12 23 09 Update:

I spent yesterday transferring all the interview video onto a mirrored RAID drive. I then need to convert the video again to audio mp3's for Tom Carroll to use, and to DVD format so it can go to the various interviewees and also be easily watched. I'm retaining everything on the one terabyte drive for easy future access. It's over six hours worth and though I didn't watch all of it, I revisited much.

There is more planned for after the New Year, which will round the Stiffel interviews out to eight. Additionally, I hope to interview other people who do not attend Stiffel.

Two things struck me as I watched the videos. The people interviewed rarely talked about objects and their acquisition. Many talked about poverty, but not about things they purchased other than perhaps saving up money for a musical instrument. My point being, as a group, their lives appear to have been very much not oriented around material gain for its own sake.

Also, recollections of how difficult or tough the neighborhood was in terms of street life varied with the women not mentioning it at all and emphasizing the connectedness and harmony in the neighborhood for the most part. The parallel story being that Stiffel has filled the void for many older residents, creating a new sense of community and even connecting people back to neighbors and relatives to which they had lost track.

The men had more "war stories," but then again it varied from recollections of doing a wrestling tackle on a larger opponent (David Welsh) to fending off a group of neighborhood toughs with a burning stick. (Joe Pepper) My only surmise is that like today, one's perception and experience has a lot to do with what circles one runs, personal temperament, and the ability to avoid trouble before it escalates.