<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?> <docID>329600</docID> <postdate>2024-10-02 04:15:49</postdate> <headline>The historian who hears voices, hundreds of them</headline> <body><p><img class="size-full wp-image-329603" src="https://citynews.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/Barry-York-interviewing-Paul-Sultana-at-Broken-Hill-in-1984.-Photo_-Peter-Cochrane-1-resized.jpg" alt="" width="900" height="565" /></p> <caption>Barry York interviewing Paul Sultana, a former miner, at Broken Hill in 1984 as part of the Maltese Australian Folklife and Social History Project for the National Library of Australia. Photo: Peter Cochrane.</caption> <p><b>Historian Barry York has recently recorded his 500th oral history interview.</b></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">It was the story of a German man who had migrated to Australia during the COVID-19 pandemic and spent weeks in the Howard Springs quarantine facility in the NT. </span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Many of Barry’s interviews over the past 40 years have been on the topic of migration, a trend influenced by his own experience and stories from his uncle Joe, who had migrated from Malta in 1924 and had sponsored Barry and his parents to come to Australia in 1954.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Barry says he would go to his uncle’s house and sit transfixed as Joe recalled stories from the “old days†in Malta.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Barry says this curiosity was also fostered by his requests for information about his grandparents, who he never knew, in the form of bedtime stories, with his mum’s answers helping him to imagine what his grandparents would have been like.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">His interest in preserving people’s stories never faded, and Barry went on to complete a PhD on Maltese migration to Australia before 1949.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“I started off by doing conventional research, you know, archives, libraries, print-based sources, and then it dawned on me that, [...] there were people still alive, old people, who had come here before 1949,†he says.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“I interviewed some who had come in the 1910s, 1920s, and now, when you hear their voices, you're hearing people who came here more than 100 years ago, which is quite extraordinary.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“You can deal with statistics about immigration and all that, but there's always a human story behind it, and I thought, well, by recording the people who were behind the statistics, I'm humanising the story. </span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“The human voice is so distinctive and intimate, the accents, the intonations, can't be captured really in print form, and above all else, the pauses can be telling. </span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“So to me, the interviews are about sound archiving, really creating a historical source for researchers based on listening.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“A lot of the people I've interviewed have been workers, working-class type people, and their stories are told and preserved through this method.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“All these stories would be lost, because none of these people would have written their autobiographies.â€</span></p> <p><img class=" wp-image-329601" src="https://citynews.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/Barry-York-3-resized.jpg" alt="" width="750" height="500" /></p> <caption>Barry York… “The human voice is so distinctive and intimate, the accents, the intonations, can't be captured really in print form." Photo: Katarina Lloyd Jones.</caption> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Barry moved to Canberra in the late 1980s, and began doing contract work for the National Library of Australia’s (NLA) oral history collection, and for the ACT Heritage Library. He also worked as a historian at the Museum of Australian Democracy at Old Parliament House for ten years, from 2006-2016.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">He continues to do contract work, predominantly for the NLA, who commission specific stories. </span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">He says one standout career moment was in 1997, when the NLA agreed to his pitch to interview former world heavyweight wrestling champion Mario Milano, his childhood hero.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“Growing up in Brunswick and working-class background and all that, I was a big fan of the pro-wrestling, it's the WWE today, back then it had a bit more credibility.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“I recorded, over three sessions, several hours of Mario's life.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“He ended up settling in Australia, so it was a migration story, but also he wrestled in America, and he was born in Italy, migrated to Venezuela after the war, like many Italians did. </span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“I would never have dreamed that I would record his story.â€</span></p> <p><img class=" wp-image-329602" src="https://citynews.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/Mario-Milano-former-world-heavyweight-wrestling-champion-taken-by-Barry-in-1998.-Photo_-Barry-York-1-resized.jpg" alt="" width="650" height="969" /></p> <caption>Barry York's photo of world champion wrestler Mario Milano in 1998.</caption> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Barry says a lot of work goes into preparing for oral history interviews, including a preliminary chat and a point-form outline of the important elements of their life to maintain a structure to the interview.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Then, he will draw up a question guide for them, which he will send to them so they can check if anything important has been neglected. </span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Barry says he takes a "whole life" approach to his oral history interviews, beginning with birth, parents, formative years, the voyage and settlement experiences, so interviews often take several hours and can sometimes take multiple sessions.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Barry hopes more people engage with recording their friends and families’ stories, especially now that technology makes it so easy.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“When I started, lucky I'm a big bloke, the recording equipment, it was called a Nagra-E, it weighed a tonne and it was reel-to-reel,†he says.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“Each reel went for 25 minutes, it was bad, because after 20 minutes you'd have to stop their flow, and then take a few minutes to change the takes. </span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“Now it's fantastic, the technology is wonderful.â€</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Barry says he also helps out a lot with those who reach out asking for tips on how to conduct the oral history interviews, always gratis.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“I'm really committed to this work,†he says.</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“It'll be my most important legacy professionally.â€</span></p> <p><i><span style="font-weight: 400;">Barry’s work is accessible for research, personal copies and public use. Visit </span></i><a href="https://www.nla.gov.au/collections/guide-selected-collections/york-collection#"><i><span style="font-weight: 400;">nla.gov.au/collections/</span></i></a><i><span style="font-weight: 400;"> to view the York Collection.</span></i></p> </body>