Louisiana Information Sources: A Guide

Fifty individual interviews conducted from 1980 to 1985 as part of writer and oral historian Tom Dent's research on his childhood friend, activist, congressman, and ambassador Andrew Young.

The NOLA Hiphop and Bounce Archive collection includes materials from the Where They At bounce and hip-hop collection and the NOLA Hiphop Archive. It contains over 60 videotaped interviews with leading hiphop and bounce artists, with new interviews added on an ongoing basis.

Sound recordings of oral history interviews conducted by the Amistad Research Center from 1993 to 1994. The project's purpose was to document the musical heritage of the Treme neighborhood of New Orleans, a predominantly African American neighborhood since the early nineteenth century. Interviewees were residents of Treme who had experience the musical heritage of New Orleans from a non-professional point of view. Topics touched on in the interviews include jazz funerals, second lines, the Mardi Gras Indian tradition, gentrification, nightlife, churches, street vendors and business owners, clubs and benevolent associations, and the boundaries of the neighborhood.

HNOC’s oral history program preserves diverse personal narratives documenting New Orleans histories in such areas as the Civil Rights Movement, the Vietnamese American community, the COVID-19 pandemic, the French Quarter, social life pre- and post-Hurricane Katrina, wildlife rescue following the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico, the Sugar Bowl, and the LGBTQ+ community.

The LGBT+ Archives Project of Louisiana partners with the T. Harry Williams Center for Oral History at LSU (Baton Rouge) to record oral histories that document the lives and events of the LGBT+ community in Louisiana. The original audio files are housed at the T. Harry Williams Center for Oral History in Baton Rouge. Links to those audio files and written transcriptions of the interviews will be made available on this website as soon as they are completed.

This link will take you to a curated search for oral histories in the Louisiana Digital Library (LDL).

Includes interview series on coastal wetlands and coastal change, graphic design, Hurricane Betsy, LGBT Lafayette, Louisiana Civil Rights, Perique tobacco, and more.

Homepage of the largest and most comprehensive oral history repository in the state of Louisiana, with core research projects on LSU's history, civil rights, Louisiana politics, and veteran history.

Several hundred interviews, culled from over 2,000 reels of taped oral history recordings, with musicians, family members, and observers that document stories surrounding the emergence of jazz and its related music and culture in New Orleans from the late 19th century forward. It is the largest collection of jazz oral history extant, and the recordings are from 1948-1997, with the majority from the 1950s and 1960s.

Interviews recorded by Goreau from 1971 to 1975 during her research into the life of Mahalia Jackson for her 1975 authorized biography of Jackson, "Just Mahalia, Baby."

Video interviews conducted by filmmaker Julia Dorn in 2004 and early 2005 for her independently produced documentary, The Legend of The Dew Drop Inn.

Author and historian Lynn Abbott conducted interviews from 1981 through 1995 documenting the Black acapella gospel quartet singing tradition in New Orleans, Alabama, and Mississippi from the 1920s. Interviewees include local New Orleans and regional gospel singers, performers, ensembles, vocal coaches and educators, several who are also reverends.

Interviews with Newcomb College alumnae from the1910 through the 21st century.

Live broadcasts, interviews, and other radio segments hosted by and/or featuring Vernon "Dr. Daddy-O" Winslow for his "Jivin' with Jax" program for WWEZ AM New Orleans, originally aired between 1949 and 1958.