All our memories : the outcomes of the Europeana 1914-1918 campaigns in Romania

Abstract

In the last years lots of projects and activities have been developed worldwide to mark the Centenary of the Outbreak of the First World War. Some projects like Europeana 1914-1918 tried to describe the Great War from the perspective of the simply people, no matter which side they were on during this conflict. In such a case, a valuable digital archive has been built up using Europeans’ family documents, stories and memorabilia from WWI time.

This ‘ People’s WWI Archive’ proved to be a communicative, digital memory, a comprehensive digital infrastructure which encourages audiences to use the stored data not only as a material basis for historical reconstruction, but also as a medium of a European culture of remembrance.

The five community collecting campaigns developed in Romania from September 2013 gathered interesting WWI stories and facts, but also revealed fascinating feminine characters unknown to the large public in the communist regime .

So that now the story of the only military enrolled nun in WWI stands together with photos and stories about the most beloved Queen of Romania or stories about people belonging to different minorities.

The paper describes the outcomes of these campaigns where the public engagement was overwhelming with contributors from 17 to 101 years old, coming from large cities to isolated monastery communities. Gathering and preserving such valuable personal documents from WWI time is even more important in the former socialist countries where many times personal archives were confiscated and destroyed during the communist period.