UNCG Telling Macedonia's Story
Ellica Church as seen in the Greensboro News and Record - November 3, 2002
An oral history project will capture residents' accounts of the community's past and present.
A group from UNCG is undertaking an oral history project to preserve the overlooked but memorable stories of Macedonia for generations.
Through interviews with residents, the project coordinated by the Center for the Study of Social Issues hopes to trace the development of Macedonia, a southeast High Point community of about 1,300.
Once a thriving neighborhood of mostly factory workers, Macedonia fell into decline as factories closed. Macedonia is the focus of revitalization efforts that are bringing together government, church and private projects.
The oral history project is being funded primarily through research grants and also will receive a $4,500 grant from the High Point Community Foundation.
Project coordinators will use the foundation grant to create a social studies curriculum based on the work. The curriculum, which will be geared toward area middle and high school students, will use Macedonia to highlight such issues as industry and integration in the South.
The remainder of the foundation grant will be used to finance additional interviews, said Margaret Arbuckle, director of the Division for Children, Youth, Families and Communities at the UNCG center.
In the past three months, organizers have interviewed about 20 residents to gain a sense of living and working in the southeast neighborhood. Organizers hope to interview at least 25 people for the project, which is scheduled for completion in February.
"The strength of the project is in the different personalities and recounting of life stories." Arbuckle said. "Unfortunately many of these stories have not been told because residents who are poor or African American are unheard."
Several Macedonia residents helped conduct interviews because the Center for the Study of Social Issues contends community involvement is central to such projects.
Arbuckle said the center plans to sponsor a presentation of project findings in February. The event also will allow the larger community to hear reflections from Macedonia residents in the project.
Discussions are under way to create a permanent location to house the audio recordings. Tapes would be indexed by topic and made available to the public.
"We want people to see the sense of connection with the past." Arbuckle said.
"We want people to understand the importance of the lives their parents and grandparents lived."