What makes a hometown a home?
Have you ever given your hometown much thought? Why did people settle there? Has it existed for centuries or can its age be measured in decades? What keeps the economy going? Three young women in Lanesboro, Minnesota explored these questions in remarkable documentaries about their hometown.
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Mississippi's Budding Young Performers Show Off Technical Skills for SfMS
Lynn Meadows Discovery Center in Gulfport, Mississippi successfully incorporated the Stories from Main Street (SfMS) project into their WINGS performing arts program while also collaborating with elementary and middle school students. Overall, almost 200 participants helped to create the film “The Making of a Mississippi Athlete” based on interviews which they conducted with athletes across an array of sports.
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Tips on Using Creative Commons and Public Domain Resources
Our "Be Here: Main Street" partners at the MuseWeb Foundation provide great resources and advice on collecting local stories, using multimedia to illuminate the story, and using multiple digital platforms to distribute local stories.
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Life and Levees in Illinois
Last spring, Lawrence County Historical Society in Lawrenceville, Illinois collaborated with teachers and 15 students to explore the area's history of recurring floods in conjunction with the exhibition Water/Ways. The area has a series of levees in Illinois and nearby Indiana. The student researchers investigate how they protect communities thanks to a savvy network of Levee Commissioners and caretakers who patrol them when a levee is in danger of being breached.
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St. Joseph - Benton Harbor's Youth Ambassadors!
Five dedicated young women participated in Stories from Main Street at the Heritage Museum and Cultural Center in the St. Joseph-Benton Harbor, Michigan area over the summer. The program has been dubbed Youth Ambassadors and staff at the Museum worked hard to meld SfMS with their collection needs. With a high value already placed on oral histories in their research library, the Museum collaborated with the Ambassadors to preserve the stories of five area locals.
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Way to Go Mahomet Students!
Inspired by the MoMS exhibition Water/Ways, three teens collaborating with staff at the Museum of the Grand Prairie in Mahomet, Illinois created a poignant video called “The Pollution of Our Waterways in Central Illinois.” They already possessed some technical experience podcasting but the Stories from Main Street project allowed them to expand their skills, learning about lighting, recording outside, and perhaps the trickiest lesson, how to research and conduct successful interviews
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