The invaluable Ian Griffin reports on a fantastic discovery by a Portland State University archivist:
a box of reel-to-reel recordings of campus speeches by figures such as LSD advocate Timothy Leary, Robert F. Kennedy speaking a few short weeks before his assassination, Nobel prize-winner Linus Pauling speaking on the effects of radioactive fallout a few months before the Cuban Missile crisis, and poet Allan Ginsberg.
And PSU has obligingly digitized them and posted them online. (I resent this just a little bit, because it costs me an excuse to go to Portland. Breakfast at Tasty n Sons, a day of listening to great speeches and an evening at Powell’s, anyone..?)
As exciting as it can be to read a great speech, they’re intended to be heard — making this find a thrilling one for speechwriters.
Filed under: Speeches Tagged: archives, ian griffin, library, portland state university 
