A reception is being held in Iowa City today to celebrate the awarding of a grant that will enable an oral history of Iowa workers to be put on the Internet. Over the course of more than 20 years, more than one-thousand Iowans were interviewed for the project, documenting 75 occupational groups.Mary Bennett is special collections coordinator for the State Historical Society of Iowa. She says this work in progress is called the Iowa Labor History Oral Project. Bennett says the goal is to put all of the information on a website so anyone, anywhere can learn about another side of Iowa.Bennett says the oral histories document the working class lives of Iowans, from coal miners to meat-packers — not just farmers. The first interviews with workers were done in the mid 1970s.Today’s reception is scheduled to run from 2:30 to 5 p-m at the State Historical Society office in Iowa City.
