Colin Hochstetler is a graduate student pursuing music at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. He is a junior fellow with the National Audio-Visual Conservation Center’s Recorded Sound Research Center. The interview was conducted by Sahar Kazmi for the Library’s Gazette newsletter.
Tell us a little about your project.
The Office of War Information Collection Lacquer Processing project is one that traces its roots all the way back to the end of the Second World War. OWI was a government organization during the 1940s. They recorded wartime news and American propaganda onto 16-inch discs which were then broadcast domestically and overseas. The Library acquired these discs — tens of thousands of them — around the end of the war and has been working to preserve them ever since. (The complete OWI records are at the National Archives.) My task is to process recordings that came from the OWI’s office in San Francisco. These recordings targeted populations in the Asia-Pacific region and are in languages like Malay, Dutch, Mandarin, Cantonese, Thai, Burmese, Korean, Japanese, Tagalog and Vietnamese.
As I process discs, the metadata I create is uploaded to the National Audio-Visual Conservation Center’s collections management system, making them discoverable to staff and on-site researchers for the first time.
I am currently in the process of compiling everything I have learned from my work and collection-oriented research into a single document so that processing can continue when my fellowship concludes.
Describe a typical day.
My day tends to be a combination of conducting research, completing processing tasks and receiving special training in all things recorded sound with my NAVCC co-fellow and good friend Joseph Sioui. My supervisor, Dave Lewis, believes it is important for us to branch out beyond our particular projects and learn how sound archives function in general, so each day offers something new and special. It could be shadowing a sound engineer, learning how to handle and store historical recording formats, cleaning discs or touring vaults and labs.
Even if I spend most of a day processing, I never know what sort of disc oddities might pop up and complicate my workflow. Processing is never a straightforward task!
What have you discovered of special interest?
I’ve learned that I absolutely love researching institutional history. I was able to sift through OWI acquisition files and discover a plethora of information not only about where these discs came from and how and when they moved, but also gaps in the collection’s history.
Sharing conversations with staff at NAVCC and the Recorded Sound Research Center has taught me a lot about how institutional knowledge can ebb and flow with different people in different times. My process of working with OWI discs has changed as I have learned more about the collection’s history.
What attracted you to the Junior Fellows Program?
The program stood out as a project-based experience that would allow me — encourage me, actually — to combine my interests in research and library work. As a training musicologist, I was particularly drawn to the projects hosted by NAVCC. I am immensely grateful to have the opportunity to work in the largest sound archive in the country.
What has your experience been like so far?
Working for the Library has been one of the best experiences of my early career. I am one of two junior fellows who have the privilege to work on-site at NAVCC. The facility is beautiful, the people are some of the kindest I have ever met and the mentorship is extraordinary. My experience goes beyond this facility, however, as I have been encouraged to travel to Washington, D.C., and explore other areas of the Library when time allows.
A definitive highlight from my various trips to the city has been getting to know staff at the American Folklife Center. I’m an accordionist, and I play lots of polka, so it was a treat to get to know folklife specialist Jennifer Cutting, who also plays. She even let me play one of her button boxes! I also serendipitously had the opportunity to collaborate with reference librarian Andrea Decker, who translated one of the OWI recordings in Malay for my display day presentation. All in all, my experience at the Library has reaffirmed my love for research and archives in ways I never could have anticipated. I have learned so much from so many kind, skilled and enthusiastic individuals.
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Comments (2)
Thank you! We are happy and relieved to learn about this project
A few years back, we donated the WW II audio materials that Miss Fitzgerald recorded during the War years…… now in the collection of the National WW II Museum.
Fran
Archivist to the Fitzgerald Estate
These recordings at the LOC are valuable historical materials for Koreans. At that time, Korea was under Japanese rule, and many Koreans learned the truth through OWI Korean language broadcasts. Missionaries in Korea at the time had shortwave radios, but they were all expelled in 1942. As a result, the radio was transferred to the radio station and the Japanese punished the station employees and distributors who secretly listened to the broadcasts, arresting 150-300 people.
Until 1945, no broadcast recordings remained in Korea, but the OWI broadcast recordings remain serving as important historical materials for understanding that period.