logan Tenth Ward," published in Utah Historical Quarterly: 56/3 (Summer 1988).
The interviews, conducted in 1986 and 1987, have been transcribed. The Library Special Collections also holds the taped copies, but listening equipment is available only by special arrangement.
Information on these and other oral history interviews at Brigham Young University is available through RLIN.
Phone: (703) 302-6990
Fax: (703) 302-6799
Contact: Stuart Kennedy
Business Hours: 9:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m., Mon.-Fri.
Holdings:
The Oral History Program of the Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training has compiled a collection of interviews dealing with American foreign affairs and diplomacy. In this guide, see the entry for Georgetown University (pp. 32-33), which is the repository for the association's collection.
George C. Marshall Foundation
Research Library
P.O. Box 1600
VMI Parade
Lexington, VA 24450
Phone: (540) 463-7103
Fax: (540) 464-5229
Contact: Tom Camden, Archivist/Librarian
Business Hours: 9:00 a.m.-4:30 p.m., Mon.-Fri.
Holdings:
The George C. Marshall Foundation's Research Library has a large number of oral history interviews, most with military personnel.
The finding aid includes only names, locations, and dates, along with a few career identifications, so researchers familiar with these names will find it easier to locate those interviews of possible relevance to their subject of interest.
The finding aid lists the videotape, "Occupation-An American Legacy," created in 1976. Participants in the videotape include Lucius D. Clay, John J. McCloy, W. Averell Harriman, Jacques J. Reinstein, and Paul Nitze.
The list of oral history interviews at the library includes several notable names: George C. Marshall, Dean Acheson, Bernard M. Baruch, Omar N. Bradley, Henry A. Byroade, Mark Clark, Sir Anthony Eden, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Leslie R. Groves, George F. Kennan, Chester W. Nimitz, Eleanor Roosevelt, Dean Rusk, Adlai Stevenson, Maxwell Taylor, Harry S Truman, and numerous members of the armed forces.
Most of these interviews have been transcribed. Contact the staff at the George C. Marshall Library to identify the most relevant oral history interviews.
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
Office of History
Kingman Building
7701 Telegraph Road
Alexandria, VA 22315-3865
Phone: (703) 428-6558
Fax: (703) 428-8172
E-Mail Address: martin.gordon@inet.hq.usace.army.mil
Contact: Martin K. Gordon, Archivist/Historian
Business Hours: By appointment
Holdings:
The Office of History at Headquarters, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, holds an extensive collection of oral history interviews. The interviews, numbering approximately six hundred, are either full career or topical interviews with military and civilian employees of the Corps of Engineers. As many as one half of the interviews deal with the interviewee's service in Germany since World War II.
Interviews have been transcribed, and some are available on audio or videotape as well. The Office of History maintains on disk a finding aid for the collection which can be searched for particular names or subjects. In addition, some of the individual transcripts include an index. The history office is continuing its oral history work, and more interviews are added to the collection periodically.
Researchers must be U.S. citizens or have prior permission from the Department of Defense to use the collection. German citizens can request permission through the Office of the Military Attaché at the German Embassy in Washington, D.C.
University of Virginia
Special Collections
Alderman Library
Charlottesville, VA 22903
Phone: (804) 295-3097
E-Mail Address: mssbks@virginia.edu
Contact: Mike Plunkett, Curator
Business Hours: 9:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m., Mon.-Fri.; 9:00 a.m.-1:00 p.m., Sat. when school is in session
Holdings:
The Alderman Library at the University of Virginia does not hold an oral history collection pertaining specifically to Germany. However, the Special Collections department is the repository of the Oron J. Hale Papers, which include interview material (Record Group 21/98).
Hale was a member of U.S. Army military intelligence during World War II. In August 1945, he conducted interviews and interrogations in Mondoef-les-Bains, France, with high-ranking military, political, and diplomatic Nazi officials to gather information on the German military. Interviewees included Ribbentrop, Goering, Keitel, Alfred Rosenberg, Doenitz, von Papen, and others. Similar people were interviewed by George Shuster, John Brown Mason, and others.
The Hale Papers do not include the verbatim transcripts of these interviews, but the materials in the collection are Hale's reports based on notes taken during his interrogations. A finding aid and a master index to the Hale collection are available.
In addition, the Special Collections department also holds tapes and an indexed transcript of a 1976 interview with Hale in which he discusses briefly the interrogations he conducted in 1945.
Phone: (608) 785-8350
Fax: (608) 785-8486
E-Mail Address: lee_cr@mail.uwlax.edu
Contact: Charles R. Lee, Director of the
Oral History Program
Business Hours: Vary with academic calendar
Holdings:
The University of Wisconsin - La Crosse has a large and growing oral history collection; as of December 1, 1996, the collection included over four hundred interviews. The main focus of the oral history program is to interview individuals connected in some way to the university or the local community.
Several of the interviewees are of German ancestry or were German immigrants to the United States. These individuals discuss the stories of their migration and the situations they found upon arriving in America. Many also provide recollections of World War I and the anti-German feelings prevalent in the United States. Some interviews also discuss World War II, including military service in Germany.
Because the oral history program was begun in the late 1960s, and because the program concentrated on older individuals, few of the interviews deal with the period 1945-1995. However, the oral history program has expanded its operations, and the university has recently added sixty interviews, yet to be transcribed, with Wisconsin-area veterans of World War II.
The University of Wisconsin has published a Collection Guide to its oral history project, available for purchase. The latest edition is from October 1991. Contact the university for purchasing information.
The 1991 guide lists over 150 oral history interviews. All entries include the name of the interviewee and a brief biographical note. Most of the interviews have been transcribed, and the entries for these interviews also provide a brief abstract and a list of subjects discussed in the interview. Bibliographic information is also provided, such as the interviewer name, date of interview, length in tapes and transcript pages, binding, restrictions, and whether or not the interview has been indexed.