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Jesmyn Ward (Arlington Reads 2015) Wins Nations Book Award

Jesmyn Ward, an Arlington Reads 2015 featured author, has just won the National Book Award for her new novel “Sing, Unburied, Sing,” making her the first woman to win the award twice for fiction.

Her previous win was for her second novel, “Salvage the Bones,” in 2011.

In October of this year, Ward was also one of this year’s MacArthur fellowship recipients (often called the “genius grant”), along with Arlington Reads 2017 author Viet Thanh Nguyen.

Jesmyn Ward and the book cover of "Sing, Unburied, Sing"

Ward visited Arlington on April 8, 2015, as that year’s featured Arlington Reads non-fiction author, for her memoir, “Men We Reaped.”

She spoke to enthusiastic students at Marymount University in the afternoon…

Jesmyn Ward at Marymount University in 2015 for Arlington Reads

And in the evening she addressed a packed audience at Central Library.

Jesmyn Ward at Central library in 2015 for Arlington Reads

In both locations she signed books and talked to her readers – you can see many more photos from both talks on flickr.

Arlington Reads is an annual program that promotes thoughtful discussion and the joy of reading throughout Arlington County. Visit our Arlington Reads playlist on youtube to see more (due to author contracts, not all programs are available on video.)

 

Arlington Wins Top Honors for Energy Lending Library

On October 25, Arlington County was presented with a 2017 Achievement award by the VA Association of Counties, for the Energy Lending Library.

County Manager Mark Schwart, Library Director Diane Kresh stand with Library and AIRE staff members who made the Energy Lending Library possible.

County Manager Mark Schwartz Library Director Diane Kresh stand with Library and AIRE staff members who helped make the Energy Lending Library possible.

The Energy Lending Library is the result of a great partnership between the Library and Arlington’s Initiative to Rethink Energy (AIRE). The goal is to increase energy awareness and to encourage Arlington residents to make their homes more energy efficient.

The Energy Lending Library has received national, state and regional awards from the Urban Libraries Council, the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments, and the Virginia Association of Counties (VACO).

Library Director Diane Kresh describes the value of the program, saying:

“The Energy Lending Library allows Arlington citizens to interact with their library in a new and unexpected way while learning about energy efficiency opportunities and solutions in their home. The program has brought new users to the library and sparked a dialogue in the community surrounding energy conservation.”

thermal cameraItems in the Energy Lending Library include thermal cameras, electricity usage monitors, LED bulb sampler kits, and of course, curated book lists.

These tools are available for patrons to borrow for free with their Arlington Public Library card.

 

Oral History: Interview with Native American Navy Pilot Thomas Oxendine

Arlington Voices: The Oral History Collection

Native American Experience in the U.S. Military

Thomas Oxendine, from Pembroke, North Carolina, became the first Native American Navy Pilot when he served in World War II.

Oxendine had an illustrious career as a Navy pilot, earning the Distinguished Flying Cross for landing at sea and under gunfire to make a rescue. After 29 years in the Navy, Oxendine transitioned to civilian life as the head of public information with the Bureau of Indian Affairs and settled down in Arlington, Virginia, where he lived until his death in 2010. His oral history interview sheds light into the complex history of Native American and United States Federal Government relations in the 20th century, and is a wonderful source in this time of reflection on Veteran, Native American, and United States founding history.

In this clip, Thomas Oxendine describes the segregation of Native Americans in the US Military, and gives an account of his famous rescue on Yap Island.

NARRATOR: Thomas Oxendine
INTERVIEWER: Joe B. Johnson
DATE: May 22, 2007

Transcript:

