Kinds of Puppets to Use - Pocket, finger, hand, or life-sized which could handle real artifacts.

1. Use puppets to share myths and legends told about or by local residents.

2. Lumber men and their ladies could tell stories of times spent together or waiting to see each other again.

3. A puppet representing him could share Paul Bunyan stories that have developed in an area.

4. Schools of yesteryear could be explored through puppets representing the teacher, students, school board, or other local citizens.

5. Puppets could tell about local holiday customs.

6. A map of the locality could be used as the stage for peek through puppets. Openings could be made at important or significant locations. Puppets could tell about those areas.

7. Puppets could discuss feelings about a given topic at different points in history. (Cooking, farming, industry, business, fishing or other themes might be used.)

8. Puppets could prepare students for a field trip to a historical site or place of interest. The puppets could "walk through" the field trip procedure.

9. A puppet could be the M.C. at a local history quiz.

10. Puppets from three or four eras could discuss the same location, event, industry, or occupation.

11. Puppets could be used to represent careers of many types throughout the history of the local community.

12. Scripts about historic topics could be prepared and used when speakers are not available.

13. Local historic women could talk about careers and contributions throughout time.

14. Pocket puppets with pictures of local elections or photographs of founders and leaders could give children opportunities to share political ideas and relive the making of history.

15. Puppets could take sides in debates concerning controversial issues in local history.

Grele, R. (1989). Elite oral history discourse: A study of cooperation and coherence. Tuscaloosa, Alabama: The University of Alabama Press.

The author of this book discusses the oral history interview, storytelling in oral history, and communication-related issues.

Hoopes, J. (1979). Oral history. Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press.

Oral history in general, the influence of society, culture, and personality, the interview, writing, legal and ethical matters and oral history collections and sources.

Kammen, C. (1986). On doing local history: Reflections on what local historians do, why, and what it means. Nashville, Tennessee: The American Association for State and Local History.

Local history and historians, researching and writing local history, writing local history in the popular press, and local history today and tomorrow are discussed.

Kyvig, D., & Marty, M. (1982). Nearby history: Exploring the past around you. Nashville, Tennessee: American Association for State and Local History.

The purpose, what can be done, sources of information, preservation of materials, leaving a record, and linking the particular and the universal are examined in this book.