13:30:05 All right, so it's 130. If everybody feels okay with it I'm going to go ahead and start the webinar and start the recording. Shortly thereafter, all good.
13:30:15 Great.
13:30:25 Come everyone, just a reminder. This session will be recorded so we are actively recording right now. Thanks so much.
13:30:37 Alright.
13:30:39 So my name is Blair Williams, I will be the moderator for the session on for today. So, first off I just want to say that will be utilizing the live transcript for this session for accessibility purposes.
13:30:51 If you'd like to hide the subtitles simply click the live transcription button at the bottom of your application and then select slide high subtitle and if your zoom application is not maximize you may need to click on the three dots.
13:31:03 More icon to turn off the subtitles.
13:31:06 If you have any questions please use the Q q amp a feature to post questions to the panel, and then I can then relay those questions to the panelists to close up the session.
13:31:15 Alright, so first off I want to introduce Dr Lindsay hot Varner. He's a historian specializing in community culture and social history. In the early modern period.
13:31:25 She's worked extensively in the public history and heritage field as a community educator and administrator. From 2016 to 2018 she was the project director for the greater Carlisle heart and soul initiative, and from 2018 to 2020 it was the first community
13:31:39 outreach department or outreach department coordinator at the Cumberland County Historical Society in Pennsylvania.
13:31:46 She started her current role as director of the rotary Museum in various Burg Vermont, in September of 2020.
13:31:55 And then our other panelists is Kara Curtis.
13:31:58 Kara has been working in libraries since her undergraduate days. She's a history degree from Miller's will University, and a master's in applied history from Shippensburg University, and a master's in library and information science from the University
13:32:23 Pittsburgh, since 2018. She's been working with the Cumberland County Historical Society, as the archives and library director, and she's actively working to make CCS collections more accessible and inclusive. So on that note, I will turn it over to Kari
13:32:28 one second here to get my screen up.
13:32:36 Okay.
13:32:38 So, thanks for joining us here today. I'm excited to be here this afternoon. I did like I do like to start with a minor warning that some of the images and words may be seen on documents, obviously aren't acceptable to modern standards so kind of a warning
13:33:01 that you may see some things that are triggering. And I'm going to get into kind of our institutional past and community past and Lindsay's going to discuss the ways in which we are reaching out to the community and hopefully making good change.
13:33:15 And we also realize that we are a very small piece of things that are happening within kind of regional, and local history. So there are things that aren't going to be discussed here today that are worthy of note as well.
13:33:32 I also wanted to note that micro aggressions, especially when it comes to some of these issues are, of course very real and important. They don't often make it into the news and they definitely don't typically make it into archival records, but I want
13:33:45 to acknowledge that those issues are definitely a part of this story as well.
13:33:51 And then we like to think of things in this community, not necessarily the historical society but it within the greater community and it's not unique to us really like to focus on the history that makes us happy and reminisce about and that's obviously
13:34:06 not the full story so we tended to leave people on their pedestal and not tell the full story. So this is our history in that and also how we're trying to change that and and to the point that even, we have a local gentleman man who was actively very
13:34:26 important to the revolution Monday was funding it, and that part of the story was told, but never how he earned his money.
13:34:33 Which, if you're going to talk about him funding the revolution, you need to talk about how he earned his money, and he earned the bulk of his fortune in slaving people and in the slave trade So changing the narrative and telling the whole story.
13:34:46 As obviously history is about people, and people are complex and not everyone is 100% good or evil and community members in particular like to wear these rose colored glasses and have their, you know your from, you know, Carlisle when Facebook groups
13:35:01 and reminisce about the past, glossing over the flaws within our greater community and the ugliness that has occurred.
13:35:09 The preference is perhaps to forget about all of that and we've kind of seen some of this kind of business come up in the recent years. One example I think of is with the Confederate monuments.
13:35:22 And these discussions about the complexity of history need to happen definitely at the local level.
13:35:28 And currently, we like to think of the Cumberland County Historical Society or cch s as a forward thinking, and in some ways innovative institution.
13:35:39 Yet we are often held back by the actions of our past. First, I also want to acknowledge that there are other societies archives and museums that embrace change far quicker than we did.
13:35:51 If anything we are perhaps an excellent example of a society that thoughts change into the late 20th century, and the elitist and racist attitudes of the past, continue to affect the society today.
13:36:05 We have to acknowledge that to move forward, and moving forward, has not always necessarily been easy.
13:36:12 And we created the barriers between us and community members and those will not necessarily quickly come down.
13:36:19 People have long memories.
13:36:21 And we are continuing to work to build new relationships built on trust with those in our community.
13:36:28 And I don't think looking through our institutions past the history, it's, it's important for the institution to accept ownership for what it did I don't think the key is to pick out a few people and just lay blame at a couple of people are there I'm
13:36:41 going to pick on our founder, a little bit, but generally speaking, the institution as a whole has to take ownership of its past and acknowledge our actions and apologizing to those we have harmed assigning blame I think isn't going to take full ownership
13:36:55 of what happened and the harm that it caused.
13:37:00 So, we are founded in 1870 for the institution that would become the Cumberland County Historical Society.
13:37:06 And it's very much a product of its time.
13:37:11 All the story that goes with that and paste that into historical context, we are very much the status quo for this time period.
13:37:21 And we never had to put into writing that people of color would not have been welcomed because it was known it was assumed that they would not have been welcome.
13:37:32 And our formation comes in the will of James Hamilton Jr. He was a lawyer by education, never really liked to practice so didn't practice for very long.
13:37:41 And he devoted most of his life to the development of the public school system in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, which was the first public school system in the state.
13:37:49 Under the school system that he of course helps you develop was not in any way equal or fair.
13:37:55 And he is problematic in other ways, although he never was directly involved, other than leaving us money, and his will.
