Worcester History Museum partners with WPI to create COVID-19 archive of people's pandemic stories

WORCESTER — During the COVID-19 pandemic, everyone had their own story to tell, many of loss, who don't want the stories of what they experienced lost.

Whether they heard, seen or experienced something during the pandemic or contributed to the community during that time, many want to share their stories with the public.

The past 18 months, the Worcester History Museum partnered with Worcester Polytechnic Institute to collect stories from the community of the pandemic and record them in a digital time capsule for future generations, calling the project the "COVID-19 Chronicles: Worcester's Community Archive."

A program, "Our History Now: Stories from Worcester's Pandemic Year," highlighted the project Thursday evening and featured individuals from the community — Dr. Mattie Castiel, commissioner of health and human services for the city of Worcester; young residents from the Worcester Youth Center; Tim Garvin from the United Way and Worcester Together; local documentary photographer Matt Wright; and archive coordinator Allison Steeves, WPI Class of 2021 — who made an impact throughout the pandemic.

Matt Wright, Worcester photographer

Matt Wright, a Worcester freelance photographer, highlighted and documented life during the pandemic including when the governor issued the stay-at-home order; when all the streets were empty; when health care professionals were in dire straits with COVID cases drastically increasing every day; later in the summer last year, during the Black Lives Matter movement; and now with people getting vaccinated.

Wright also was granted access to document the situation at UMass Memorial Medical Center soon after the pandemic hit to see what caretakers and health care professionals were going through.

"We haven't seen anything like that for a hundred years...," Wright said during the panel discussion. "I can't believe that I was there. I can't believe that it was all happening."

Dr. Matilde Castielwho, commissioner of health and human services for the city of Worcester

Since the first COVID-19 case in the Worcester community was identified March 14, 2020, Dr. Matilde Castielwho along with the city has been working to provide shelters with what they need, distributing food supplies, helping get people tested and providing people with information about vaccines.

During the worst of the pandemic, there were four shelters, including homeless shelters, in the city. Castielwho said around 25 to 30 people were separated in each building, and she went by every day to make sure those who were most vulnerable had what they needed.

The city also worked with UMass Memorial on a "COVID-19 equity task force," with the goal of reviewing racial inequities in the community that were intensified by the pandemic and providing resources to the community including promoting outreach, pursuing targeted testing and prioritizing data collection.

"I have to tell you again that all of this time, besides the anxiety, besides being stressed about it, besides worrying about your own health, it was probably the best thing I've ever done in my lifetime, and I will cry about that," Castielwho said while sobbing recalling her time at the shelters. "It was just an incredible piece to work together with the others."

Worcester Youth Center

Nydia Colon, director of creative leadership at the Worcester Youth Center, and several youths from the center, joined the panel Thursday night.

The center promotes advocacy for young people to own their voices and encourages them to share their thoughts.

During the past 18 months, they were battling three pandemics — COVID-19, racial injustice and violence — Colon said.

Colon said the center is involved in a campaign called "Violence Is Not Normal." No violence should ever be normal, she said, and peace is a human birthright.

Felicity Ekeh, a sophomore student at Quinsigamond Community College, talked about the importance of "self love" during the pandemic, emphasizing that the occurrence of violence is a result of a lack of self love.

"I kind of became more of a person that wants to experience stuff with self love...," Ekeh said. "I feel like with the violence as Nydia just said because we don't have enough experience of self love, people turn it to (people) especially (when) they don't know how to communicate what they want, so the next best thing that they think of is their hands."

Tim Garvin, Worcester Together: Central Mass. COVID-19 Fund

United Way of Central Massachusetts started the Worcester Together Fund on March 13, 2020, initially expecting to raise $50,000.

As time went on, they delivered more than 200,000 meals to those who were quarantined at home experiencing food insecurity, investing more than $300,000 into the restaurant community.

Worcester Together, joined by local nonprofits, businesses and officials, was formed soon after the pandemic hit after their first meeting March 16

It started with 26 people and expanded to 350 people including U.S. Rep. James P. McGovern, Sen. Ed Markey, Worcester Mayor Joseph Petty and other city officials and local organizations.

"You form, you storm, you norm, you perform," is a term of organizational development, Garvin said, adding that he didn't know what the results would be when they first formed Worcester Together that has continued helping those most vulnerable for 71 weeks.

Health statistics and data helped with decision-making and pinpointing what and where the issues are, he explained.

They later formed several sub-committees that each focused separately on health, food insecurity, housing and shelters, education, youth development, clergy, culture, senior, economic development and more.

"If I need to sum up the last 71 weeks, this is a Worcester miracle because we have come together as a community, and we have to stay together as a community to help everyone," he said.

Allison Steeves, digital exhibit creator for "COVID-19 Chronicles" archive

Allison Steeves, a recent 2021 graduate of Worcester Polytechnic Institute, started contributing to "COVID-19 Chronicles: Worcester's Community Archive" for her senior capstone project in writing and interactive media.

She contributed to the archives as a website designer, social media manager and digital exhibit creator.

She collected individual multimedia contributions — the form could be anything from text, pictures and videos to poems or social media posts, which she calls them "items."

"Items are really the bones of this archive," Steeves said. "I like to think of it as kind of a glimpse into a pandemic moment of what happened on this day to experience these feelings, who experienced these situations and even what the situations that had emerged from the circumstances of COVID.

"Even better than items becoming collections is items becoming exhibits, and I think of exhibits really being where this magic happens," she said.

©2021 www.telegram.com. Visit telegram.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.