For a podcast and radio show called The Archive Project, you can imagine there is a lot of digging through old collections, files, and even cassette tapes! The public programs team at Literary Arts has been hard at work combing through over 38 years of material to be converted and filed in our digital archive. Finding a working recording from the organization’s history that we can secure content rights for is exciting because it sometimes means getting to share a new episode of the show for free in Oregon and beyond!
Our friends at Multnomah County Public Library have kindly lent out some of these old gems out to us, and Tom Wade at VISUALtronics has been converting them for our records! We got a chance to talk to Tom about his time working on digitalization and conversion projects and some of what that entails.
You have been working in digital media transfer services for over 30 years; what aspect of the work do you enjoy the most?
What I enjoy most is recovering historic information. Part of this includes solving puzzles relating to finding correct equipment to digitize each project. Each project has its own challenges. Even with more than 30 years’ experience, I still occasionally run into situations I have never seen before and love the challenge of coming up with solutions.
Families, nonprofits, filmmakers, and more come to you for your services. Do you have any favorite moments or projects you can remember working on?
One of my favorite projects I took on was a 10+ year project that digitized film, slides, video and audio interviews about the Leavenworth Washington transformation from the early ‘60s to what it is today. The project showed the changes of a lumber town that was failing and transformed it into a Bavarian style village that people from all over the world come to visit. All of the completed work has been donated to the University of Washington by the client.
You have been helping Literary Arts digitize some cassettes from our catalogue of over 38 years of lectures, conversations, and other literary content for use on our podcast and radio show, The Archive Project. Have you always had an interest in working to preserve collections, memories, or history? Have the projects you have worked on changed how you view archives at all?
I did not start out with this type of work in mind. I started with video work pertaining to advertising and promoting projects. As technology changed, I continued to use and keep up to date all the equipment that other businesses “phased out” and ended up getting clients with projects that required transferring “old technology” to something newer. It is rewarding and also requires the old equipment be properly serviced and in good working order because none of it is being manufactured anymore. I have been trained in this field as well and it helps immensely with this type of work.
As far as archiving projects is concerned, this is very useful for preserving history. I have worked on many projects for libraries, museums, and historic web sites that took my final products and imported them to their websites. Some very interesting projects included interviews on tape from back in the ‘50s and ‘60s of individuals who were in their 70s, 80s and 90s. These people were born and raised in the 1800s and had very interesting stories from that century. Now these stories are preserved forever.
VISUALtronics provides video, film, and audio transfer and duplication services. While newer technology can become more efficient or compact, sometimes people have a certain nostalgia for a VHS, vinyl, or something else from the past. Do you have a soft spot for any of the older formats? Is there one you like to work with more than others?
Vinyl is the most interesting. Actually, that format is making a comeback lately, and in 2022 more records were sold than CDs for the first time since 1987. Other than that, it is interesting working with all the older analog formats and bringing them to the digital world so more people can enjoy them.
Find out more about Tom’s work and VISUALtronics here. And don’t forget to tune into new episodes of The Archive Project Sundays at 7 p.m. on OPB!