13:38:05 Those things should be included in the narrative, and when we discuss our early history. So his father is a judge and a very prominent man.
13:38:15 And he is listed here on this run away ad for a freedom seeker named Bob.
13:38:22 The Hamilton's never appear in the slave returns for Cumberland County, that were created after the act of graduate abolition in 1780. But according to the Lancaster County slave records we see that James Hamilton.
13:38:37 Use the labor of an enslaved woman named Betsy Pearson 1825.
13:38:42 And unless this was recorded far after the fact, which I think is unlikely. This could not have been James Hamilton senior as he died in 1819 so this is most likely.
13:38:51 Our James Hamilton
13:38:56 purpose of this, Hamilton Library Association, at its founding was the establishment of a public library, the advancement of literature and the elucidation and preservation of the history of the county.
13:39:08 There was of course the contested will and money issues and all the things that can happen with these types of societies when they're started, and we had a tumultuous first couple decades.
13:39:17 Part of that is the establishment of another Public Library in the town with a much larger endowment.
13:39:22 And this caused us to adjust our mission and our leadership. Some of them are pictured here at the turn of the 20th century decided to focus on the elucidation and preservation of the history of the county, and therefore thinking probably saved this institution
13:39:37 and allowed us to evolve into the Cumberland County history, historical society that we are today.
13:39:43 And while they were forward thinking, and that manner, and what the society could become.
13:39:48 They were not forward thinking when it came to who and what should be involved with the institution and who and what should be remembered.
13:39:58 Early members had to be approved by the board of directors. And of course this was very much a men's club, a lot of civil war veterans are involved.
13:40:07 And I'm very much going to sit around and smoke a pipe kind of mentality members were allowed to bring gaps and they did call out special attention that those guests could be female and Annie hatch was the first woman to present a paper in 1908.
13:40:23 The following year in 1909, they gave honorary memberships to two women who had given significant items to the collection.
13:40:31 And then during 1910 they did open it up for females to join.
13:40:35 But all members had to still be approved by the board.
13:40:42 We also gave platform for topics that were popular at the time, but in hindsight, probably should be looked at in greater detail, the founder of the Indian School would present a paper in 1908 on the Indian industrial school in Pennsylvania its origins
13:40:59 purposes progress and its difficulties of surmounted, and this was four years after he was removed as superintendent of the school.
13:41:08 So obviously, there's a history between the institutions there.
13:41:12 And I can only imagine how one sided a program on quote the early Indian depredations of Cumberland County would be the narrative of the poor settlers.
13:41:25 And, you know, the atrocities committed against them is often still seen today, that's some of the language that has probably been the hardest to kind of shift is the colonizer language and those, the indigenous people that were here beforehand and how
13:41:40 they are discussing addressed within histories and lectures and within the greater community this language has definitely something that is hard to shift currently
13:41:54 in 1932, to 1933. It's the first printed membership list that I found and during this year, just under 25% of the membership is female by 1959 to 1960, the membership has grown to over, just over 33% female.
13:42:12 And we don't track membership, this way today. But when I look at who comes in the building and who participates in events I would think it's pretty even along gender lines in the 1956 57 program brochure which is partly seen here.
13:42:30 It states that the membership is open to all.
13:42:33 And I am going to go ahead and say that's a lie.
13:42:36 I do not believe we would have been welcome to everyone in 1956. We are not an island.
13:42:42 And we created a society that made people comfortable and didn't challenge their beliefs, and the academics that were involved with this institution at the time were not embracing the rise of social history that was very much not a thing, seen here the
13:42:56 Historical Society and the community in which the society lives, is it was incredibly divided especially during this time period.
13:43:05 It was the middle of the civil rights movement, and on a very predominantly white town.
13:43:12 We don't track membership based on rice but I see members at our events and our events remain incredibly probably upper middle class and incredibly white.
13:43:23 I feel strongly that our history should be accessible to everyone. And we try to balance the need for fundraising and accessibility as best we can.
13:43:33 Art Museum remains free to everyone if you walk through the doors to see the museum that is free.
13:43:40 And during normal times we also have a lot of free programming.
13:43:45 And most of our programs are also filmed and put up on our YouTube channel so we can make sure programs are accessible to people who can't make it here have other ability issue so lots of good things that happened with the rise of social media and that
13:43:59 way.
13:44:01 We also typically have scholarships for our summer camps, and the one of course issue is the library where members, it's a perk to get into the library for free and students get in for free as well.
13:44:15 But we were hearing backlash from some of our community members and from the public library that about the charge, which is $5 for non members at this point.
13:44:25 So we came up with kind of solution in which we created passes that can be checked out from the public library so anyone can get in to use our records or records can be accessible to everyone for free, which I think is important as everyone should be
13:44:41 able to look research the past.
13:44:45 And also, with it, like I said, we're working progress within the past few years to the best of anyone's knowledge, we finally have had the first people of color serving on our board.
13:44:56 So, these pictures are from the same event in 1974 as our building was expanding.
13:45:03 And they of course tell a story. And I'm afraid to say that if we probably did another one of these stakeout events that the only things that probably would look different, would be the smoking.
13:45:17 And maybe the clothes but definitely the smoking but things would not appear that different. if we did another event like this today.
13:45:27 We are also at a middle of an area that has struggled with racial issues and continues to do so.
13:45:33 So give a little bit of perspective on that. Based on these 2019 figures, the county remains incredibly white or Asian population is even slightly larger than our African American population within the county.
13:45:48 And this is not well reflected within our collections.
13:45:52 The last kind of major group that has moved into the county that's reflected came in the early 20th century and that's the Greek population, but anyone that has come in.
13:46:03 Since that is not well reflected within the collection and that's something we actively need to work on and are working on.
13:46:10 Of course, the demographics within the borough of Carlisle are slightly different and we do have a slightly larger African American population, but still it is very white.
