Interview
During an investigation of the whereabouts of Father Urban Baer, I [Dale Trelevan of the State Historical Society of Wisconsin] was directed to Father Timmerman since he had worked closely with Fr. Baer in the 1930's and '40's. I visited with Fr. Timmerman at the parish house in Prairie du Chien, where he was assigned in 1976, then made arrangements to meet again with a tape recorder, this time in Sparta, the community to which he had been assigned as hospital chaplain. After the first session on June 8, 1976, nearly a year passed before I returned in May 1977 to record the remembrances of his work with the Apostolate for Migrant Workers. The interview with Fr. Timmerman helps to better understand the work of rural priests, especially in times of farm crisis, and to learn more about the grass-roots efforts of the National Catholic Rural Life Conference, headquartered in Des Moines, Iowa, to act forcefully in behalf of farm families who must--according to NCRLC--continue to be the backbone of rural America.
Abstract to the Interview
The abstract below lists, in order of discussion, the distinct topics covered on each tape and indicates the time-marking on the user tape at which point the beginning of the particular discussion appears. These time-markings are keyed to a time announcement, heard at five-second intervals, on the second track of each tape.
Thus, the researcher, by using a tape recorder's fast-forward button, may find expeditiously and listen to discrete segments without listening to all of the taped discussion. For instance, the user who wishes to listen to the topic on “Neighborhood Cheese Factory on Timmerman Farm” should locate the place on the second track of tape one, side one, where the voice announces the 06:40 time-marking (the voice says at this point, “six forty”), and at this point switch to the first track to hear the discussion. The discussion on “Neighborhood Cheese Factory on Timmerman Farm” continues until approximately 07:30, at which point discussion of the next topic (“Reasons Parents Encouraged Education Among Children”) begins.
Notice that in most cases, sentences beneath each headline explain more about the contents of the topic. For example, the sentence underneath “Neighborhood Cheese Factor on Timmerman Farm” gives further details on what appears on the tape between 06:40 and 07:30.
The abstract is designed to provide only a brief outline of the content of the tapes and cannot serve as a substitute for listening to them. However, the abstract will help the researcher to locate easily distinct topics and discussion among the many minutes of commentary.
