Category: Consulting Historian

Working to Develop and Share Community Stories for Traveling Exhibit, Hometown Teams

I am pleased to serve as a “museum capacity building consultant” for a Smithsonian Institution Museum on Main Street traveling exhibition, Hometown Teams.  While touring Maryland from February 2014 to November 2015, this program explores the connection between sports and American culture.

A team of consultants will help host institutions identify regional stories, develop engaging content, and offer unique public programs. In my area of practice, cultural and social history, I will focus on oral traditions that assists in the development of community narratives, the collection of local stories, and sports-related storytelling.  Other consultants will work with the partners to enhance deliverables in additional practice areas.

The Museum on Main Street (MoMS) project is a Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service program, which teams up with state humanities councils to bring high-quality traveling exhibits to small communities through their own Main Street museums, historical societies and other cultural venues.

Having the opportunity to work with great groups of volunteers, local historians, and community subject matter experts while we piece together fading aspects of our past that explore, preserve, and share stories of how sports shaped communities is exciting.

People loved baseball and in every community across the national crowds turned out when the local team was playing.
People loved baseball, and in every community across the nation, crowds turned out when the local team played.

Presentation on Research and Writing About History

On the day the Digital Public Library of America opened its virtual doors to the public, I was in Havre de Grace to do a talk with author Heidi Glatfelter on “Researching and Writing about the War of 1812.”   We took a team approach to the program as I focused on new methods of doing digital research, while Heidi discussed how she accumulated information to produce her just released title, “Havre de Grace in the War of 1812:  Fire on the Chesapeake.”   We both drew on our experience in working as consultants on the 1812 Bicentennial celebration that is taking place this spring in the beautiful community at the top of the Chesapeake.  Heidi was the grant administrator and I served as a consulting public historian. 

Online research has made a broader universe of information easily available to anyone studying the past.  So for this community-oriented audience I talked about some of the basic virtual repositories such as the Internet Archive, the American Memory and Chronicling America collections at the Library of Congress, and Project Gutenberg.  As old maps are of interest, we took some time to examine some of the portals for cartography such as Old Maps Online.  Of course, in the age when we all Google our information, we took a little deeper look at some of the tools in that massive index, such as Google scholar and newspaper archive.   These were free resources, but we also talked about the commercial content providers.

Once Heidi finished talking about how she accumulated her body of data and developed the narrative for the enjoyable and informative work, we turned to the audience for questions.  They were interested in discussing how to use the online tools and other topics such as derivative digital copyrights.

Here is a link to online research resources you may find helpful.

The Digital Public Library of America
The Digital Public Library of America

 

Preparing Interpretive Plan Exploring the Havre de Grace Storylines During the War of 1812

havre de grace interpretive plan
The Havre de Grace Interpretive Plan.

I have been working as a consulting public historian since 2011 on a project to document the story of Havre de Grace around the time the British burned the town in May 1813.

This work was part of the development of the Star Spangled Banner National Historic Trail.  As one of two project historians, my assignment was to design and direct research focused on the community narrative.  Another historian worked on the military aspect.

My final assignment involved preparation of an interpretative plan for the heritage museums of Havre de Grace.  The document focused on helping those stakeholders deliver their unique storyline to the public during the Bicentennial.

It was an exciting project, as I worked with a great group of volunteers, local historians, museums and community subject matter experts to piece together the forgotten parts of the town’s past and develop the Havre de Grace Interpretive Plan.

Project Scholar For New Study Asking What Happens When Big Government Moves In and Families Move Out

I have just started working on an exciting new investigation that is seeking to answer questions about the impact the military has on people and communities when it uproots long-established families to create a wartime reservation.  This particular migration occurred in Harford County, Maryland, as the government established Aberdeen Proving Ground in 1917, six months after the United States entered World War I.  To create the Proving Grounds, families occupying nearly 73,000 acres were forced to make a “patriotic sacrifice” and move.  They had no choice but to quickly relocate for the “good of their country,” so hundreds were displaced, many with large farms that had been in their families for generations.

As many of the displaced and their descendants still live in the area, two local partner organizations, Harford County Public Library and Hosanna School Museum will document their stories.  Using “youth curators,” the project will collect their oral histories, documents, and photographs, as we examine their reactions and efforts to make a new life work.

The goal of this project, which is being underwritten by the Maryland Humanities Council and the Smithsonian Institute is to work with “youth curators” to help them create an exhibit that will tell this unexamined story.  So soon, thanks to the stakeholders and “the youth curators,” we’ll have a better idea of what really happened when the big government moved in, and families moved out.

I’m serving as the project scholar.  It’s always exciting to investigate the changes that have come to our communities, and I’m particularly looking forward to this youth-oriented project.