TO: Well, as I was just pointing out my background is a little unusual in that I am a Lumbee Indian, born on a farm near Pembroke, North Carolina.
In 1941 – very unusual. There was an enterprising person who had a flying school in Lumberton, North Carolina, Horace Barnes. And he petitioned the government to do a study by training ten Indians to fly, and do a study similar to what they were doing with blacks down at Tuskegee, Alabama. So I was fortunate enough at age eighteen to get a license to fly. So at the time of Pearl Harbor I already could fly and went down to join up in January, and joined the Navy and became the first American Indian to go through Navy flight training.
You may have an interest in how that came about, because the policies of government during the days of segregation were a little unusual, in that the way the Armed Forces dealt with segregation, the Army only segregated black people. They had all black people doing what they did in the Army, they did it in a segregated unit. There were no restrictions on Indians in the Army. They could attain any level they had the skills and qualifications. So it only applied to blacks.
At the same time over in the Navy, the Navy restricted their officer corps to Caucasians. Indians could be any of the enlisted grades but not an officer, and blacks could only be steward’s mates. Again, that’s not good or bad, that’s flat out the way it was. In fact, the application for me signing up for the Navy had three categories: they were Caucasian, Negro, others. I don’t know who all the others were but Indians were in the “others.” So the qualifications for a naval officer was Caucasian and certain age. I think it was 19-26.
I found out the Navy has a problem with me in that at the time I applied, the Navy had enlisted pilots called NAPs or Naval Aviation Pilots. The Army had Flying Sergeants and what they did is: they did routine maintenance flights, ferried airplanes and what have you. But the war had just broken out and the Navy did away with the enlisted program. So I’m not restricted from entering flight training.
However, if they put me in, by the time I get to the other end, completion, there is no enlisted program. So it took a couple of months and finally permitted me to enter and then I got all kind of publicity as the first American Indian to go through Navy flight training. But that was kind of a fluke, and I don’t know of any others who came in until President Truman integrated the Armed Forces in 1947.
JJ: All right. That’s an unusual way to get through, and you then went through the training and went on to be an active aviator and had a career.
TO: Right.
JJ: You made at least one rescue?
TO: Yes, on July 24, 1944. It happened at Yap Island. We got a message that there were three downed pilots, in too close to the beach for their submarines to pick up. We were one hundred or so miles away, and flew in to make that rescue. The first pilot was going without anyone in his backseat and we spotted the raft, and he landed and made that recovery. They said there was a third pilot crew member in the water also, but without a life raft, and that is very difficult from being airborne to locate a person who is just in there with a life jacket under enemy gun fire.
But while that rescue is taking place by the other aircraft, I finally spotted him, and I went in to make the rescue, and the gun fire got really heavy and the air group commander said: “Do not land, do not land,” but I had already made up my mind I would not take my eyes off this person.
So I landed and went in and picked him up and leveled out and avoided the gunfire. I didn’t get hit but had splashes all around while I’m making that. So I kind of wiped my brow and said” Thank goodness I was able to do that.”

You can find Thomas Oxendine’s interview in its entirety in the Center for Local History – VA 975.5295 A7243oh ser.3 no.207

 

The goal of the Arlington Voices project is to showcase the Center for Local History’s oral history collection in a publicly accessible and shareable way.

From June 2017 – May 2018, we will post one oral history clip and transcript each month, focusing on Arlington’s history, culture and identity.

What is the oral history collection?

Oral history is a popular method of research used for understanding historical events, actors, and movements from the point of view of people’s personal experiences.

The Arlington Public Library began collecting oral histories of long-time residents in the 1970s, and since then the scope of the collection has expanded to capture the diverse voices of Arlington’s community. In 2016, staff members and volunteers recorded many additional hours of interviews, building the collection to 575 catalogued oral histories.

To browse our list of narrators indexed by interview subject, check out our community archive. To read a full transcript of an interview, visit the Center for Local History located at Central Library.

 

 

Central Library Set to Receive Major Upgrades [News Release]

Oct. 21, 2017 News Release

Design features include new meeting rooms, a multi-purpose maker lab and updated ‘Tech-Central’ area.

  • County Board awarded contract to TMG Construction Corporation for Central Library upgrades.
  • Construction is set to begin this fall.
  • Library to remain open throughout year-long project.

Read the full Library news release [PDF].

Read the County news release on the County website.

Visit the Central Upgrades page for more information and the latest updates.

 

Hispanic Heritage Month: An Interview with Vanessa Cárdenas

Arlington Voices: The Oral History Collection

The Center for Local History hosts a diverse collection of Oral History interviews with Latino and Hispanic narrators, covering the cultural, economic, and political aspects of life in and before Arlington.

While Latino and Hispanic people have been a part of this region’s history since long before 1950, the population boom of the mid and late twentieth century in Arlington included a dramatic growth in these groups as well.

In this interview, Vanessa Cárdenas shares her memories of her time at Washington-Liberty High School (formerly Washington-Lee), the importance of the Latin American Student Association in her life, and her service to her fellow students. Hispanic Heritage Month first became an annual time of celebration recognized at the national level in 1988 (you can read more about the month-long observance on the County website). 

