'Hope We Never Lose Memory'

 

“We use the word 'hope' perhaps more often than any other word in the vocabulary: 'I hope it's a nice day.' 'Hopefully, you're doing well.' 'So how are things going along? Good I hope.'  'Going to be good tomorrow? Hope so.'  Memory is valued, and I hope that we never lose memory.” – Studs Terkel 

 

Born this day in 1912, Louis “Studs” Terkel was an author, historian, actor, and broadcaster who won the Pulitzer Prize for his book on World War II, The Good War. Besides that book, he is probably best remembered for his other terrific book Working, unbending optimism about life and the goodness of people.

  

WFMT, the radio station which broadcast Terkel's long-running interview program, preserved 7,000 tape recordings of Terkel's interviews and histories.  After his death in 2008 at age 96, The Library of Congress announced a grant to digitally preserve and make available those recordings, which it called "a remarkably rich history of the ideas and perspectives of both common and influential people living in the second half of the 20th century." 

  

Louis “Studs” Terkel

"For Studs, there was not a voice that should not be heard, a story that could not be told," said Gary T. Johnson, president of the Chicago Museum of History, the initial recipient of the recordings. "He believed that everyone had the right to be heard and had something important to say. He was there to listen, to chronicle, and to make sure their stories are remembered."

 

 

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