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Oral History British Library Sound Archive, 96 Euston Road, NW1 2DB
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Olive Stevenson recorded a seventeen-hour life story interview with Niamh Dillon as part of National Life Stories Pioneers in Charity and Social Welfare project. National Life Stories
http://www.bl.uk/reshelp/findhelprestype/sound/ohist/ohnls/nationallifestories.html
was established in 1987 to ‘record first-hand experiences of as wide a cross-section of present-day society as possible’. As an independent charitable trust within the Oral History Section of the British Library Sound Archive, NLS’s key focus and expertise has been oral history fieldwork. Over the past two decades it has initiated a series of innovative interviewing programmes funded almost entirely from sponsorship, charitable and individual donations and voluntary effort. Pioneers in Charity and Social Welfare is one such project and it has benefited from funding by the J. Paul Getty Jr Charitable Trust. Each collection comprises recorded in-depth interviews of a high standard, plus content summaries and transcripts to assist users. Access is provided via the Sound Archive’s online catalogue
and a growing number of interviews are being digitised for remote web use. Each individual life story interview is several hours long, covering family background, childhood, education, work, leisure and later life.