 

Interviewer: Ingrid Kauffman
Narrator: Vanessa Cárdenas
Interview Date: November 18, 1999

Transcript:

VC: In the 10th grade we were lucky that the National Association of Hispanic Journalists came to Washington-Lee looking for a partnership. They wanted to mentor and partner with a group of Latino students. I was very lucky to be there at that time. Washington-Lee accepted, and they were trying to form a group of students. Initially it was just going to be a mentoring sort of program. But then it developed into the students forming an association, and that's how the Latin American Students Association was born back in 1989. That was really the beginning I think of one of the most respected student organizations in Arlington and the longest to be here.
LASA's objective was to portray a positive image of the Latino students. That was very important for us. We were not just a cultural organization that did dances and food. We wanted to provide a positive image of Latinos.
IK: So what did you do in connection with the journalists' organization?
VC: Basically what they did, they came once a month, they brought a speaker, usually a professional in journalism, sometimes different fields. They would speak to us about careers. They were very supportive in the first two years, and I think that was crucial because that was when the organization started.
But the other thing that they gave us was for the first time to see a Latina, a Latino, who were in different positions, who were professionals. Although from back home I knew there were professionals, people who made it. But all of that tends to go away. Unconsciously, I think, you just start taking that in. So that's one thing that made a difference in my life.
We also contributed a lot to the school. I think that Washington-Lee changed a lot from the time I started to the year I graduated. I think it was because of LASA, the role it was playing, because it was pushing for things. I remember when I got there, 9th, 10th grade, even 11th grade, in the yearbook you hardly saw pictures of Latinos.
IK: Why is this?
VC: Just because most of the yearbook staff, the people, the kids were white or minorities that were really integrated.
IK: So the informal shots were not of Latinos.
VC: Yes. Everybody had the picture, but when you go to a game or something, you didn't see -- not just Latinos, but kids from the HILT program. It was like we didn't exist. By the time I graduated, the yearbook staff was going to the HILT classes to explain to them what the yearbook was. So I think it really made a difference. The other way it did, another of our objectives was to have more Latinos students getting involved in the different clubs and sports. We took some of the Latinos that were already on teams like track team, soccer team, because even in soccer there weren't very many Latinos on the soccer team back then. We'd pair them up, and that increased the number of kids who were into sports.
IK: What do you mean?
VC: For example, we would call Gustavo, he was in the mainstream program. He came in to LASA, we would ask him if he would be willing to take one or two students who might be interested in being on the track team. And he did, and he took them with him--he spoke Spanish. He'd guide them, little things like that. Even to try out for a club is very intimidating. That's how LASA changed Washington-Lee for the better. And I think as a result of LASA, the Hispanic Parents Association was formed. One of the objectives that our sponsors had was to also get a group of parents involved. Most of our parents were involved in the Hispanic Parents Association as well. It was almost like the students' association. It was really a good time to be at Washington-Lee, I think.

You can read Vanessa Cárdenas’ interview in its entirety in the Center for Local History - VA 975.5295 A7243oh ser.3 no.153.

 

The goal of the Arlington Voices project is to showcase the Center for Local History’s oral history collection in a publicly accessible and shareable way.

From June 2017 – May 2018, we will post one oral history clip and transcript each month, focusing on Arlington’s history, culture and identity.

What is the oral history collection?

Oral history is a popular method of research used for understanding historical events, actors, and movements from the point of view of people’s personal experiences.

The Arlington Public Library began collecting oral histories of long-time residents in the 1970s, and since then the scope of the collection has expanded to capture the diverse voices of Arlington’s community. In 2016, staff members and volunteers recorded many additional hours of interviews, building the collection to 575 catalogued oral histories.

To browse our list of narrators indexed by interview subject, check out our community archive. To read a full transcript of an interview, visit the Center for Local History located at Central Library.

ADA Renovations at Shirlington

Shirlington Library

Beginning Monday, Oct. 2, the Shirlington Branch Library will undergo renovations to achieve ADA compliance.

The Library will remain open during this construction.

While every effort will be made to minimize disturbance to normal Branch activity, certain areas of the building may be closed for short periods, and noise may be unavoidable at times.

We appreciate your understanding.

Remembering September 11: An Oral History Collection

Paper cut sound waveform sign with shadow , and photo of September 11 memorial

In 2006, on the 5th anniversary of the 2001 terrorist attacks, the Center for Local History conducted a series of interviews with first responders and Arlingtonians about their experiences on Sept. 11, 2001, and the days that followed.

The three narrators who you’ll hear from in these clips – Gabriella Day-Dominiguez, Elizabeth Davis, and firefighter Dale Varnau – experienced the same events that day, and yet had uniquely personal responses to the tragedy shaped by their identities and roles within the community.

