Oral history project turns focus on Hispanics in America
Gustavo Mestas walked 57 blocks a day to medical school because he didn't have the money for the bus. He still saved up enough money to buy his daughter a Barbie doll, however, to replace the roomful of dolls she'd left behind in Cuba.
Recounting the story in Georgetown, Del., his daughter, Ileana Smith, chokes up.
"I want you to know that you have had the greatest influence in my life of anyone, and I love you and I respect you and admire you," she tells him, the interview now part of Historias, a new initiative by the oral history project StoryCorps to record and preserve the life stories of Hispanics across the United States and Puerto Rico.
StoryCorps already has recorded 30,000 interviews since its start in 2003 and launched other initiatives, including one in 2007 to record the stories of African-Americans. David Isay, who started the national effort to get people talking - and listening - said the response from the Hispanic community had been unprecedented.
There's been a"sense of excitement and gratitude that Latino voices are going to be heard, respected and preserved," he said.
The 40-minute interviews will be conducted over the next year in cities that include Miami, San Diego; Chicago; Houston; Taos, N.M.; Yuma, Ariz.; and San Juan, Puerto Rico. Bilingual facilitators will collect the interviews, which resemble intimate conversations between family members or close friends. Some end in tears, others in laughter.
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Recounting the story in Georgetown, Del., his daughter, Ileana Smith, chokes up.
"I want you to know that you have had the greatest influence in my life of anyone, and I love you and I respect you and admire you," she tells him, the interview now part of Historias, a new initiative by the oral history project StoryCorps to record and preserve the life stories of Hispanics across the United States and Puerto Rico.
StoryCorps already has recorded 30,000 interviews since its start in 2003 and launched other initiatives, including one in 2007 to record the stories of African-Americans. David Isay, who started the national effort to get people talking - and listening - said the response from the Hispanic community had been unprecedented.
There's been a"sense of excitement and gratitude that Latino voices are going to be heard, respected and preserved," he said.
The 40-minute interviews will be conducted over the next year in cities that include Miami, San Diego; Chicago; Houston; Taos, N.M.; Yuma, Ariz.; and San Juan, Puerto Rico. Bilingual facilitators will collect the interviews, which resemble intimate conversations between family members or close friends. Some end in tears, others in laughter.