Living History: Augusta's library wants to help write the history of COVID-19

The COVID-19 pandemic will go down in history, and the Georgia Heritage Room wants to record...
The COVID-19 pandemic will go down in history, and the Georgia Heritage Room wants to record it. (Source: WRDW)(WRDW)
Published: May. 20, 2020 at 4:36 PM EDT
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Wednesday, May 20, 2020

News 12 at 6 O'Clock/NBC at 7

AUGUSTA, GA (WRDW/WAGT) -- While COVID-19 has certainly consumed all our thoughts the past few months, the Georgia Heritage Room is thinking hundreds of years ahead, planning to capture this moment in history.

What better way to remember history than to capture it for future generations?

The Georgia Heritage Room at the Augusta Library is asking for people to

It's so that this moment in history doesn’t get lost in time.

"This is a historical moment," Tina Rae Floyd of the Augusta-Richmond County Library said. "Everybody agrees that nobody has really experienced this in a long time."

It's a historical moment that we're living in real-time. The Augusta Public Library is thinking ahead to a time when COVID-19 would be ancient history.

"When people start to forget kind of the day-to-day and go back to whatever the new normal might be, it will be good to be able to have people’s impressions of the here and now," Floyd said.

Floyd says this census year couldn’t be a better time to do it.

"This census has some of the fewest questions that have been seen in a long time," Floyd said. "Being able to have a collection of people’s experiences will give us a better sense of what was going on and how we dealt with such a huge humanitarian crisis."

But even more than remembering COVID-19, Floyd hopes the capsule will remind us of a strong community.

"I definitely hope it will show Augusta’s compassion for one another - how people have stepped up to help each other," Floyd said.

The Georgia Room is asking anyone, particularly first responders and healthcare workers, to add something to the collection.

They say nothing is too mundane. They just want to be able to show people what everyday life was like during this pandemic.

To participate in the project, visit the library's project

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