13:46:21 And so, narratives that are part of who we are.
13:46:27 And we held on to slavery in till the very bitter end here, and enslavement.
13:46:36 So of course you have the 1780s after gradual emancipation for Pennsylvania enslavement in this area increases after that time period. Unfortunately, and we held on to it into the 1840s.
13:46:49 We are community that's divided we had members of our community that were actively involved in the Underground Railroad. And those who were working to catch and reading slave freedom seekers Excuse me.
13:47:04 We are community that had one of the few northern colleges that Southern students were attending, and the years preceding the Civil War. And this picture a nice, the slide, we have a man named James pow, and he's unique and a lot of ways that there are
13:47:22 photographs of him and especially from this time period. And he's also unique and that he has an obituary when he dies, the newspapers actively ignored.
13:47:29 Members of the African American community during this time period.
13:47:32 And his obituary, it states you know that he was born in Maryland and he came here as the quote bond servant and quote.
13:47:40 It gives his age is 85 or 90 or possibly over 100.
13:47:45 And we know that Mr Powell dies at the poorhouse. He's frequently known by diminutive names that we no longer use although you can see it on the slide.
13:47:55 And we make sure to use his proper given name of James Powell.
13:47:59 We don't know where Mr pal, is laid to rest but most likely in the poor house cemetery, or in the historic African American Cemetery in Carlisle, now known as Lincoln cemetery which will learn more about from Lindsay.
13:48:13 Historically, as a community, with very very good as I said earlier and discussing what's on the pedestal and but not telling the whole story.
13:48:20 There's always an Asterix that's kind of ignored.
13:48:25 The Thompson McGowan collection is a wonderful collection focuses on Miss Emma McGowan, who is born in the 1870s in Virginia to parents who had been enslaved before the war on her family comes up to Carlisle, and she's the eldest of 16 children, has working
13:48:45 at a young age to help support the family but he's also able to attend the segregated schools of Carlisle, and becomes a teacher in the 1890s, she's forced to marry basically Reverend of third Presbyterian Church was was an African American mission, and
13:49:03 her husband was not a popular man, and they're kind of run out of town and they have to move around a little bit and they end up in Detroit for a while, and after the birth of her last child.
13:49:17 He has definitely become abusive and she's a strong and amazing woman and she divorces him in 1917 and comes back to Carlisle, where she continues to teach and gets her job back as a teacher, what is often not noted in the schools are they note that they
13:49:31 desegregated the high school early and they're very proud of this and they talk about how early they D senior high school, they leave out the fact and often left out is that it was a lottery system.
13:49:41 And not all students of color could attend the high school only a certain number.
13:49:45 They also leave out the fact that it was only the high school that was partially desegregated.
13:49:51 So Emma gallon retires in the 1940s and she never teaches in a decent fully desegregated Carlisle Area School District. She lives to see that happen, but does not live through it, and then the early 2000s, a wing of the high school is named for her so
13:50:07 there's now a MacAllan building at the high school.
13:50:11 So, we are want to the last schools and Pennsylvania to fully desegregate.
13:50:18 So, in 1948, they frame it in the papers also that this is a financial decision as well, because they have to build another school if they don't do this, but I think they could see that they were going to be forced to if they didn't do it on their own.
13:50:34 And obviously, even as this is happening, students of color did not have the same guidance or support as their white counterparts, going through the same school.
13:50:48 And so, as this is happening kind of the same time period development is happening within the borough and some areas I had been more farmland open land.
13:51:23 And so this is just kind of in the southwestern part of town, and you can see there's restrictions on this development that only members of the quote Caucasian race can live here and only people that were
13:51:15 domestics basically could be would be allowed to spend the night, even.
13:51:19 And so, this, we have kind of this unofficial redlining in most places rather than official redlining but it definitely is an issue. So right as the schools are segregating, you know, parents may have been, you know, forced to kind of with the busing
13:51:34 BND segregated schools but this children when they're at home are going to be in a lily white community.
13:51:41 And so this is definitely an issue and these people, a lot of people lived in these homes for decades, and the deeds on actually state this they just say they have to follow the restriction so unless someone is going to go and delve deep and see what
13:51:56 the restrictions are some of these restrictions are technically still on the record, though, obviously, People don't have to follow them.
13:52:05 But definitely still hurtful things on the record and Cumberland County.
13:52:13 These issues remain a long standing of course your core protests from the 1960s, who travel through time a little bit.
13:52:20 One is a Borough Hall, the other one is in front of a barber shop of that had a whites only sign.
13:52:27 And they're fighting against that, obviously.
13:52:30 And of course, in the 1970s we'll hear what happened to Lincoln cemetery
13:52:38 hate groups are prominent in South Central Pennsylvania. Although definitely different have a different reception than they used to. So in 1925 we see they had a meeting on the square, the picture below it in 2000, that's also at the square of Carlisle
13:52:54 on the steps of the old courthouse.
13:52:57 The community had a very different reaction to that event, and there were unity rallies and a real concerted effort to kind of ignore them and not pay any attention to them, But they did come.
13:53:11 It doesn't seem like it really was 21 years ago I can remember this event. Well, and the community, anger and frustration that this was happening.
13:53:22 But something we're still working through and every every so many years the clan will send out flyers and put them on people's cars and everyone's always surprised by it, but they're still around.
13:53:33 Although underground these days.
13:53:39 Another prominent collection we have at the Historical Society. I call out for variety of reasons.
13:53:47 And so the Johnson collection.
13:53:49 And I call out our own institutional history again with this so this comes in in the late 90s, and it's one of the best family collections that we have.
13:54:00 And it covers. It includes artifacts images and archival material. It's a family that was enslaved in the south and comes up and fights in numerous awards including the Civil War.
