News from the Center
As the fall 2008 semester kicks into high gear, the Center for Public History is picking up steam with several exciting projects.
Over the 2007-8 academic year, graduate research assistants Kristi Hartmann and Katie Hicks and Center director Ann McCleary researched Georgia foodways in preparation for the arrival of "Key Ingredients: America by Food," a traveling exhibit developed by the Museum on Main Street program of the Smithsonian Institution and the National Federation of Humanities Councils. After completing over fifty interviews with people in the twelve communities, we produced Food, Family, and Community: A Collection of Georgia Memories, published by Georgia Humanities Council. This twenty-four page publication is now available at the exhibit sites or through the GHC office. During this academic year, Kristi, Katie, Ann, along with Shanda Davidson will again be working on the project by enhancing the website <www.georgiafoodtour.org>, adding recipes from our interviews, writing articles on foodways for the New Georgia Encylopedia, indexing the interviews, and creating a finding aid for this research collection.
After releasing four volumes of traditional music for the Regional Music Project, we continue our pursuit to document significant music traditions in our region. This year, Center assistant director Sandy Pollard will spearhead this effort, assisted by graduate research assistant Angie Ramirez. We plan to continue our research and interviews with African American note singers, including the United Shape Note Singers, begun last year by undergraduate intern Jerome Danner. Sandy and Angie are also beginning a new intiative to document music of Latino immigrants into the west Georgia region. If you are interested in participating in this project, please contact Sandy at the Center.
The Center continues to be involved in documenting and presenting textile and apparel history in the Georgia piedmont. Lauren Miller and William Nesbitt developed an interactive website for school children, complete with podcasts that include interviews from our collection. This website will go "on-line" later this fall. It has lesson plans to relate this important history to the Georgia Performance Standards. Also, Lauren will be coordinating our traveling exhibit on the same topic. We hope to send the exhibit to schools and other sites around the region. Contact Lauren at the Center for more information.
Morgan Carraway is working with the City of Bremen as they seek to develop a museum on the apparel industry in their community. She will be conducting interviews and seeking out artifacts for this new museum under development.
Sandy Pollard, Nick Gray, and Shanda Davidson are getting our new traveling trunks for the Veterans History project ready to go! The two trunks document World War II and the Cold War, and each come complete with lesson plans that relate to the Georgia Performance Standards. Please contact Sandy or Nick if you are interested in borrowing these trunks for classroom instruction. They are available free of charge, so please place your reservation soon.
We appreciate the opportunity to work with the residents of our community and our region. We invite the public to come visit the Center and utilize our archives or to contact us to help you in your community history projects.