20 Years, 8,600 Interviews: KHS Completes Major Oral History Digitization Project

KHS is pleased to announce the completion of a major oral history digitization project. Over 8,600 oral history interviews on 13 different media now have digital master files for preservation and access. Interviews on Reel-to-Reel tape, cassette, VHS, CD, MiniDV, microcassette, Mini cassette, VHS-S, DAT, Hi-8, DVD-R, minidisc, and Betamax are now digitally accessible. This project completes the digitization of KHS’s entire oral history collection.

This achievement culminates 20 years of digitization projects. In 2023, KHS staff prioritized digitizing the 3,000-interview county collection, which features interviews from almost every Kentucky county. Staff achieved this goal in 2025 and expanded digitization efforts with the goal of digitizing the entire collection. By 2025, staff digitized an average of 30 interviews per day. In the last year, staff converted more than 9,000 hours of interviews.

These oral history files present the voices and stories of the past in new ways. Once accessible only with a cassette deck or other obsolete analog media players, these resources are now more readily available for research and interpretive programming. In addition, KHS has made these digital interviews available at events through oral history listening boxes, made possible by a grant from America250.org and Walmart Inc. Stay tuned for more updates on how KHS continues to make the past digitally accessible through audiovisual media.

Learn more about KHS's oral history collection and the Kentucky Oral History Commission here.