Jeffrey Brown:

Operating in this small basement office of Spalding University, the team works to curate the past.

Deputy Director Joe Manning was taking old recordings of gospel music gone missing, hidden in closets and attics, and digitizing them as part of I’m Glad About It: Louisville Gospel Restoration Project.

In the mid-20th century, the city was a hotbed of gospel producing and recording. Manning took us to see fifth-generation gospel singer Wilma Clayborn, who ran a record label called Grace Gospel and a record store by the same name in the 1970s and 1980s. She was rehearsing with her grandson, recording and performing artist Jason Clayborn, and spoke of the history she wants to put into the book.

Wilma Clayborn, Contributor, “I’m Glad About It”: The talent in Louisville was so powerful.

We moved to a store. It was owned by a church. And we rented the — it was two or three rooms, and we set up the records. And I said, well, we got — this is records. We’ve got to have gospel music in here.

So that’s what started the gospel music industry in Louisville for me. There were no other stores that were selling gospel music.

That was taken here in Louisville after a program.

If you don’t write the history or tell somebody the history, the history is lost. And I found that the history of gospel music has been lost, pretty much.