Project SAVE Celebrates 40 Years of Preserving History

In the photo, he had his family members back in the old Armenian lands, as well as spliced in photos of family members in the US. All the family members in Turkey were killed and he came to the US 10 years after the Genocide and through the Red Cross, was able to connect with the members who had moved to the US before the Genocide.

The photo was the only connection he had with his past.

The story of the picture will be part of the documentary by Nubar Alexanian which will be shown at the group’s 40th-anniversaery celebration on November 21.

This first photo led to others. Thomasian started collecting photos and visiting the people who were giving her photos and they just loved it. “For seniors to have a young person interested in their lives. They all had their stories and pulled photographs out. Some of their kids hadn’t even heard the stories.”

She added, “I made the time and they were so grateful that someone was listening. I knew this was the work I had to do.”

For Thomasian, the photo and its provenance and ownership all go hand in hand to provide a complete picture and preserve a slice of history.

“I was a milliner in the theater world but I decided you can’t always talk to the elders,” therefore the choice was made.

She wrote a piece soliciting photos in 1975 and sent it around to the Armenian papers. After putting in a lot of her own money into the nascent group, she applied to various state-wide organizations who handed grants and started her organization.

The first decade of Project SAVE, she decided, would be dedicated to gathering stories that the picture donors had not shred with anyone. “I didn’t bring up the Genocide, but they told me” their horrifying stories, she said.

Then, in the 1980s, she started recording the oral histories behind the pictures.

“We really were cataloguing the pictures,” she said.

For the past decade, Project SAVE has also issued calendars with themes; this year’s is “Our Children Carry the Light.”

“It has done pretty much what I have wanted. I knew no national archives and no source of visual information. I couldn’t see what our forefathers and homeland looked like,” Thomasian explained. “The archives for research purposes made no mention of Armenians in the popular culture. The Metropolitan Museum, for example didn’t know Armenians from the Turks.”

Thomasian also conducted research on photographers in the Ottoman Empire and Turkey, many of whom were Armenian.

In the next 40 years, Thomasian said, it will be the responsibility of the next generation to carry on the work. The plan is to convert everything to digital so that they can last.

Thomasian recently brought on board as her deputy Tsoleen Sarian. Sarian may be new to the office, but she and Thomasian have worked together before.

Said Sarian, “In the past decade, I have served with Ruth on a steering committee where she speaks strongly for including women in our commemorations as keynote speakers and honorees, something I honestly hadn’t really paid much attention to.

“At Project SAVE, I admire her advocacy for the stories and the memories of all of our elders. The ‘white genocide’ has continued over the past 100 years resulting in the loss of much of our Armenian culture, folklore, customs, and values. Yet Ruth established an organization to hold on to our collective memory, organize it, and provide access to this information and distribute it. “The individuals captured in the photos, their names and stories are documented, which means they are not lost and forgotten. We are able to teach their stories, give their testimony, and share their information to the greater world.”

She concluded, “Years ago my grandparents had known the importance of contributing their family — Shnorhokian and Khatchadourian — photographs from Aintab to Project SAVE Archives. It’s important to me that I’m now able to work for what they valued. Whether it is my enjoyment of the photographs, or learning the individual histories, or actively contributing to the vibrancy of my culture and heritage by acting as a steward, these are all valuable and gratifying to me personally and professionally.”

Thomasian said it was important to keep up with technology as it was changing so rapidly.

“Our collection reflects immigration patterns,” she said. For example, she said, there is a large presence of Armenians from Kharpert who ended up in Worcester. One reason for original Armenian settlers there was the similarity of Worcester’s hilly landscape to their hometowns.

Now, she said, Project SAVE also has photos from the Soviet era from Armenian immigrants, though there are still not too many. Also lacking are photos and stories from immigrants from Iran.

To order tickets to the November 21 banquet or calendars, visit www.projectsave.org.