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While the eerie soundtrack played, I started thinking about what I was trying to do. How could I,
with no roots in Springfield, have the audacity to think that I could capture the images that fill the memories of the thousands
who have passed through this building in the last 100 years? How would I know what they cared about? I might wind up taking
artful photos of the woodwork, only to learn that they were dying to get one more look at the funky bathrooms where kids gossiped
or sneaked a smoke.
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| Entrance to girls' bathroom, Park Street School, Springfield, Vermont, 2008 |
So
how do we find out what’s important? Has the town considered holding several forums at the school, where former students
(especially the older ones) are invited to reminisce? And why not televise the forums on the local access channel? People
could be encouraged to write down their memories and send them to the Springfield Town Library, where volunteers could organize
them and put them in scrapbooks, or file them away for safe keeping.
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| Park Street School, Springfield, Vermont, 2008 |
Armed with that information and some appropriate camera equipment, and on a few days during the school
year, a good photographer (I’ll pass on this one) might be able to preserve images of the things that matter most, even
if they include stuff like a clunky old water fountain or steps worn away by a 100 years of scruffy shoes.
Finally, the rain wound down to just a roar,
and I popped into the office to tell the secretary about the sound spectacular. “I wish there was some way to capture
those sounds on my camera,” I said. She replied, “I wish your camera could capture the way the school smells.
Everyone remembers that.”
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| Park Street School, Springfield, Vermont, 2008 |
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