13:54:15 And it in course includes multiple generations and this family also tended to the past the house down so numerous generations lived in the same home.
13:54:20 And it's been a part of town that's often not associated associated with the African American population, when this came in or was offered to us.
13:54:30 Some of the people in charge of the time did not think this was worthy of being included in our collection that people wouldn't use it.
13:54:37 Thankful and were mostly volunteer at this time. And thankfully our director at the time, put her foot down and said no, we absolutely want this. So, people have memories and remember events like this where this was something we really didn't want, although
13:54:51 thankfully we did accept it.
13:54:54 There's over 119 Museum artifacts with this collection, and some things that even are in photographs, like we have most of this odd fellows uniform in the collection as well so it's absolutely wonderful.
13:55:08 but we created the walls around ourselves.
13:55:12 One way we are working to break down those walls, and this is five or six years old now, is ongoing work in progress is the gardener Digital Library.
13:55:24 And it's a little bit of a lot of things but we have a local history encyclopedia that we can help share some of these stories. We also do oral histories, and getting people to share their stories and to trust us with their words because words are powerful,
13:55:39 it's a work in progress.
13:55:41 This also for people on different, different economic classes who don't feel their stories have value or and why would they be important to the historical record and those stories are often not written down as well so having them contribute, so we are
13:55:54 gathering a full spectrum of Cumberland County history through the stories and stories that might not have made it into the archives any other way so that work continues although it kind of got passed during covert as people aren't comfortable doing oral
13:56:09 histories, but hopefully we'll be able to pick up again very soon with those.
13:56:17 And of course, our community we don't need to just talk about the African American community and Lindsay will speak to that as well.
13:56:25 We have, like I showed a larger Asian population we have a Bosnian population, which is also kind of the start of a Muslim population here in the Cumberland County.
13:56:36 And why would any of those community groups be interested in us as a history or heritage site when we do not represent them at all if you don't come into the museum and you don't see your face or anything about you on the walls.
13:56:51 Why, why would you want to come to our museum. So we gave the museum a small facelift several years ago, and the museum is arranged thematically not chronologically so we have industry and military galleries, things like that.
13:57:05 And the decision was made not to create just a separate African American History collection as it's part of those themes and also important not to just show African American History In, just slavery in the Underground Railroad.
13:57:20 So throughout, there are new pictures and new labels and trying to be more inclusive of the stories here in Cumberland County.
13:57:32 As part of that facelift, there is one gallery. That is separated out, which I think was important to do so and this has been like this for several decades, the second have separate gallery.
13:57:43 And one thing where our story has definitely changed over the past few decades and probably was one of the first stories that really evolved and how we told it of the Carlisle Indian School.
13:57:55 And this, of course, if you're not familiar with the Indian School is founded in 1879. So just five short years after we were started, and our administration definitely would have known their administration and teachers and probably some students as well,
13:58:09 and the community was in full support of the school and its mission of cultural genocide during this time.
13:58:19 And if you walked into the gallery, this would be the first picture you see and it really kind of shocks people and takes them back which I think is good.
13:58:28 The language and actual saying cultural genocide is now in the museum labels.
13:58:34 When I started my goal is always to get the information we have about the Indian School to the descendants, and families that were affected by these policies and being able to work with amazing people like Jim grants or at the Dickinson archives, and
13:58:52 their digital Indian School digital Resource Center. So we have been slowly working to add information from our collections on to that site as well so some of our photographs are there, our newspaper school newspaper collection is there.
13:59:07 So, so many stories are being told now and then are much more visible than they ever were before.
13:59:13 To make this American governmental policies. Incredibly visible to also tied into the greater community.
13:59:23 The first student that died. Not too long after he arrived at the school was originally buried in Ashland cemetery which is was a I should say was a white cemetery and so there is kind of an outcry after he's buried there and he has to be re entered at
13:59:42 the school. So that's the start of the original Indian School cemetery, which was also moved again in the 1930s as kind of the school, or another school was closed at that point but as the Carlyle barracks expanded.
13:59:57 And you school was great at propaganda and showing what they thought was amazing works of assimilation.
14:00:06 Of course, destroying culture, language, and a whole lot of other harm that was done to the students so there's not only this is not the most common of the before and after photos as they are known, but I wanted to share a different one.
14:00:25 And I always say there are about a little over, we think now 7000 students that were at Carlisle during that almost 40 years periods of it operation and they each have their own story.
14:00:39 So, yes, there are some themes that can be pulled out but each story and their family members are important, and to to be able to connect to these people.
14:00:49 I think it's incredibly important and I'm so glad that we're able to have so much more accessibility to this information than we ever had before, not everyone so we're going to make it to Carlisle or wants to come to Carlisle bots they can access this
14:01:03 information in ways they never could before.
14:01:07 in ways they never could before. And all, all of it.
14:01:09 One thing that did come up as a grassroots efforts
14:01:15 was several years ago, the. It's now the US Army War College Carlisle barracks was tearing down some mid century housing that had nothing to do with Indian School, to build new housing for the students of the Carlyle the Army War College.
14:01:31 And this building was also slated to be destroyed the farmhouse.
14:01:36 And a grassroots effort that was indigenous lead.
14:01:41 Got that not happen, and had the army and the government reevaluate the importance of this home.
14:01:48 And so it has been saved.
14:01:51 And so, it'll probably it's still up in the air exactly what it'll be and some work, probably stalled because of covered, but it'll be exciting to see what happens with the farmhouse and the importance of the farmhouse and its history, and connection
14:02:03 to the Carlisle Indian industrial school, and it'll be indigenous lead and have indigenous voices at the helm, which is exciting to see and of course we support the work that is happening there.
14:02:16 And we've also done some conferences, and it's a mix of trying to get or have the ability to have descendants and people affected by the educational policies of Carlisle share stories and have them accessible to greater community, and the greater community
14:02:34 so they are aware of what happened at Carlisle, so they have been very successful in bringing together.
