LSP member Prof. Margaret Vandiver is hoping to make some progress on LSP research this summer and would welcome help from anyone who has the time and the interest! Here’s what she's hoping to work on:
- Trial transcripts: Several Shelby County lynchings resulted in trials. We need to get all records available from the Shelby County Archive, located at Shelby Farms.
- Internet newspaper research: The Library of Congress site chroniclingamerica.com is a great resource for articles through 1922. This site does not require a subscription. There is quite a bit of searching to be done, especially for the decade of the 1870s.
- Internet genealogy research: We need to try to track family members in a number of cases. If anyone has access to ancestry.com or other sites and wants to work on this, that would be very helpful.
- Historic map searches and site visits: We need to try to locate sites as precisely as possible, which will involve using old maps, current maps and satellite views, and making trips to the locations.
- Microfilm research: Many newspapers are not yet available online and searching them has to be done on microfilm at the public or the UofM library. Be advised: this is tedious and unpleasant work!
If you would like to be involved in any of this, please email her at vandiver@memphis.edu and we’ll work out details.