Transcripts:
NARRATOR: Elizabeth Davis
INTERVIEWER: Diane Gates
DATE: August 2, 2006

ED: Our neighborhood is very friendly people but nobody ever seems to talk to anybody else. But on that day everybody was outside of their house. So I was talking to my neighbors and they didn’t know anything and they were asking me and I didn’t know anything. So we ended up having a kind of a barbecue. Nobody really wanted to be alone. Everybody pulled a little bit of something out of their refrigerator and just gathered together.
DG: It was just impromptu
ED: Totally impromptu.
DG: When your neighbors had the cookout or got together to eat did people seem just quiet and somber. Was anyone crying? Were there people there who knew or wondered if they had a friend that was—
ED: There were a lot of people who knew somebody. I don’t think I knew anybody who knew anybody who had been hurt but there a lot of people who worked in the Pentagon or knew somebody who worked in the Pentagon. Even more than that there were people who knew somebody in New York. And at that point of course we didn’t know what was going on. You had no idea of head count. And the phones were so busy it was very hard to get through to people. So there was a lot of “I don’t know if this person is okay” going on.
But the one thing I noticed for the next, might have been two or three weeks, if you remember they had shut down every single plane everyplace, nothing was flying. So we’d be standing outside and you’d hear a plane go overhead and everybody stopped and everybody sort of cocked their head and just listened and you could tell they were thinking is this us or is this them and that wasn’t just the first day or so, that was two or three weeks.

NARRATOR: Gabriella Daya-Dominiguez
INTERVIEWER: Judy Knudsen
DATE: August 24, 2006

GD-D: My husband in the meantime, what was occurring with him at that moment was he was just entering his office. He was about 200 yards from the building. He saw the plane coming very low overhead. He saw it make a U turn and bank right into his building. At that point he said he knew that this was not an accident, this was an attack and all hell broke loose. The pandemonium in the city was already going on. First with the North Tower. People were just standing there staring. They weren’t really running, they were just watching. But by the second tower hitting people started running frantically.
GD-D: And then another twist of the story is the fact that my father is Arabic. I remember feeling a sense of dread that week. I couldn’t eat at all. I remember food tasted like paper. It was just hard to put something in my mouth and I’m not someone who loses my appetite easily. So it was deeply concerning. I felt that there was going to be an Arab backlash and I was worried about my father, although my father is not Muslim, he’s Christian. But it was an Arab group of terrorists that struck the buildings and I was worried about the perception that the world was going to have about Arabs at that time. I remember being terrified. I remember feeling like I didn’t want to talk to anybody. I was afraid to talk to anybody. I just didn’t know how to explain it.

NARRATOR: Dale Varnau
INTERVIEWER: Judy Knudsen
DATE: December 14, 2009

JK: Right. So after it’s over with, how long did it take you to…. I mean, some people were obviously very freaked out, didn’t recover so well, and I have talked to police and firemen. And some people did—Of course a lot of people internalize things, and you don’t know. I mean, how did you feel, say, afterwards, a few years afterwards? Obviously it still affects you.
DV: Yes. The first I-don’t-know-how-long, I was very angry. I was like, “Let’s go get the people that did this to us! This is America!” I’m very patriotic.
I didn’t notice it bothering me for about a year, but after a year I started, “Hey, I haven’t been sleepin’ that well. I’m startin’ to have nightmares about it, relivin’ it.” So it was pretty close to a year before I started feeling anything physical from it.
DV: And people I’ve talked to—you know, my brother’s a Vietnam vet, and he was like, “Well, I saw a hundred times worse.” “Yeah, well, you were trained for it, I wasn’t!” I was trained to fight fires, you know.
JK: Exactly.
DV: So yes, there was about a year delay for me. I knew other people that the next day had problems. There were a couple of guys that day, that while it was goin’ on, basically they wanted to say, “Okay, I’m done, I’m outta here,” and they wanted to go home right then. But it took about a year for it to really build up in me. I was kind of surprised, I guess this is the first time I’ve really talked about it in depth for a while, that I was starting to crack up a little bit a while ago. But yes, it had a delayed effect for me.

You can explore the entire September 11 oral history collection in the Center for Local History - VA 975.5295 A7243oh ser.5 - or read the transcripts online.

You can also explore our current display of letters, which were sent during the days and weeks after September 11, from children all over the county to Arlington rescue workers.

