Galina Pozharsky is a Russian immigrant who has been living in Eau Claire for the past 10 years. We discussed her views on why she believes Covid-19 is not that big of a deal and why she believes the pandemic is at least partially politically motivated.

Josh Miller is from Eau Claire, Wisconsin and he is a police officer. We discuss how Covid 19 has impacted his work, family, and community and how he feels about the pandemic.

Kathy Volkmann works at a credit union in the center of Wisconsin. She also volunteers at a museum through the Marathon County Historical Society. In the interview, she discusses the ways that Covid has changed the way she works and communicates with people around her. She also considers how museums in the present and future could be shaped by the virus. Additionally, she contemplates the ways that Covid has changed the way she looks at her community based on people who have not been cooperating with mask mandates and CDC guidelines.

Barbara Hartwick was born and raised in Minnesota and currently works between two nursing homes as a stylist. In this interview, Barb will describe how Covid-19 has impacted her life including both work and family. She shares her experience and her ways of dealing with not working and then eventually working during a pandemic. She describes the impact the residents had on her and the impact she had on her customers. She also had some other interesting experiences during these unprecedented times.

Wendy Villalva currently lives in Eau Claire, Wisconsin, and attends the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire. She is a second-year student that is majoring in Biology and double minoring in Pre-Professional Health Science and Latin American Studies. In the first half of the interview, Wendy talks about how the COVID-19 Pandemic has affected her education, family, employment, and community. In the second half of the interview, Wendy shares her own experience working on the rapid-response collection project for the Western Wisconsin COVID-19 Archive with the specific goal of “Documenting the Undocumented.” This part of the project focuses on documenting the Spanish-speaking populations in Western Wisconsin specifically migrant and undocumented workers. Wendy discusses her role and experience with this project.

Lan Yang is an international student from China at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire. In this interview, Lan talks about how the COVID-19 pandemic has affected her and her family. She shares her concerns and challenges with the pandemic and describes how she stays in contact with friends and family. She talks about school activities and classes online. Lan explains the pandemic’s effects on homesickness and how she has been dealing with that as well as the pandemic’s impact on nursing homes and hospitals. Lan also shares information about her job working in the Center for International Education at the university.

Pa Cha Vang is a student at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis, Minnesota. She graduated high school during the pandemic. In this interview, Pa Cha discusses how the COVID-19 pandemic has affected her, including moving from Winona, Minnesota to Minneapolis during the pandemic, finishing high school and starting college, and what she does on a daily basis. She describes how she stays in touch with her friends and family. She also describes her experience with the vaccine and volunteering at a vaccine clinic. Pa Cha also shares her concerns about the pandemic and mental health, and she touches on her personal experience with racism during this period.

Chris Delvin is the RN perioperative manager at the Marshfield Clinic in Eau Claire. In this interview, Chris discusses the effects of the pandemic on his clinic and how he and his staff responded by converting a surgical clinic into a negative flow covid unit and doubling the number of beds they could handle. He talks not only about work but also about how the pandemic has transformed his home and spiritual life. Matt Schneider also joins midway through and offers his perspectives on how Chris managed the situation and contributed to helping protect his community.

Catherine Lee may have been born in Maine, but she currently lives in Eau Claire, Wisconsin with her husband and two kids. She works at the Center for International Education at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire and discusses how COVID-19 has affected that job, along with her family life and mental health. She shares how living through the pandemic with her family has changed her views on what is important and how she sees the future of her job. She also talks about her children in school and why she was glad to see her daughter go to kindergarten. Catherine shares that she urges more people to get vaccinated.

In this interview, Chloe Ylitalo describes how COVID-19 has affected her life regarding college, work, and family life. Chloe has attended two different colleges during the pandemic and compares how they handle it differently throughout the 2020 year. Chloe attended Wisconsin Indianhead Technical College in Ashland, WI for her Medical Assistant degree in the spring, and University of Wisconsin – Eau Claire in the fall for her Micro-Biology degree. She touches on the first responses to COVID, what has changed for her, mental health, and how different parts of the state have reacted. She also gives her opinion on how she expects the country will react with talk of a vaccine coming, as well as how she wants the schools to change.

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In this interview with Avery Judnic, a freshman at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, she will be touching on a variety of topics ranging from her experiences as a high schooler to her college experience. Being a freshman in college, in 2020, means that Avery’s spring of 2020 was spent in high school during the COVID pandemic and her fall semester is being experienced now as a freshman in college. Her class has experience from both high school and college during the pandemic. As she discusses her concerns about the pandemic pre-college and during college, varying trends and ideals are displayed in her experiences. Understanding the life of the class that has been thrown into the thickest of it all will reveal some of the most impactful effects of the pandemic. Avery focuses on her experience in her hometown compared to college life, as well as the concerns of her and her fellow classmates. “It's not about business, it's about teaching, and inspiring young people to do other things in their lives.”

