Use Restrictions

All interviewees have donated copyright to The Valentine without restriction. All requests to publish any of the Historic Fulton Oral History Project materials should be directed to The Valentine .

Access Restrictions

Collection is open to research.

Alternative Form Available

VCU Libraries hosts the streaming digital collection of the Historic Fulton Oral History Project, which can be accessed here.

Preferred Citation

Historic Fulton Oral History Project, Collection # M 540, Special Collections and Archives, James Branch Cabell Library, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, VA.

Acquisition Information

Gift of The Valentine in 2013.

Historical Information

The purpose of the Historic Fulton Oral History Project is to educate, to raise awareness, and to document life in the Historic Fulton community, located in the East End of Richmond, Virginia. In an effort to document the 20th century history of the neighborhood and its residents, the project collected the oral histories of numerous members of the Historic Fulton community, particularly those with strong ties to neighborhood prior to the city of Richmond's 1970s urban renewal project.

The project was developed in 2011 in partnership among the Virginia Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC), The Valentine, the Neighborhood Resource Center of Greater Fulton, and the Greater Fulton Future Legacy Work Team. Physical copies of audio recordings and written transcriptions were distributed to a variety of local institutions to ensure that the oral histories may be accessed widely. VCU is one of those institutions.

Scope and Content

The Historic Fulton Oral History Project contains 17 interviews with 32 named interviewee participants. The interviewees are teachers, activists, clergy, and community leaders who grew up in the predominantly African American Historic Fulton community from the 1930s through the 1950s.

The interviewees were also witness to the City of Richmond's 1970s urban renewal plan that permanently changed the landscape of Historic Fulton. These interviews allow the members of the community to speak for and about themselves, and therefore they represent a unique perspective on this period in the neighborhood's history With the Greater Historic Fulton area undergoing continued change and development in the 21st century, understanding Historic Fulton's past is an invaluable resource for the neighborhood's future.

The collection includes transcripts of the interviews and mp3 files of the interviews available on CDs or a flash drive. The interviews were conducted by Dr. Caroline Morris. Freda Johnson, the project coordinator, was often present during the interviews as well.

Arrangement

The original order of this collection has been kept.