Voicing concerns over future of Viking Video program
Board must protect history
To the editor:
The video program taught in the Technology Center at Caribou High School for the last 15 years has been discontinued. I’ve had the pleasure of advising this program for many of those years along with other local media professionals.
Over the years this video program, under the name Viking Video, has generated noteworthy documentaries of historic value. Video footage of German prisoners of war, for instance, is extremely rare and precious. Many of these documentaries have enjoyed wide play on Maine Public Television and have garnered awards and esteem from historical institutions. It would be a great loss to the state of Maine and Aroostook County if these video projects were destroyed due to neglect and disregard for their long-term stability. When this classroom is finally dismantled and equipment and materials are set aside, I suggest that all the video projects and related materials be sent to Northeast Historic Film in Bucksport for archiving and preservation.
I know that it is difficult to see the need to take such steps. It seems a simple matter to stash video tapes in a closet somewhere or in a library for safe keeping however it is not that simple. Videotape, like film, needs proper archiving and preservation or it will be lost. Magnetic medium like video can be corroded by humidity, corrupted by stray magnetic/electrical activity or scratched by dust contamination. Even if the video is sealed air-tight and isn’t physically touched for years it can still fade away simply because it is magnetic.
Beyond this video standards change. What media we used to play in one type of machine dies when that machine standard becomes obsolete. Preservation societies like Northeast Historic Film will not only physically store the videos in climate controlled areas they will continue to transfer the images to modern media standards as new media standards become available. Although the school could transfer this media to another format like DVD that too is subject to decay and changes in prevailing media standards and technology.
In the end this time consuming work should be done by dedicated professionals for the long-term. The results are many fold. For one the school system retains the right to earn proceeds from selling copies plus gains a percentage of sales from Northeast Historical Film’s efforts in that regard. Most importantly these historic videos remain available, not only to the students that created the work, but to generations of Mainers and people across the nation in years and decades to come. A simple authorization secures these works with no more investment in resources or time.
I urge the School Department, the School Board and county citizens to insist that we save these pieces of history before neglect and indifference destroys them.
Caribou
