ABSTRACT
Not too long ago, original recordings of oral history interviews ended up in an attic or a basement. At a project’s completion, only the most organized and dedicated oral historians sorted out their tapes, transcripts, and, at the end of the 20th century when institutions began to require them, consent forms, and donated them to a community or institutional archive for preservation. If anyone ever consulted one of these archived oral interview collections, it was usually to view the transcripts; hardly anyone listened to the actual recordings. The voice of the past was just that: past.
