In 2004 Deb Ellis and Dennis Muëller’s film “Howard Zinn: You Cant Be Neutral On A Moving Train,” based on Zinn’s memoir of the same name, shared this activist, scholar and writer’s story of support for youth and Civil Rights and protest against war with the twenty-first century.
A decade later, the filmmakers partnered with Media Burn Independent Video Archive of Chicago to digitize and make available the archival footage they had produced — including over fifty hours of interviews with Zinn’s friends. former students, and fellow activists.
From January to April 2018, nine students studying public history at Skidmore College (Saratoga Springs, NY) found inspirations in the interviews content that had been left, so to speak, on the cutting room floor — that is, not included in the film. Each student transcribed one interview, and built a short video story around it or inspired by it.
Ellis and Muëller spoke about their goals both in making the film and archiving the original footage. Sara Chapman, Executive Director at Media Burn, provided an overview of the archive’s missions and aspiration to engage today’s public in working with media as primary sources for history and understanding.
Click on each interviewee’s name to see and hear the stories they found.
