Last month, after we held our "Celebration of Life"
remembrance of Barbara Anderson, I promised we'd make
available videos of the event for those who could not
attend, and those who attended but wanted a look. The
event and a few other videos of Barbara's efforts for
taxpayers over the decades are now available, and more will
follow.
During the preparation of the remembrance I had requests out to many
of our friends in the media for old TV video and radio recordings of
Barbara's many appearances over so long, expecting this wouldn't be a
problem. The time was running out and nobody had come up with
anything. With exactly one week to go and little hope in sight,
while looking for something else up in the CLT storage room I stumbled
upon an old box, buried under a bunch of other boxes and accumulated
stuff. I dug it out, wondering what it contained
— and to my astonishment it was full of old
VHS tapes dating back to the mid-80s, a long forgotten cardboard
treasure chest containing, I'm estimating, a hundred or two hours of
Barbara's appearances!
I didn't have a working VCR player, but remembered Barbara had an old
picture-tube TV with a built-in VCR and DVD player
— but that her son Lance had put it out on the curb with a lot of
other "junk" for the taking while he was out here from Nevada the week
before. On a long shot, I walked next door to see if by chance it
might still be there, and found it back up on Barbara's front porch
covered with a blanket. I lugged it back to my place, set it up on
my kitchen table, and spent the next fourteen hours reviewing a few of
the old VHS tapes. At 4:30 the next morning, the end of my all
night viewing marathon, I came across the WGBH/PBS documentary of
Barbara's life from the beginning all the way up to CLT's big 1986
ballot question win repealing the Dukakis surtax on the income tax. "This
is it!" I exclaimed to my empty kitchen, startling our cat,
Gilgamesh. "Why couldn't I have come across this first,
fourteen hours ago?" That was Sunday morning, exactly one week
before the event.
The next morning I shipped overnight delivery a few of the old tapes
and a list of my selections to Ed Corliss, a CLT member and A/V
specialist who'd volunteered to put together a presentation for the
event using anything I could put my hands on. He jumped right on
the project and amazingly, he had it ready to go by the event.
Meanwhile, another CLT member, Michael Gendre, volunteered to
video-record the entire event and he put that together.
On my drive home from Lombardo's of Randolph, I decided to learn how
to convert VHS tapes into digital format, edit them, and begin working
on the rest of that treasure trove of memories. I was warned that
these VHS tapes, many 30-years old, are at the very end of their shelf
life; they should be converted very soon or will be lost. Everyone
needs a hobby, and I'm making progress slowly but surely. I've
converted another dozen recordings to digital format
— the tip of a virtual iceberg
— which I'll be adding to
my YouTube channel soon I hope.
If you're interested in watching them, here are a few links to what's
now available.
Note: The two-part video of the entire Lombardo's celebration
of life event for Barbara contains the WGBH/PBS documentary, but the
event video shows the documentary being presented to the audience.
I've converted and made it available separately —
my first steps in climbing the new learning curve.
WGBH/PBS - Documentary on Barbara's Life - Host: Chris Lydon
(Nov, 1986)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VqcjjPTKc1A
Barbara Anderson: A Celebration of Her Life (June 5, 2016),
Part 1
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-dIOlFwXSIw
Barbara Anderson: A Celebration of Her Life (June 5, 2016),
Part 2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BG2EhqWe_pY
Barbara and Chip Ford on Braude/Eagan NECN program - 1997, on
merging organizations and lives.
https://youtu.be/tAoFoABJQ2o
WGBH-IMHO: Remembering Barbara Anderson - Commentary by Jim
Braude
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=folOK_2shA8
