Background on the Creation of the Dorsett Oral History Collection

Above: Lyle and Mary Dorsett, Scotland, Summer 1984. Image owned by the Wade Center.

With his wife Mary handling the video recorder and audio back-up, the Dorsetts planned their first interview trip to England and Scotland in the summer of 1984, one year after Lyle had come to the Wade as director. Identifying individuals whose recollections of the Wade authors were worth preserving was the first step. This was followed by an air mail letter asking if he or she was willing to have their memories recorded with a detailed travel itinerary being arranged as acceptances were received.

Lyle credits Mary’s great support, not only in terms of serving as videographer, but also her help navigating often obscure back roads as being essential elements to successful oral history trips. But equally important was Mary’s winsome way with interview subjects, helping to break through the nervous reserve of an interview subject, and thereby making a more personal and relaxed interview possible. In brief, the Dorsetts worked together as a team, and the Wade Center’s fledging oral history collection grew by leaps and bounds as a result.        

For the next six summers, Lyle and Mary traveled thousands of miles throughout the United Kingdom interviewing family and friends of the Wade authors as well as Owen Barfield, himself. These trips resulted in forty-five historically valuable interviews with individuals such as Douglas Gresham, Aidan Mackey, Pauline Baynes, and George Sayers among many others; recordings which document irreplaceable memories before they were lost to time.