Kim French is the small business owner of River City Stitch in the rural town of Prescott, Wisconsin. Both Kim and her lead Graphic Designer Amanda Hines had to make changes to how they conduct their business during these uncertain times of the pandemic. While they may not have suffered as greatly as some small businesses, they found an opportunity to give back to their fellow local small businesses in the Prescott and River Falls, Wisconsin areas.

Jackie Weber was born in West Bend, Wisconsin. She now lives in Milwaukee, Wisconsin and works as an occupational therapist in one of the major Milwaukee hospital systems. In this interview she dives deep into the affect that Covid-19 has had on her workplace such as staffing issues, equipment shortages, and burnout. She also talks about the emotional weight of working in such a stressful situation and not being able to help people in the same ways as pre-pandemic. She also speaks on the ways in which hospitals are changing how they treat Covid and often cites an ever-changing set of policies. Throughout the interview she intertwines her views on policy proposals, and anti-maskers into her strong points about safety.

Judy Cherniak discusses how the COVID pandemic changed life for her during the opening months of the pandemic in Toronto, Canada in 2020. She touches on family life, her job loss, the local economy, news media, fake news, isolation, mental health, homelessness, and how she filled her time at home in isolation.

An oral history interview with Trent Jansen. Trent discusses how family and friends have been impacted by the COVID pandemic. He also talks about how his day-to-day work life has evolved during the pandemic. Trent additionally discusses his views that it is time to reopen businesses and get people back to work. He theorizes that mental health issues caused by shutdowns will result in worse long-term issues than the virus itself.

Dang Yang is the Director for the Office of Multicultural Affairs at UW Eau Claire. He identifies as a Hmong American that was born and raised in the Midwest of the United States. Dang discusses how the COVID-19 pandemic affected his personal life as well as his professional life. In this discussion he emphasizes the challenges of operating an office at a higher learning institution as well as the issues of racism that came about with the onset of the Coronavirus and isolated racially charged events that happened during the pandemic. He focuses on equity in his discussion.

An oral history interview with Stanton Webster who discusses his background opening a distillery in Knoxville, Tennessee before the pandemic. He discusses how his business reacted to the COVID-19 Pandemic and his efforts to keep employees paid while finding new revenue streams. In this business-focused interview he also illustrated how a small group of local business banded together to navigate the pandemic and government funding pitfalls. He also discusses family life and changing roles in the home.

In this monologue, Winnie Tomsheck answers questions relating to COVID-19.

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The contributor of this item did not include verbal or written consent. We attempted to contact contributor (or interviewee if possible) to get consent, but got no response or had incomplete contact information. We can not allow this interview to be listened to without consent but felt the metadata is important. The recording and transcript are retained by the archive and not public. Should you wish to listen to audio file reach out to the archive and we will attempt to get consent.

Lou Ann Koval was born in East Lansing Michigan, and currently works for a company called Laird Connectivity. This company makes electronics, some of which were made to help keep people safe from COVID. During the pandemic, she switched between two companies and shared some of the struggles of joining a new company without anyone being able to have a real social interaction with her. She also talks about the struggles of balancing a social life and keeping involved with her elderly family members. She also briefly talks about her opinion on the political actions taken to avoid COVID and some of her responses to stay healthy during this pandemic.

Zoe Tresemer was raised in Brodhead, WI. She currently is a full-time student at the University of Wisconsin lacrosse. Zoe also works as a nanny in the lacrosse area. Zoe discusses how COVID-19 has affected her life including her work, family life, and mental health. She shares what it was like to be a college student and nanny during the pandemic. Zoe also tested positive for COVID-19 and shares her experience with that. So we also discuss her experiences with quarantining and getting the COVID-19 vaccine. Zoe also discusses her experience with news and the pandemic. The interviewer, Tyler Urness, and Zoe have known each other since both were kids.

Jocelyn Penagos was born and raised in Columbia until the age of eight when she finally followed her older brother's footsteps and moved with her family to Florida. Leaving Colombia was a callous but necessary thing that she felt she had to do. Upon arrival in America, she began watching a movie and listening to music to better learn English. After being fluent in both languages and graduating High School, Jocelyn joined the armed services and enlisted in the United States Marine Corps. She is still currently enrolled in the Marine Corps and is going on her ninth consecutive year. Jocelyn shares her experiences with covid from a military point of view. She offers great insight into what had changed or been created because of the lockdown and the virus. Jocelyn also shares with us her struggles to see her mother in Columbia because of fears that she could be the reason for her death.

