By Jessica Gorman
It’s not possible to tell all the stories. No matter how long I choose to do this work, no matter how many of us do, the stories will never run out. Even on the weeks where time runs extra short or inspiration doesn’t come, it’s never because there isn’t a story waiting to be told.
Some stories are easy. Admittedly, those are the ones that tend to get written. Time always runs short. The to-do list is always long. What is easy, what can be done quickly, is what wins. While everything I write is backed by credible sources, due to my work load, I’m relegated to the sources that can be quickly and easily accessed, often in the middle of the night. My work is never quite what I would like it to be.
The reason some stories are easier than others is the existence and availability of documentation. For some people, it’s so easy you can search a digital newspaper archive and find just about anything down to who attended their children’s birthday parties. For others, it’s almost as though they never existed.
Monday night, our museum program featured Mr. O.S. Strickland of Minden who found great success in the oil and gas industry as part of one of the first black-owned oil companies in the country and the first to employ all-black drilling crews. Not only was he successful but during a time that would have presented great challenges based on race. This was a man who came to live in Minden and he wasn’t the only Minden resident involved in this company. Our speaker, Dr. Mary Barrett, pointed out the significant challenge presented when researching black topics. This echoed a statement made in a recent meeting of another group. Here’s where we get stuck. We can do something with what we have, but we can’t do anything with what we don’t. In so many instances, the historical record of our black communities isn’t well-documented or easily accessible. Maybe it’s time to figure out what we can do about that.
There are so many stories of exceptionality based in Webster Parish. There is a lopsided telling of those stories. Too many have been omitted for far too long. Stories that we should all be proud to say that all of these people came from, or is some cases came to, our community and did exceptional things. When people say there is something special about this place, they’re absolutely right. There really is something special and we don’t even know the half of it. The half we, generally speaking, don’t know and understand enough about are the stories from our black community. And there really are some exceptional stories.
Researching black history presents its own challenges. Not just the sensitive nature, but the availability of information. For those of us who ground our work in documentation, that’s difficult to navigate. I, for one, feel the call to do what I can to improve that situation and to deliberately spend more time on the things that really matter to people.
(Jessica Gorman is Executive Director of the Dorcheat Historical Association Museum, Webster Parish Historian, President of the Minden Cemetery Association, and an avid genealogist.)