Legacy
Through my reporting job, I’m sometimes able to do what I love and what I think I do best – telling the stories of others.
It’s just about 6 pm on a Sunday night and I just finished writing that piece about Leonard Campbell whose family has been in Wrangell for over one hundred years. How many people can say their family has been in one town, a small town I may add, for 107 years? There’s something about legacy and a long sustained presence, something which I know nothing about, that seems rich and fulfilling; something about one’s family, not only knowing the history, but living the history.
And that’s what I like about telling other people’s stories – revealing a person’s history or a person’s present, which will ultimately become history. And through this job, I know that in this very small way, in this small town with this small weekly paper, these stories and histories are being recorded. They are kept and will ultimately be bound in big books organized by year.
Growing up, I loved seeing the news clips from local papers that my family’s story had once been spread on. I wish I could see them now. I’d record here what they said. In the summer of 1980, my family’s arrival to Chappaqua, New York, was newsworthy. In archives of various papers, that event will forever remain, even if a Phu never lives in Chappaqua ever again.
The preservation of my family’s history has long been a motivation for my writing – it’s my dream to write my mother’s story. It’s something that’s always in the back of my mind, always. In an egotistical way, I think it's my duty to do so, one of my responsibilities as the youngest daughter who didn’t have to go through any of the struggle or historical strife the rest of my family had to go through, the youngest daughter who’s been lucky her whole life perhaps because of that.
I love being able to write about Leonard Campbell’s grandfather coming to Wrangell from Prince Edward Island, passing through New York and Portland, Oregon on the way. I love that Leonard has roots that extend from Wrangell’s early days during the Gold Rush through the climax of the lumber industry to present day Wrangell. And I was a bit sad to hear that he thought the Campbell presence in Wrangell will probably only last, optimistically, ten more years. I’d like to think he’s wrong about that.
A few hours after our interview, Leonard called me back at the office. It was snowing that day, so he had gone home after talking with me, built a fire, and his thoughts wandered. He called back to recount to me a very fond memory that hadn’t occurred to him when he was here at the office. At the end of the conversation he said, “And I just thought I’d leave that with you. I don’t know what you can make out of it. But for me, it was one of the better memories of our existence.”
We all have better memories. My oldest sister once said when we were still living there that she wished Chappaqua could return to its past self, before the Clintons moved in, before everyone went on the Atkins diet, when there were genuine, kind people living in Chappaqua – the Chappaqua of our growing up. But that's the thing. We can no longer say that because we don't live there. Like many other families, we picked up and left. Twenty-three years – not too shabby. But it’s no 107 years.
During a time where moving from one home to the next is the norm, where kids going off and never coming back is standard if not desired, where neighbors who’ve been there and taken for granted are suddenly gone, meeting someone like Leonard Campbell is refreshing and inspiring, almost magical. As much as I want to home-hop for the next few years, spend no more than twenty-four months in any one place, I do aspire to ultimately make roots somewhere. A place where, I hope, I can start a legacy.
It’s just about 6 pm on a Sunday night and I just finished writing that piece about Leonard Campbell whose family has been in Wrangell for over one hundred years. How many people can say their family has been in one town, a small town I may add, for 107 years? There’s something about legacy and a long sustained presence, something which I know nothing about, that seems rich and fulfilling; something about one’s family, not only knowing the history, but living the history.
And that’s what I like about telling other people’s stories – revealing a person’s history or a person’s present, which will ultimately become history. And through this job, I know that in this very small way, in this small town with this small weekly paper, these stories and histories are being recorded. They are kept and will ultimately be bound in big books organized by year.
Growing up, I loved seeing the news clips from local papers that my family’s story had once been spread on. I wish I could see them now. I’d record here what they said. In the summer of 1980, my family’s arrival to Chappaqua, New York, was newsworthy. In archives of various papers, that event will forever remain, even if a Phu never lives in Chappaqua ever again.
The preservation of my family’s history has long been a motivation for my writing – it’s my dream to write my mother’s story. It’s something that’s always in the back of my mind, always. In an egotistical way, I think it's my duty to do so, one of my responsibilities as the youngest daughter who didn’t have to go through any of the struggle or historical strife the rest of my family had to go through, the youngest daughter who’s been lucky her whole life perhaps because of that.
I love being able to write about Leonard Campbell’s grandfather coming to Wrangell from Prince Edward Island, passing through New York and Portland, Oregon on the way. I love that Leonard has roots that extend from Wrangell’s early days during the Gold Rush through the climax of the lumber industry to present day Wrangell. And I was a bit sad to hear that he thought the Campbell presence in Wrangell will probably only last, optimistically, ten more years. I’d like to think he’s wrong about that.
A few hours after our interview, Leonard called me back at the office. It was snowing that day, so he had gone home after talking with me, built a fire, and his thoughts wandered. He called back to recount to me a very fond memory that hadn’t occurred to him when he was here at the office. At the end of the conversation he said, “And I just thought I’d leave that with you. I don’t know what you can make out of it. But for me, it was one of the better memories of our existence.”
We all have better memories. My oldest sister once said when we were still living there that she wished Chappaqua could return to its past self, before the Clintons moved in, before everyone went on the Atkins diet, when there were genuine, kind people living in Chappaqua – the Chappaqua of our growing up. But that's the thing. We can no longer say that because we don't live there. Like many other families, we picked up and left. Twenty-three years – not too shabby. But it’s no 107 years.
During a time where moving from one home to the next is the norm, where kids going off and never coming back is standard if not desired, where neighbors who’ve been there and taken for granted are suddenly gone, meeting someone like Leonard Campbell is refreshing and inspiring, almost magical. As much as I want to home-hop for the next few years, spend no more than twenty-four months in any one place, I do aspire to ultimately make roots somewhere. A place where, I hope, I can start a legacy.
posted by Siapiau | 6:27 PM
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