“Ken Hechler - In Pursuit of Justice” out-takes and transcripts deposited at Marshall archives
Russ Barbour, 2009 WV Filmmaker of the Year, and Chip Hitchcock worked for several years documenting the life of one of our state’s most extraordinary citizens, Ken Hechler. The result was the 120 minute film, “Ken Hecher- In Pursuit of Justice.” ( I assisted in research on the film and programmed the Kanawha Valley premiere on Ken’s 94th birthday, September 20th, 2008, for The South Charleston Museum.) After months of hard work by Chip, Russ, and who knows how many others, the entire archive created was sent to the Special Collections section of the Marshall University Morrow Library.
On September 20th, 2009, the Morrow Library opened the Ken Hechler Reading Room so that people will have a place to go through the thousands of items Ken has donated to the library over the last half century. Lately, he has transferred many other materials that he had located in other places so that soon, the Hechler collection will be complete. Now some people just have to spend a few decades sorting and processing all of it!
Included in this latest addition are 32 tapes of interviews with Hechler and 66 tapes that include interviews with 42 other people. Those interviews are on 87 DVDs. Several hard drives with the transcripts of all of the interviews have also been given to the collection.
Ken is very concerned that people who are hard of hearing will be able to see the words of what he said, and all of the interviewees. I had to find a unique gizmo made in Texas that would show the closed captions when we screened the film in South Charleston. ( Video projectors normally cannot show the closed-captions like TVs by law must.)
Copies of the DVD were sent FREE to every public library and public school in the state. Dr. Barbara Winters, who was the leader of the project at Marshall Libraries, retired this last summer after working very hard to get this film made.
When people have watched the film, on TV, etc., they always tell me, ” I never knew he did so much!” Indeed, Ken has helped thousands of people directly during his 50 years in West Virginia, and before that helped FDR, President Truman, Adlai Stevenson and a thousand students at Princeton, Marshall, etc. Phil Kabler recently told me that “someone should write a new biography about Hechler.” I know that at least two people have tried since 2004. I am afraid that the only person who could do the necessary book justice is Ken himself. He still has almost a photographic memory.
For more on the archives, contact
Lyle Brown
Curator
Special Collections
Morrow Library
Marshall University
One Jonn Marshall Drive
Huntington, WV 25755
