Executing a plan to expand access to historic archives

The Chesapeake Heartland: An African American Humanities Project is an extensive digital archive containing extraordinary stories rooted in the history of Kent County, Maryland. Bringing these local stories to a national audience via an oral history film shoot required careful planning and a clear vision.

During preproduction we identified storytelling opportunities aligned with our client’s goals, setting us up for success long before we got on set. To understand the landscape, we engaged in our 360° process of interviewing community members, historians, and subject-matter experts. This is how we learned which stories our stakeholders felt were represented in the archives, which were not, and what stories they were interested in gathering. This research shaped our creative process moving forward, with several of those community voices ultimately becoming interviewees in the film shoot itself.

Over two days of shooting, the team captured more than 12 hours of oral histories with local community leaders and elders, regional historians, musicians, artists, and entrepreneurs. The footage captures deep dives into the stories of repatriated artifacts told by the ancestors of those who first owned them, preserving their significance for future generations. It also highlights key initiatives at the Chesapeake Heartland: An African American Humanities Project, including their youth program dedicated to preserving history through art.

To act as a bridge between Kent County and a national audience, we partnered with André Robert Lee, a renowned Philadelphia-based filmmaker and documentarian, as the ideal interviewer. Together we completed extensive pre-interviews and research to identify ideal questions and topics to explore, ensuring maximum impact once cameras were rolling. His authentic, unfolding discovery of the area and its inhabitants became a compelling contribution to the production.

These oral histories now serve as a foundation for future interpretation, including both online and in-person exhibitions to come.