Paradise Lost: Florida’s Egmont Key during the Civil War
The Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater area evokes images of sugar sand beaches and crystal-clear Gulf waters. A stone’s throw from St. Petersburg, the Tampa Bay Ferry carts beachgoers two or three times a day between Fort DeSoto County Park and Egmont Key State Park. Egmont Key’s informational brochure boasts that it is ...
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Camp William Penn and the Fight for Historical Memory
If you were to drive down Cheltenham Avenue north of Philadelphia today between Penrose Avenue and School Lane, you would pass standard urban blocks, nothing extraordinary. A cemetery, gas station, a mixed collection of residences, and a community center. Casual passersby—many residents, even--do not recognize the historical significance of the ...
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“A History They Can Use”: The Memphis Massacre and Reconstruction’s Public History Terrain
On May 20th and 21st, a group of scholars, students, and public historians gathered at the University of Memphis to discuss a dramatic event often overlooked in the narrative of Reconstruction, the Memphis Massacre of 1866. The symposium, and the Memphis Massacre Project, informed the public about the massacre and ...
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Slavery, Nostalgia, and the White House
At the Aiken-Rhett House Museum in Charleston, South Carolina, visitors do not view the beautiful interiors of the slaveholders’ residence until they have become fully acquainted with the slaves’ living quarters and work spaces. Tours begin in the basement and back yard of the house. The site interrupts the nostalgic ...
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Bidding on History: The Strange Afterlife of Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Birthplace
In May 2016, the remains of a dismantled eighteenth century wooden house appeared for sale on eBay. The online listing specified that, “Every single thing has been saved including the original plaster walls.” The seller asked $14.5 million to purchase the structure, claiming that the pieces constituted the “most important ...
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Home Sweet Home?: Slave Dwellings and the Politics of Home
Perhaps nothing better encapsulates our personal histories than our homes. From the slightly outdated furniture to the embarrassing school-age portraits to the perfect warm spot by the fireplace, the amalgam of objects, images, and spaces that comprise home shapes our core. So too do those within; our families, friends, and ...
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