14:02:47 Descendants and community members to learn about what happened here.
14:02:46 And so wonderful opportunity for everybody and some of those are also available online.
14:02:53 And the concrete general community has come around and most people agree that the school. School is complicated and difficult and and horrible and cultural genocide.
14:03:13 But at the same time, this is a community that was also the training location of the Washington football team for several decades, and so they'll agree that the Indian School is bad, but then, you know, changing the Washington football team's name is
14:03:24 too much that's that's ridiculous, generally speaking, you'll hear that in the community so there's a lot of work to do, and to share these stories and recognize the past and how can we reach out to these communities so I'm going to turn it over to Lindsay,
14:03:41 to have her share about ways of reaching out to the community and new and exciting ways.
14:03:51 Thank you so much Kara, I am going to share my screen.
14:04:04 Alright. So good afternoon everybody. And as Laird mentioned my name is Lindsay Varner, and I'm the director at the rookie museum.
14:04:13 But prior to moving to Vermont and taking over at Brophy. I started out as the Community Outreach Director I started out as the director for community heart and soul, and then later became the Community Outreach Director at Cumberland County Historical
14:04:29 Society. And what's incredible about the heart and soul process is, it's a process that was started by the work and family foundation out of Vermont, and it tended to be a process that worked very heavily with local governments municipal governments as
14:04:49 a way of doing community outreach for municipal planning purposes at engaging communities, to really understand what people love and value.
14:05:01 And this, this idea of reaching out and talking with communities is very much a humanities related process. So the Jordan family foundations community heart and soul initiative partnered with the Pennsylvania Humanities Council, and released a series
14:05:17 grants that began in 2016, and those grants went to three pilot towns in the state of Pennsylvania and Carlyle the greater Carlisle area was lucky enough to receive one of those grants as part of this pilot program, and the Cumberland County Historical
14:05:36 Society saw this as an opportunity to one engage more meaningfully with the surrounding community not just in downtown Carlisle but as the County Historical Society, with communities all across the county.
14:05:51 And then it also happened to coincide at the same time, the gardener digital library that Cara had mentioned earlier was about to launch as well. And one of the major components of community heart and soul is both story collecting and then also story
14:06:07 sharing, so it was an opportunity to gather stories that could be a part of Gardner Digital Library they would have a home and an archive. And these stories could be used for heart and souls purposes of gaining this better understanding of sense of place
14:06:23 and values and what people would like to see for the future. And then it's a very proactive archiving process we could take all of these stories and make them part of an active archive through anything from digital stories we have videos we did some audio,
14:06:43 but then also things like the picture in the bottom corner where we collected note cards and lots of archival material that really helped to gain this better feel for current sense of place within the community.
14:06:57 One of the things that is amazing about these types of storytelling projects, is we didn't go out with heart and soul with any idea of the types of stories that we were going to gather and it wasn't like a lot of oral history projects that I've worked
14:07:15 on in the past where you know we are essentially going out and saying we're going to collect the history on this particular topic we're going to interview people who remember a specific point in history.
14:07:32 Instead we went out and ask very broad questions and allow the community to guide our questions. And so we would ask you what do you value in your community, what would you hate to lose in your community.
14:07:45 And what do you hope to see for the future in your community, and those very broad questions, led to a whole series of new understandings about how people view our history, and then also how we gathered our history over time.
14:08:01 So we say with a lot of the projects that came out of heart and soul that they all started with a single story and they evolved, and the one project that really symbolizes This is what's now called the Mount Tabor preservation project, and the church
14:08:17 that you see on the far left hand side of your screen is the Mount Tabor church in Mount Holly Springs Pennsylvania. It's about nine miles from the main building Cumberland County Historical Society and downtown Carlisle, And this was a building that
14:08:33 we had little to no record of.
14:08:36 And when I talked to a member of the town. They thought that it was a chicken coop for many years. And, but in about May of, 2016, I was asking, community members who we should be reaching out to talk to to do these interviews.
14:09:02 And I kept coming back to the name, don't be over and over again people so you have to talk to one of the downbeat is the zombie family has been here for multiple generations, they really should be somebody that you talk to to get their opinion.
14:09:16 And I was working with one of the Borough Council members from Mount Holly Springs at the time Pam still who's in the middle of this picture, and I asked Pam if she could do some reaching out for me.
14:09:28 And in fantastic small town community networking and Pam initially reached out to Harriet, and Harriet wasn't returning our calls she didn't know Pam.
14:09:41 So Pam reached out to the local pharmacist, who knew Harriet's and can vouch for us and the project that we were doing, and Harriet eventually calls Pam up and says, I hear you want to talk to me.
14:09:54 What is this all about. And we realized very quickly that it's as much as we love that this project and we knew this project could do great things for the community.
14:10:04 And it was going to take a level of trust building in order for people to want to tell us their stories, especially because in the past, we realized that nobody really cared about their story.
14:10:17 It's why the church doesn't exist in the archival records. Nobody deemed it important. Historically, to capture that history.
14:10:26 So we sat down with Harriet and her sister.
14:10:31 And it took us three meetings of just talking with them and getting to know each other, learning a little bit about you, their history, their family history they learned a little bit about me.
14:10:43 And after the third meeting they allowed us to ask some questions and report their story.
14:10:51 And over the course of about the hour 15 minutes hour and a half long interview that we did.
14:10:57 Harriet told this incredible story of her grandfather whose heads down this on the far side here, Elias Parker and his connection to the town, his status as a veteran of the army, his history has been enslaved person in Maryland.
14:11:17 And, and she told this incredible family history that tied her to the site that we were sitting from multiple generations. So I'd like to play a video for you and hopefully this will work, and that allows Harriet to really tell this story.
