Dubbed the \u201cHeritage Initiative\u201d (without apparent irony), the project featured, among other things, a four-lane boulevard bisecting a densely populated half-square-mile neighborhood in order to improve access to the civic center and a bread factory whose yeasty aroma wafts along the patched streets.<\/p>\n
In announcing the project, then-Lewiston Mayor Lionel C. Guay promised that the Heritage Initiative would honor the historic neighborhood\u2019s \u201cwonderful heritage\u201d and make it \u201ca more desirable place in which to live and raise a family\u201d \u2014 in part by razing the homes of 850 residents to reduce population density. His remarks carefully demonized the inner-city neighborhood, characterizing it as a transient-filled area that had \u201clost its self-esteem and its zest for quality of life.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\u201cFor the first year I was pretty much a fly on the wall. The more I stuck around, the more interesting it got.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
The movie tells how people in the neighborhood came together to establish their identity and block the project. It also shows how the area has changed through the past five years thanks to its residents\u2019 newfound activism.<\/p>\n
For Saddlemire, who settled in the neighborhood after graduation and makes videos for nonprofit organizations through his production company, Round Point Movies, creating the documentary changed his life.<\/p>\n
He was a Bates senior who had rarely ventured off campus when a friend told him that a working group of roughly 40 residents, dubbed the Visible Community, sought a volunteer to videotape their activities for the historical record. Broadcast on public access television, the footage initially was a tool to inform citizens and to hold public officials accountable.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor the first year I was pretty much a fly on the wall,\u201d Saddlemire says. \u201cThe more I stuck around, the more interesting it got.\u201d<\/p>\n
After graduation \u2014 magna cum laude in psychology and film studies \u2014 Saddlemire rented an apartment across from the bread factory, and his role evolved from observer to activist. He went door to door, helped plan meetings, and facilitated meetings \u2014 videotaping all the while \u2014 though he doesn\u2019t cast himself as a leader \u201cany more than other people in the group.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt became my life to a large extent,\u201d says Saddlemire, who has also represented the Visible Community on various municipal committees. \u201cLiving in the community gave me a much deeper appreciation for what was going on.\u201d<\/p>\n
Saddlemire\u2019s documentary has quickly found its way into urban planning, economics, and anthropology classrooms in colleges from Maine to California. A lively question-and-answer session followed its screening at the Social Justice Cinema Film Series at the University of Maine\u2013Farmington, said organizer John Messier, whose economics students continued the discussion in class the next day.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt shows a clear distribution effect: There was a neighborhood in the way of a business deal,\u201d Messier says. \u201cWe see a community figuring out how to organize and use their power to get a seat at the table.\u201d<\/p>\n
The documentary \u201cmakes you want to get involved in the neighborhood even if you don\u2019t live there,\u201d says Anne Kreig of the Maine Association of Planners, which gave the movie its 2009 Project of the Year Award. \u201cIt speaks to different age groups, including people in their 20s and 30s \u2014 an especially tough age group to engage.\u201d<\/p>\n
At Loyola University Chicago, it\u2019s being used in a course on community-based research and leadership. \u201cNeighbor by Neighbor is an example of authentic community-university collaboration,\u201d explains teaching assistant Ashley Kehoe. \u201cIt demonstrates the knowledge, power, and agency that community members hold, as well as the potential that college students have to be actively engaged in local issues.\u201d<\/p>\n
At Bates, where the story has special resonance, Associate Dean of Students Holly Gurney plans to use the movie to introduce first-year students to recent Lewiston history. Likewise, Associate Professor of Anthropology Elizabeth Eames believes Neighbor by Neighbor will prepare students in her economic anthropology course for their community-based research.<\/p>\n
Back at Knox Street Park, whose construction is one of the more recent developments covered by Neighbor by Neighbor, Saddlemire considered the camera\u2019s role in helping a community organize to save its buildings, playgrounds, and gardens.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe documentary has given the group a way to reflect on their accomplishments,\u201d he says. \u201cIt validates their work and legitimizes them in the eyes of the greater public. People see it and they are inspired by what others with few resources were able to do.\u201d<\/p>\n
He also reflects on his own path from Bates student to Lewiston citizen.<\/p>\n
\u201cLike a lot of Bates students, I had misconceptions about what Lewiston had to offer. I learned it was a much more attractive community than I\u2019d thought it was.\u201d<\/p>\n
Freelance writer Virginia Wright profiled Professor of Psychology Georgia Nigro in the Spring 2009 issue.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Craig Saddlemire ’05 went from observer to activist as he chronicled a Lewiston neighborhood fighting to be heard.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":221,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_hide_ai_chatbot":false,"_ai_chatbot_style":"","associated_faculty":[],"_Page_Specific_Css":"","_bates_restrict_mod":false,"_table_of_contents_display":false,"_table_of_contents_location":"","_table_of_contents_disableSticky":false,"_is_featured":false,"footnotes":"","_bates_seo_meta_description":"","_bates_seo_block_robots":false,"_bates_seo_sharing_image_id":0,"_bates_seo_sharing_image_twitter_id":0,"_bates_seo_share_title":"","_bates_seo_canonical_overwrite":"","_bates_seo_twitter_template":""},"categories":[7,30,130,133,175,31,220,11009],"tags":[10769,10856,4087,10830,10777],"class_list":["post-16173","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-alumni","category-civic-engagement","category-collaboration","category-creativity","category-justice-poverty","category-lewiston-auburn","category-service","category-the-college","tag-anthropology","tag-bates-magazine","tag-harward-center-for-community-partnerships","tag-lewiston-auburn","tag-marketing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16173","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/221"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16173"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16173\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":88230,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16173\/revisions\/88230"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16173"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16173"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16173"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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