Jill Polglaze is a librarian in the Franklin School District in Southeastern Wisconsin. She manages staff at the libraries at all levels of schooling in this district. In this interview, Jill discusses how COVID-19 has affected her life, including her job, family life, and pandemic overload in the media. She gives specific focus to the Franklin School District’s reaction to the pandemic and its involvement in the creation of protocols and keeping everyone safe. Furthermore, Jill discusses the various reactions to the pandemic she has noticed between the different school levels, elementary, middle, and high. Jill has a positive outlook on the future and shares her thoughts on a post-pandemic world.

Jody Pabich lives in Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin, and works as a senior safety manager at the corporate office of a nationwide big box retailer. Jody directly handled all of the COVID-19 protocols for her company across the country, and talks about how counties, states, and the country have been handling the pandemic differently. She explains how her family and friends have dealt with COVID-19, addressing health concerns about her daughter, mental health concerns about her friends, and the politics and distrust of media. She describes how her community has come together to support each other and local businesses. She also discusses her experience with and concerns about the vaccines. She talks about how her experiences have made her value life and experience more than she did before COVID-19.

The contributor of this item did not include verbal or written consent. We attempted to contact contributor (or interviewee if possible) to get consent, but got no response or had incomplete contact information. We can not allow this interview to be listened to without consent but felt the metadata is important. The recording and transcript are retained by the archive and not public. Should you wish to listen to audio file reach out to the archive and we will attempt to get consent.

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This interview was recorded as part of the COVID-19 Oral History Project, a project of the IUPUI Arts and Humanities Institute and The Cultural Ecologies Project.

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Morgan Kallenbach was born and raised in Hudson, Wisconsin. She works as a childcare teacher for Grace Lutheran Communities. In this interview, Morgan shares her experiences during the Covid-19 pandemic as well as her thoughts on the pandemic as a whole. She discusses what is like to work during this pandemic as well as her home and social life. Morgan goes on to talk about her experiences with information and news as well as her take on the politics of the situation.

Annalyse Stratton was born in Marsh field, Wisconsin and grew up in Colby, Wisconsin. She works at Grace Lutheran Communities as a child care teacher. In this interview Annalyse shares how the Covid-19 pandemic has affected her, her family and her friends as well as her thoughts on the pandemic itself. She shares what it has been like to work during these difficult times and also shares what she thinks that we can do moving forward. Finally she touches on the politics of the situation and how we can learn from it.

Wade Pitrucha, Marine Corps veteran and butcher, was raised in Texas and lived in California for several years, and currently works as a butcher and lives in Barron, Wisconsin. In this interview, Wade discusses the political and economic developments he has observed since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. Wade gives an inside look at the COVID-19 meat shortage, and explains some of the causes, as well as the impacts on farmers and families. Wade also shares some of his personal experiences and frustrations with the local handling of the pandemic, and how he feels the federal government and the Trump administration has contributed to the massive spread of COVID-19 in the United States. In an entertaining and sometimes darkly humorous interview, Wade’s military experience and personal beliefs provide a unique and well-balanced view of the COVID-19 pandemic and modern American society.

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Alison “Ali” Schatzman is a resident of Racine County, Wisconsin. She is currently employed as a cashier at Kwik Trip in Racine, Wisconsin. In this interview, Ali discusses how COVID-19 has impacted her life in various ways, touching on a job layoff from iHeart Radio, and her experiences working at a gas station during the pandemic. Additionally, Ali touches on the current political atmosphere as well as the global response to the pandemic. Ali also discusses social media and memes, and how informative and entertaining they’ve been during this time of uncertainty. Lastly, Ali reflects on her college years, noting the difficulties that current college students struggle with today.

Marla McCartney, former Chief Executive of an unnamed charitable organization, is interviewed by Marion Lougheed as part of an oral history project. The interviewee is asked about her experiences in the workplace and at home during the pandemic, and about her personal opinions on the handling of the pandemic by the public and government.

Celia White is a law student at a university in Toronto, B.C. She recounts how her life has been affected by COVID-19 and her thoughts on of how the world as reacted to it. Additionally, she talks how COVID-19 has affect her family, where she gets her news, and what conspiracy theories she’s seen floating around.

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