14:11:42 It all started with a story about a church in the cemetery, as part of a community project to uncover what matters most. The Elias men beyond Parker left the Civil War,
14:11:57 and came over the mountains to the little small town of Mount Holly Springs and settled in the 1800s.
14:12:04 He built a church there that served.
14:12:17 to that Apple was the Sunday school teacher wafting across the pasture, or the through the woods, you would hear the gospel singers and people singing and, and all of that, so of course I was drawn to that church.
14:12:36 After World War Two work for African Americans was scarce and mount Holly, and many families moved away.
14:12:43 The me church closed its doors in the 70s with everything from him nose to the Oregon inside
14:12:57 buttery before.
14:12:59 And from Harriet's interview, I just was impassioned to know about it and of course, I love old buildings, when I saw it, I didn't see what some people see, I saw the beauty in it, because we saw an opportunity.
14:13:16 And with mount Holly Springs we have lost so much.
14:13:22 A lot of the historic buildings were torn down, gone.
14:13:28 The railroad station.
14:13:38 Alright, let's see if I can get this work, although now the computers going slow.
14:14:50 Oh no. Looks like we lost Lindsay there, and.
14:14:55 Looks like we had a little bit of an internet snafu.
14:14:58 We'll see if we can get her back in.
14:15:03 Oh, home site everyone.
14:16:16 Hi Lindsey, do we have you back.
14:16:26 I think you're on mute. If you're trying to talk.
14:16:42 Hey Lindsay. Hey, sorry about that. All right.
14:16:48 All right.
14:16:49 I shared the link in the comments Lindsay.
14:16:53 Thank you.
14:17:05 Oh, okay. All right. Okay, So, so thank you Kara for sharing that link, and so if you have an opportunity, please do watch the video and the story with the family is Elias Parker is the grandfather of Harriet and Edna Gumby and, which I think for a lot
14:17:29 of the descendants, and the volunteers who work on the Mount Tabor preservation project. It's an incredible thing to think about that. It's their grandfather, you know that's close connection was a civil war veteran he had been enslaved and the family
14:17:47 story is that he had helped to build this this church Mount Tabor church, and they were so protective of the site. The church was established in the late 1870s, and we think probably between 1875 and 1878, but we're not entirely sure when it was created
14:18:15 And it was created as a museum church and African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church, but it served many functions, it was the, the church on a Sunday for the Methodist congregation in the area, but it was also the school for a short period of time.
14:18:26 It was the meeting place stay for literary societies and debates. It was really the heart of the African American community.
14:18:37 And when we found the site when it was kind of the story was told to us by the company's. It was incredible to me that one, this site closed in around 1970, and it was a time capsule that was just sitting in the middle of the woods in the picture that
14:18:58 you see on the far left hand side is exactly how I learned about the church from the Gumby is from their back garden, and it was overgrown with trees and violins and when you walk around to the front of the building.
14:19:14 You see, in this window this incredible church that has just been left untouched, to the point where there were still fans from a funeral that have taken place, and hymnal books sitting in the pews some of them open two pages of songs.
14:19:33 Sunday school books just stacked up in the one corner.
14:19:37 All of this was still in place, and the family was incredibly protective both of the their family's legacy and tied to the church but then also the church themselves because it was the place that they had grown up.
14:19:51 And when we interviewed, Harriet and we asked her about what she would like to see for the future of the community. She said, you know two things she said one.
14:20:03 She wanted to see the African American communities history, recorded and saved and her grandfather's legacy part of the historical narrative, especially since it hadn't been before.
14:20:16 And the second thing that she asked for. Was she wanted to have a fence put around the cemetery that sits just down the street from the church, and the cemetery wasn't tied to the congregation.
14:20:29 We learned later that it was the the designated segregated cemetery from Mount Holly Springs, but it had such close ties to the whole of the African American community that it, it became linked to the Mount Tabor church.
14:20:45 So, today we call it the theater street cemetery. For many years, it was known as the colored cemetery or the Mount Tabor cemetery.
14:20:52 But today we have named at the cedar street cemetery.
14:20:56 And the reason she asked for the fence. Is she knew from family stories that there were more people buried on this site than the headstones actually show, we have 16 headstones on the site, a family burial plot that is very well recognized, but the neighbors
14:21:18 surrounding it didn't really know the boundaries of the cemetery. At one point in neighbor put their shed on the corner of the cemetery very close to what we believe is a burial.
14:21:25 We see kids playing in corners of what we know a cemetery property. And over the course of our research, we now believe there's somewhere between 50 and 60 people buried on this site.
14:21:37 And so her desire was to make sure that the boundaries for very clearly marked so that the hollow ground remain hallowed ground and people would have a visual reminder, we're in the cemetery is.
14:21:49 And one of the things that we did when we came back to the Historical Society after doing this interview is I immediately dug into the archives and I spoke with Tara, and I asked her about this, this site, and the.
14:22:05 What did we have on the history of the site. And the first thing we pulled out, was a in one of our drop folders, there was a commentary in the newspaper about to the church that essentially stated it is a shame that the church has gotten to this condition
14:22:21 and this was in 2004, that was published. And, and then nothing. There's nothing that we could really find out what sites, and the cemetery, we were able to find in the veterans registered the seven veterans who are buried at the site, all USC at all
14:22:38 veterans of the Civil War.
14:22:40 of the Civil War. And that's pretty much it, that's all that had been gathered on the site.
14:22:44 We went back through the histories of Mount Holly Springs and when you look at those particularly 19th century histories that were done you would never know that there was an African American community in this town.
14:22:54 They were completely written out of the history is the only reference I found with the church was in 1973 for the centennial of the borough. They mentioned that there used to be a museum church, on, off of cedar Street, but it no longer have an active
14:23:11 congregation, and it was about two sentences and that was it was all the other churches in the borough had very extensive histories written on them.
