Oral History Project Idea!

This morning, it came to me. The perfect idea for our oral history project! A prominent business owner with a long history in my hometown is starting up a farmers market on Main Street. Sarah Kirby has decided that every Saturday morning, her lot at Kirby Brothers Feed Store should come alive with merchants and shoppers, all within the shadow of the local Shop Rite. In Medford, the name Kirby is what Ben Franklin is to Philadelphia. There's the old Kirby's Mill, and now even an elementary school named after the family. Just last year, Sarah Kirby lost her father. It seems like now she is putting her effort into feeding Medford mouths with the food of local farmers, in a town on the edge of agrarian Burlington County. While I have never met Ms. Kirby, my father knows her and I am sure securing an interview would be no problem. My first impulse is to ask her how to put together a farmer's market. As a research question, this could lead to a very informative project.

I came up with some possible interview questions:
-Why have you decided to do this?
-How are you preparing?
-Who do you expect to shop here?
-What are your biggest concerns?
-In what ways has this been more challenging than you expected?
-What has been the biggest obstacle?
-How would you define sucess?
-What do you hope is the end result?

Additional aspects of the project could include a brief examination of the environment and culture: available food stores, shopping habits of citizens, income level, etc. Another interesting angle could be examining the potential effects of the proximity of Shop Rite, both on the new farmer's market and on Shop Rite itself. Regular Shop Rite customers could be "street interviewed."