Photo: Arlington Ridge Rd Overlooking Pentagon – Public Memorial; Source: Photographs of the Arlington Historical Society, PG 230-6928

The goal of the Arlington Voices project is to showcase the Center for Local History’s oral history collection in a publicly accessible and shareable way.

The Arlington Public Library began collecting oral histories of long-time residents in the 1970s, and since then the scope of the collection has expanded to capture the diverse voices of Arlington’s community. In 2016, staff members and volunteers recorded many additional hours of interviews, building the collection to 575 catalogued oral histories.

To browse our list of narrators indexed by interview subject, check out our community archive. To read a full transcript of an interview, visit the Center for Local History located at Central Library.

1930s: Arlington Develops – An Interview with Walter De Groot

Paper cut sound waveform sign with shadow

The early to mid-20th century was an exceptional period of change and growth for Arlington, and the expansion of the Federal economy from New Deal programs and World War II was one of the largest catalysts.

Over little more than a decade during the 1930s, Arlington began to transform from a country town to a bustling suburb.

Walter De Groot provided our Center with one of the most comprehensive interviews about that time in Arlington’s history, totaling 180 transcribed pages. In this clip, Mr. De Groot remembers not only the technological and infrastructure changes that the war years brought to the area, but also the complicated social implications of war and expansion.

Narrator: Walter De Groot
Interviewer: Sara Collins
Interview Date: June 30, 2004

Transcript:
SC: Were most of the houses in that time, let’s say in the thirties, most of the houses in that neighborhood have outhouses?
WDG: We were probably, as I recall, one of the first houses that had indoor plumbing built into the house. Now that I’m thinking about it we were not on a sewer line, we were on a septic field. But I don’t ever recall any service of it while we were there. And I do not know when they had tied into the road but I’m going to assume it’s probably about the time of World War II because that’s about the time they paved Columbia Pike. That was done with German war prisoners. Columbia Pike, Arlington Boulevard, Lee Highway. All these east-west highways were being covered using war prisoners.
SC: Where did they stay? Where were they housed?
WDG: They came from Arlington Hall.
SC: That’s where they were incarcerated?
WDG: Well, they had some in camps around but I believe they were stationed, held, incarcerated at Arlington Hall area. They had a place over there. In fact, that takes to the story when I was stationed in Germany in ‘54.
We as kids, we used to take things from home like maybe cigarettes or candy or stuff like that and we’d go over to this prison camp. We kids called it the “Cracker Jack Box.” These prisoners in their off time didn’t have anything better to do and they would cut up tobacco cans and tin cans and they’d bend them and twist them and make them like something, like a horse or a bird or a carving. They would carve things. So we never knew if we threw and it was sort of like, “okay it’s your turn.” I’d go over to the fence and one of the prisoners would sort of meander over that way and let’s say I had gotten a few cigarettes. I would throw it over the fence and then he would show up and he’d throw something over the fence. We never knew what we were going to get. So that’s why it was called the “Cracker Jack Box.”
Now when I was in Germany I met a man who it turns out he had been incarcerated there
and he had a young wife. Many of the young German girls spoke English. Why I don’t know other than they got that much of an education as a second language. But I had mentioned to this fellow, I said something and he said, “My wife does not speak English but I do.” And then we got talking about how did you learn to speak such good English and he said, “I was a prisoner in America.”
And I said, “Oh, where?”
He said, “Oh, you wouldn’t know this place. It was a little town called Arlington.”
I said, “Oh my goodness. You came from the Cracker Jack Box.
He said, “You know the town.”
SC: Isn’t that amazing. What a story.

You can find Walter De Groot’s oral history interview in its entirety in the Center for Local History – VA 975.5295 A7243oh ser.3 no.193 – or read it online.

Photo: Boy Scouts Scrap Drive 1940’s; Source: Photographs of the Arlington Historical Society, PG 230-2326

The goal of the Arlington Voices project is to showcase the Center for Local History’s oral history collection in a publicly accessible and shareable way.

From June 2017 – May 2018, we will post one oral history clip and transcript each month, focusing on Arlington’s history, culture and identity.

What is the oral history collection?

Oral history is a popular method of research used for understanding historical events, actors, and movements from the point of view of people’s personal experiences.

The Arlington Public Library began collecting oral histories of long-time residents in the 1970s, and since then the scope of the collection has expanded to capture the diverse voices of Arlington’s community. In 2016, staff members and volunteers recorded many additional hours of interviews, building the collection to 575 catalogued oral histories.

To browse our list of narrators indexed by interview subject, check out our community archive. To read a full transcript of an interview, visit the Center for Local History located at Central Library.

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