14:23:20 So, it got us thinking about, you know, why, why one was the community's history never recorded, especially when we have a large number of individuals in the community that remember the church when it was active and what we later found out worshipped
14:23:40 in the church when it was active. And we started to pull together, neighbors and friends and family of companies, I start to ask about what they would like to see for the sites and who else should be involved in the conversation surrounding this site.
14:24:00 The one thing that I was really adamant about and the Historical Society was very adamant about was the this project and what happens on this site, really needed to be led by both descendants, and congregants of Mount Tabor church, and it was we wanted
14:24:20 to know what their thoughts were for the future of this site, and it, it turns out that living all around the church were either descendants or comprehensive of the site.
14:24:33 And it became this incredible project that led to a whole series of conversations within the historical society that we began asking, you know, what other histories are out there that we could be forgetting.
14:24:48 And I remember at one point Karen I were having a conversation, and I said, you know, shame on us for not knowing that this existed. A we're looking at a building that has herb historical integrity that my one friend who's a former congregate would say
14:25:05 you it doesn't look loved, but this church is so loud. And if it wasn't loved, you wouldn't have this time capsule inside of it you wouldn't have every piece of the church still intact.
14:25:21 And, but nobody knew who to turn to in terms of fixing the building up getting ownership for the building that was the the number one question when we started this preservation project is who owns this building, and nobody really had an answer for that
14:25:36 in the end it reverted back to being the Zion Church, and who donated it to the borough of Mount Holly Springs, who is now currently the owner.
14:25:47 And as we began to have these conversations we realized it was a very.
14:25:53 It was a time within the community where they were ready to start talking about their past and their history. And we found that neighbors were so excited to get involved and help with this project, and Harriet had said she wanted a fence around the cemetery,
14:26:10 and within a matter of months, we had a donation of a fence. We had an Eagle Scout who was going to install the fence, and we had a partnership with Dickinson college and a professor in the earth sciences department, who was going to do ground penetrating
14:26:27 radar to help us identify potential burials, and then also ensure that our fence, covered the largest portion of the cemetery and didn't have any fence posts, right on top of some of those variables.
14:26:39 So it was this absolutely amazing project that has continued to grow. There's now a nonprofit, and about paper preservation project. And just a few months ago the church was officially listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
14:26:55 And it has become this kind of symbol and staple of how history had been neglected in the community and how we can start to have some of these more in depth conversations around whose history is it when you walk into the historical society or you walk
14:27:12 into any historical organization, whether it be a museum or archives or Historical Society, you, whose history is recorded within those institutions who story is being told his story can be told.
14:27:29 And how do we start to piece together histories that one weren't necessarily deemed important enough to save and to record. And if we don't have that written information, how can we start to build this more inclusive narrative, whether it be through oral
14:27:48 oral histories, or through piecing together.
14:27:53 Newspaper articles family papers, photographs. And this was a question that we really are trying to answer at the Historical Society.
14:28:02 After my grant ended with community heart and soul. I was asked to stay on and start as the first director of the community outreach department at Cumberland County Historical Society, and we began the, what we now call the, can you work with, I should
14:28:25 it out, the community outreach plan. And it began looking at how can we reach multiple members of the community, and as Kara said start to create an archive and a museum that really represents everybody who's living in the community and as providing a
14:28:40 voice for everyone.
14:28:44 And what Mount Tabor helped to do is open up a whole series of conversations in the community that had been taken that has really been happening for decades, and one conversation that I remember very early on Karen and I had had in the back of our minds
14:29:01 for years, the Cumberland County store besides a very special place Karen I both did our internships there's undergrads, and I myself Never thought I'd go back and work there I just didn't think I'd end up back in Carlisle and I did and it was such an
14:29:17 amazing experience, but throughout my undergraduate internship at the Historical Society, Lincoln cemetery came up over and over again, it's three blocks from the Historical Society.
14:29:29 It had been established we believe somewhere around 1805.
14:29:47 And it has hundreds of burials on this site. And in the 1970s, the headstones removed, none of the graves removed, so it is still hallowed ground, and a park was placed on top of it is a passive portion of the park is in the cemetery, the active portion
14:29:52 of the park is on what was once railway lands, and there's an old railway station there.
14:29:59 And as we were going through this heart and soul project and talking with community members. The theme of history in the community and sense of place was coming up continuously.
14:30:12 And we realized this was the time and this was the opportunity to have meaningful conversations around what happened at Lincoln cemetery.
14:30:21 And one of the things that we had to do was go back through the archival records and see what we could piece together for this history. When we initially started looking at Lincoln cemetery.
14:30:32 We didn't know when the cemetery had started we had some ideas. We didn't know the full story of the creation of the park and how that sites have evolved over time.
14:30:44 And we had some loose dates we knew that the cemetery closed around 1905, and another segregated Cemetery in the community was created.
14:30:53 What we didn't know is that the cemetery was condemned because it was so overly full, at one point, there was a burial in the cemetery that was only 16 inches deep and the smell was so bad or 18 inches deep excuse me and the smell was so bad, the Department
14:31:10 of Health closes the cemetery down.
14:31:14 And we didn't know that throughout the decades from the time that it was closed residents were approaching the Burrell asking the borough to do something with the site.
14:31:25 And we know from some of the maps and the layouts of Carlisle, that the cemetery was probably on one of the worst pieces of land in the borough. It was, it's one of the lowest points in the borough so it has a tendency to flood.
14:31:40 And, and if you were to look at a map of Carlisle and to draw a line, it is almost exactly opposite on the side of town, from what we could consider the white Cemetery in the borough.
14:31:51 And this is a cemetery that is maintained by the borough Carlisle has a beautiful stone wall around it and monuments and historic markers to founding fathers and Molly picture.
