Written by Mackenzie Manley, Content Specialist, Downtown Main Library
If walls could talk, our meeting and study rooms would brim with lively tales, perhaps even more so at the Forest Park Branch, where Cincinnati Compass podcast Roots, Routes & Voices that Shape America explores immigrant stories from the region.
The podcast was created and is co-hosted by Clara Matonhodze Strode, founder of The MCS Agency — a marketing agency that helps nonprofits and small businesses grow — and Bryan Wright, Cincinnati Compass’s executive director.
When forming the idea for the podcast, Matonhodze said that she was drawn to the idea of having a platform to explore where people are from and how they got here.
“I felt like there was nothing out there that really touches on those things, and if they do, it’s not pronounced,” said Clara, adding that she wanted to focus on narratives from everyday people in the community that might otherwise not be known.
The podcast currently has 10 episodes, all of which were recorded in one of the Forest Park Branch’s meeting rooms. (The Cincinnati Compass team uses their own recording equipment.)
Podcast subjects have hailed from places like Senegal, Mexico City, Saigon, the Soviet Union, and Zimbabwe, but all their paths led to Cincinnati.
Bryan added that they wanted to make sure the stories are told by immigrants in their own words. They also wanted to focus on people who are building, creating, and innovating.
“Immigrants are often asked to tell their stories to an audience to make audiences feel better about themselves,” said Bryan, explaining that audiences often want to hear about one’s struggles or suffering.
“We understood that, yes, there are struggles that people go through, and that’s important in shaping people’s lives, but people’s stories didn’t stop or are [not] only limited to that market,” Bryan said.
Meeting Rooms for Minds of All Kinds
When it came to finding a place to record, Clara and Bryan landed on the Library for multiple reasons: Not only was it a free space to record, but it was also an accessible community hub for guests to meet in. Forest Park, too, is a diverse community for long-term and recent immigrant arrivals.
“We can come here and we’re not getting rushed out,” said Clara. “...It’s very nice to welcome people into this space and make them feel at ease because people are sharing their life stories. The last thing we want to do is make it seem stuffy or that we’re running out of time.”
The Forest Park Branch has two bookable meeting rooms and four study rooms. View a full list of meeting and study rooms across CHPL locations. Meeting rooms are free to use, except for the purpose of social gatherings like parties or showers.
Interested in recording a podcast? While the Forest Park Branch does not have recording equipment, two of our locations — the Downtown Main Library and Reading Branch — have recording booths in their MakerSpaces.
The Library wasn’t initially on Clara’s radar, but Bryan said Cincinnati Compass’s relationship with CHPL, particularly the Forest Park Branch, already existed in other capacities.
“When I came over here with Bryan, and we took a look around, suddenly it just started making sense,” said Clara. “[The Library] makes people feel very welcome. And then, just the naturalness of this Library. We don’t have to pay. And, at the time, we connected with library services to do recording for us in terms of sound. Those were three things already that [had us] going, ‘Oh, we don’t have to worry about that.’”
We insist on being a Library for all. All minds. All modes. All needs. More than 2.4 million visits are made to the Cincinnati & Hamilton County Public Library each year from customers living in and working in our diverse, vibrant, and unique neighborhoods. Our series Meet a Library Customer shares the stories that minds of all kinds have each day at CHPL.
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