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much of the Bay Area's recorded history, lives in a small san Francisco office. All of the film that we have was shot in the Bay Area. The media exists on conflict and confrontation. Much of the world's history was made and then recorded in the Bay Area.

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Then one day America must understand that integration is not a problem. It is a privilege. I would go into villages that had been bombed the day before and talked to women whose families have been wiped out. Alex Cherien has a front row seat, it knocks my

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socks off today, I'm announcing my candidacy for the Democratic nomination for governor. Apparently though it takes a serious demonstrations to create the feeling within all of the greater community that there has been something has to be done Alex a SAn Francisco state film archivist is fighting

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to save Bay Area history and he's in a race against time. Yeah. Over time our film is continually deteriorating. Eventually it will be lost forever. Beginning in the middle of the last century, Bay Area television stations sent film crews out to cover the news of the

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day. Ben Williams reporting for eyewitness news from SAn Quentin and the next day from the black panther headquarters in Oakland and the day after that in the Bay off Alcatraz. After a while those days added up to millions of feet of film. Then in the late

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70s and early 80s, the TV stations made the move from shooting primarily on film over to shooting on video. Uh, that was the point when people decided it would be prudent to dump all of the film to make room for the video. It was partly a

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space saving exercise. Tv stations simply ran out of room when push comes to shove. If they have to make tomorrow's news, then they are going to make room for it by getting rid of yesterday's news reels and reels of historic film were tossed into the garbage

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and this is only a fraction of what actually survived. Yeah, Alex is transferring that film into digital files. He's literally caring for history with his own hands. You can't just take the film and put it into the film transfer system and hit play. You have two

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very painstakingly clean it, repair, it makes sure that all of the splices are repaired. So I know exactly what has gone into repairing that film When I transfer the film, it's the first time you're seeing those images. One of Alex's favorite reels is a 1978 Harvey

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milk debate. It's one thing to be told that Harvey milk was a mercurial politician who was a great speaker. It's another thing to see him in action. He is so full of pepper and full of life. You're the one who keeps bringing up this phony recruitment.

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You know, you're lying watching film is a visceral experience and now anyone can share in that experience, Alex posts, the historic videos onto a website. That's what we're trying to do here. We want people to take part in their own history And all of these clips

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online are available for free. All you need is a basic broadband Internet connection, but there's only so much that Alex can do if I was to do it just myself with the equipment I have here now, it would take me probably 25 or 30 years. And

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bearing in mind that the film continues to fade and to deteriorate, that wouldn't be a good idea. I would be happy to complete the process, but it would be better if there were a few more people doing it with more resources, Alex is running out of

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time. The film is fading and so is Bay Area history. But I for one intend to speak out. History isn't just written by historians. History is a collective memory. I mean, you're going to jail as a pacifist. You come out a stronger pacifist. And what we're

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doing is giving people the opportunity to contribute to the history of the Bay Area. It's it's their heritage and they should be allowed to take part in it. And if we don't do this work, these images will be lost and memory is fickle