Tribute to William H. Rehnquist

The casket was plain unvarnished pine, and over it was draped the American flag. As my fellow Rehnquist clerks and I carried that casket up the marble steps of the Supreme Court building, to the Great Hall, it occurred to a number of us that this was very fitting. For Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist was direct, straightforward, utterly without pretense—and a patriot who loved and served his country.     

Remembering an Industrial Landscape

Abandoned industrial factories and decaying communities have become a common sight in many places throughout the western world. Since the beginning of the postindustrial age communities have needed to make decisions about how to deal with these industrial landscapes. The celebration and interpretation of these places become important in a region's heritage. The struggle between labor and capital to control the meaning of the past is ongoing. Often, when under the control of government agencies, the story of labor is overshadowed by the benefits of industrial and engineering feats. Working-class histories, which are readily available for public interpretation, are omitted or downplayed in an industrial site's official memory.Virginius Island, located in Harpers Ferry National Historical Park, is one example where a working-class history is available for public interpretation, although the park continues to promote industrial heritage over working-class heritage. While archaeological investigations over the past several decades on the island have mainly focused on recovering signatures of its industry, recent work has explored the lives of the workers and their families who toiled in this industrial community. The latest effort to stabilize above-ground ruins that continues into the early twenty-first century has concentrated exclusively on the industrial sites. The interpretation of the island and the development of trails have made many of the industrial ruins accessible to the public. Today the National Park Service spends considerable time protecting, stabilizing, and interpreting the industrial sites on the park's landscape. It is obvious that the histories fading from the official memory are those that belong to the craft-oriented and working-class community.     

Remembering the Kwangju Incident

Books reviewed in this article:
William H. Gleysteen Jr., Massive Enganglement, Marginal Influence: Carter and Korea in Crisis
John A. Wickham, Korea on the Brink: From the "12/12 Incident" to the Kwangju Uprising, 1979–1980     

Remembering September 11: Photography as Cultural Diplomacy

American cultural diplomacy has taken on fresh significance in the wake of the September 11 attacks on the United States and there has been increasing support within the US State Department for initiatives to promote the diplomatic role of culture in the 'war against terrorism'. This article considers one such initiative: the photographic exhibition, After September 11: images from Ground Zero which is touring the world over three years with substantial support from American diplomatic missions. This exhibition is clearly intended to shape and maintain a public memory of the attacks on the World Trade Center and their aftermath. As such, it is a fascinating initiative in cultural diplomacy that echoes structures of Cold War propagandizing yet asks fresh questions about the role of visual culture in American foreign policy in the digital age. The article examines the origins of this exhibition and considers tensions that exist between its aesthetic components and the ideological framework that surrounds its implementation.     

Talking about Remembering and Forgetfulness in Oral History Interviews

In this article, the author seeks to open a discussion of explicittalk about remembering in oral history interviews. He exploresways of talking about remembering and forgetfulness in oralhistory interviews and the effects of such talk on the interviewrelationship as well as on the process of recall itself. Thearticle provides examples of collaborative remembering betweenthe narrator and the interviewer, the recall of specific detailsand reports of exceptional clarity of memory as well as justificationsof faulty memory. Reported speech in oral history narrativesis considered as a clear case of constructing as opposed toremembering the past. Throughout, the author frames questionsconcerning the significance of talk about remembering and forgetfulnessfor the evaluation of the events and personal identities expressedin the oral history interview.     

Living with Stories: Telling,Re-Telling,and Remembering

THE FOLKTALE. By Stith Thompson. New York, the Dryden Press; 1946. Pp. x and 510. $6. Reviewed by Kenneth Jackson.

CONTRIBUCIÓN AL ESTUDIO DE LA MKDICINA POPULAR CANARIA. By José Pérez Vidal. Offprint from Tagoro (Anuario del Instituto de Estudios Canarios), 1944, pp. 29–88, La Laguna de Tenerife, 1945. Reviewed by W. L. Hildburgh.     

Remembering a Vietnam War Firefight: Changing Perspectives over Time

Intense, deadly combat is one of the most traumatic of humanexperiences. How veterans remember it and how they retell it,is explored in this article by Marine Corps Oral Historian FredH. Allison. Allison compares two interviews of the same Marinetalking about the same horrific Vietnam firefight in which fiveof eight Marines on a reconnaissance patrol were killed. Oneinterview took place in-country two days after the firefight,the other 34 years later. The early interview is an oral snapshotof the world of a combat Marine, while the later interview isa study in how memory reconstructs a combat experience. In comparingthe two interviews the reader can begin to understand how veterans'memory works to organize and make comprehensible an event thatmight not have been orderly or comprehensible in the first place.