You know when something that looks like it’s going to be a really unfortunate happening in your life turns into a really fortunate happening in your life? Happened to me.
Let me fill you in. In my Multimedia Journalism class, the last half of the semester is almost solely focused on our final projects. The final projects are completed in groups of three and are intended to put together everything we learned about multimedia in the first half of the class (i.e. photo, audio, video, etc.) in one, coherent website. Of course, the hardest part of any journalistic venture is finding your story. We came up with three solid story ideas to pitch to our class: a story about the state of reading (specifically in regards to its popularity and the growing popularity of e-books), a profile on a Jefferson City man who owns a PR firm in addition to staging houses for listings, and a deeper look at the historic buildings that dot the MU campus such as the Conley House and Memorial Union.
Initially, we zeroed in on the historic buildings story (I loved the reading story but we figured it would be difficult to find good multimedia components to tell it). We thought it would be really cool to use these unique buildings to tell the rich history of our campus. But, as often happens in journalism, we had some problems. We had trouble gaining access to the Conley House and we couldn’t figure out for sure which sorority house was the oldest on campus. So just a few weeks out from our due date sitting in class talking about our project with our instructor, we had nothing. Since we had done very little and there was little looking up on this project, we switched gears and switched our project idea. Naturally, we were a little worried. Over a week into the process, we had nothing and we were starting over on a whole new idea.
But, it was the situation we were in and we were going to go forward with our new topic: veterans in Columbia. And I am so happy that we did. If we hadn’t, I wouldn’t have met Colonel William Boston III.
Part of our decision to switch our topics to veterans was the fact that we were coming up on Veterans’ Day and there were lots of events happening around MU and greater Columbia that we could use as part of our coverage, one of them being a parade and ceremony along Eighth Street. We covered the event for two reasons: as part of our overall veterans coverage and to find some veterans that we could interview for our website. I followed the parade down along Eighth Street to the Boone County Courthouse where the ceremony was to be held. I popped around the amphitheater adjacent to the courthouse taking hundreds of photos. After the ceremony, I found one gentleman in the crowd in uniform. His name was Major Bruce Schlager and he agreed to be a part of our story. After taking a few pictures of Major Schlager, I looked around and found that most people had cleared out. One of the only places left that had a strong concentration of people was the stage where the ceremony’s keynote speaker, Col. Boston, was talking alternately with journalists and children. I figured, what the hell, I mine as well go big before I went home. So I made my way to the stage and asked Col. Boston if he would be willing to be interviewed for our story. He said he was willing and gave me his number to call him later and set up a time. So it was that on Tuesday morning, I sat in one of the 7th floor study rooms in Mark Twain Residence Hall conducting an interview with a colonel in the Air Force.
Wow.
Like I said earlier, this final project is supposed to bring together everything we’ve learned all semester. This interview was going to be an audio interview and we’ve been taught that you shouldn’t record much more than 10 minutes of audio because it will take FOREVER to go through and edit down to a reasonable length that people will be willing to listen to.
We begin the interview. I ask him about why he joined the military. His answer was several minutes long. And totally captivating. And so it went on. I would ask him a question and he would give a totally engaging and fascinating answer…that would last several minutes. Long story short, I am now in possession of nearly 40 minutes of freaking amazing audio from this interview. I have him talking about flying planes in Vietnam. I have him talking about welcoming back fellow servicemen after they were released from North Vietnamese prisoner of war camps. I have him talking about working in Germany as part of NATO during the Cold War. I have nearly 40 minutes of gold that I need to edit down to 3 minutes MAXIMUM. His audio was so good that I can’t let it merely be an audio piece. I asked Col. Boston for some photos from his time in the Air Force, and I am going to do a video interview of him and his wife (I’ve posted a video down below that is serving as partial inspiration for this piece).
To make a long story pretty long, finding a great story is hard. But when you do, don’t you dare tell an Air Force colonel to stop talking.
Until next time.
Ryan's Multimedia Blog 