Setting Up the Interview
When setting up the interview make sure you use a room that is quiet and where you are least likely to be disturbed.
Always - ALWAYS - begin your audio or video recording with the name of the interviewee, including a middle initial. Do not simply start talking. Spell the interviewee’s last name aloud on the recording, even if it’s as simple a name as “Smyth” or “Browne.” As a note, “Bill Jones” is not appropriate for historical records; use the full legal name of “William B. Jones,” instead. Nicknames and call signs are fine for inclusion as long as the individual’s true name is provided at the outset.
Specify the date and location of the interview and your own name at the outset of the interview after naming the interviewee. If interviewing an active duty service member, specify the member’s current unit, to include company, battalion, regiment and division or, if an aviator, similar sized units. DO NOT INCLUDE SSNs OR SERVICE NUMBERS. To do so raises Freedom of Information restrictions regarding the use and release of the interview. If you have a second interview session, or if the initial session extends to a second recording, start the subsequent session in the same way. Recordings can get separated and, without this opening identification, may be lost or discarded due to lack of proper identification.
Finally, one-on-one interviews are the best. Multiple interviewers or interviewees create cross talk and make intelligible interpretation and transcription difficult, if not impossible. If a third party enters the room while you are interviewing, pause the recording.
A Quality Recording
If possible, try to use an external microphone for each participant using a “Y” connector to plug both microphones into the microphone jack of your recording device. You can find these devices at a Radio Shack, electronics supply store, or online. Watch that you get the right size plugs for your recording device. Standard microphone jacks usually take a 1/8 inch plug. Built-in microphones on most recording devices often render a poor quality recording.
Equipment Check
While you are recording your initial preliminaries and before you begin the interview, glance at the recorder to see that it is operational and actively recording. Check your levels if you have a device with a recording display. Many recorders have a jack that you can plug earphones into and listen as you record. For cassette recordings, stop the recording for a moment and replay the last few seconds to ensure you are recording and the recording level is audible. Many professional oral historians have had the humbling experience of discovering after an interview that, due to an incorrect switch setting, no recording was made of their interview.
Documentary Material
Any hard copy material sent with the recorded interview, such as photos, cruise books, letters, maps, etc., are separated from the recorded interview and forwarded next door to the Personal Papers Collection at the Marine Corps University. When filling out the summary form, note the documentary material submitted with the interview and although separated, they will always remain connected intellectually. Consider whether documentary material you’re planning to submit really is historically significant or merely personally significant. They are not the same, and the distinction requires hardheaded and unsentimental judgment. You may contact the Oral History Section for assistance in making this determination.
Classification
Although not usually a problem for volunteer interviewers, classified interviews are not accessible to the public or to most researchers or scholars. Classified interviews are discouraged. Some interviews will be understood to be classified, such as those conducted with certain officers during combat operations. Those aside, advise your interviewee to avoid classified content whenever possible. Classified interviews present significant problems of transcription, storage and eventual declassification.