14:32:05 And so residents throughout the decades are asking the borough to take over care of the, the black Cemetery in the same way with their parents for that.
14:32:16 And nothing really comes of it until in the 1960s residents once again approached the borough asking them to take over ownership of the site, and the borough seeks ownership through the courts there's no record it owner of the property, and by 1971.
14:32:37 Take that ownership, apply for a grant through the state, what was that in the state, recreation, office to create a park on that site.
14:32:50 And over the decades. We see the same conversation happening. And we see community members who are pushing back against the park, we see some community members who are saying we don't want to harp on this site, particularly in the 1960s and early 70s
14:33:08 housing was a major issue in the community surrounding the park, and we see people asking for housing, rather than for a park and the borough essentially has this grant and the grant was for a park and that's what they're going to move forward with.
14:33:24 And from 1974 onwards when the park opens, there's constant discussion in the newspapers about remembering black history in the community. Looking at these subtle signs of racism and prejudice, giving feedback into the early 2000s about how the cemetery
14:33:44 deserved better about how the headstones that were removed from the cemetery need to be placed back into the cemetery.
14:33:55 And it seems like every 10 years there's just the cycle of conversations that were happening, but no action was being taken.
14:34:12 There was no discussion from the borough about really taking ownership for the the loss of the cemetery. There's a few historic markers on the site recognizing it as people who are very there but really know memorialization of the cemetery as hallowed
14:34:22 still. And when we were going through and talking with residents during the heart and soul process we realized a lot of people just assumed that everybody who was buried there had been re entered someplace else.
14:34:36 And when we would tell them you know people are still very here we're still standing on hallowed ground. They were absolutely shocked. And so what we realized is we needed to piece together that's history and we needed to find ways to not just share the
14:34:53 history and make it available to descendants of those who are buried there, but we needed to take some type of action to get into the public minds that the, The cemetery still exists.
14:35:08 It might be manicured and it might be without a park but it still exists. So, this incredible project we were able to do over coded and it's almost hard to believe we, we managed to get this done in 2020, was we had this great melding of archival research
14:35:21 community outreach and public art, and one of the first things we did was we had an intern. Identify through the archives, and through some research that had been done by an incredible volunteer Janet bell.
14:35:42 And then along with a lot of Paris research, come up with a list of all the known burials on the site. And we took every name, whether it be an unknown name or an infant child.
14:35:54 And we wrote those onto strips of fabric. And we asked community members to come out. Take a strip of fabric and tie that fabric with a name on it to the fence around the cemetery.
14:36:07 And we left this up for a little over a month and a half to give that first visual reminder of the the people who are buried there.
14:36:18 The next thing we did was working with a local artist and business was introduce them to the descendants of those who were buried there and have them work with them to create this public mural.
14:36:33 One thing that we learned over the course of our research was this kind of semi circle with the flagpole in the middle, was intended to be a little bit of a memorial to the cemetery, looking at the original grant to the States.
14:36:48 These headstones that were removed from the park were meant to be put back into the park around this circle. That never happened, it appears through some of the communications that they wouldn't cover the, this kind of Memorial as part of the grant.
14:37:04 So the headstones went into storage, and nobody really knows what happened to them after that. So, the artists and the descendants thought this would be an opportunity to go back to what the original idea was supposed to be.
14:37:18 And that is to create a memorial and start to get people thinking about this site as hallowed ground. So, everybody, all those names that were put onto the strips of fabric are now incorporated into that Memorial along the center where the flagpole is
14:37:33 all the node veterans in the cemetery are now listed on that space.
14:37:39 So it's this incredible project that just melts together, these difficult histories that we've been uncovering in the archives and using them to create positive change but then also difficult conversations of the community that are starting to bridge
14:37:55 some of these divides between community members and the borough government as well.
14:38:02 And then we start to look at, you know, how can we as an organization as a museum as an archive. Be a community stakeholder, how can we work with people in the community to become a more welcoming place.
14:38:19 And I think one of my favorite stories is from this picture in the bottom corner.
14:38:24 I, when I was Community Outreach Director I really wanted to open up the historical society so that it felt like this friendly place as a free Museum, I dreamed of people just coming in and wandering the museum and learning a little bit more about the
14:38:38 history and seeing themselves and the history of the.
14:38:43 As they walked through and I wanted people to feel welcomed and not like they were walking into the stuffing museum or they feel a little awkward.
14:38:50 So we opened up the site to the local youth council.
14:38:55 And they were having issues in the school surrounding racial bullying, and they asked if they could use our space to write a letter to the school board, and this was the perfect definition of history, happening in the building as we could record it in
14:39:11 real time. So the students came together, they used our space they wrote their letter to the school board, they gave the letter to the archive to be recorded.
14:39:21 And then the next day read this letter to the school board and we later found out this was one of the first times in decades that a student had gone to the school board and read a letter demanding change because of bullying that was happening.
14:39:34 And it became a way for us to really open up and and provide an opportunity for for students to feel like they're contributing to the history and be actively collecting as things were happening.
14:39:51 And then we also started to look at some of the programming that we could do, and how we can create even more accessibility within the archives, and the research that we were doing at the Historical Society, and we created a cycling driving or walking
14:40:08 tour around the Underground Railroad, as we were learning more about Mount Tabor and at Lincoln cemetery. we wanted to find a way to engage people in that history, and created this tour that connected all of these sites across the county.
14:40:25 And then during the lockdown I had an intern who was hoping to get a little bit more experience on the Historical Society side of public history, and the one project I could come up with that she could easily do during coven when she couldn't get into
14:40:42 the building was to map out all of our cemeteries in the county and start to pull together some of the histories of not just family cemeteries and public cemeteries, but really pull out some of these stories on segregated cemeteries in our communities
14:40:59 cemeteries where we know, formerly enslaved people were buried.
14:41:04 And these kind of hidden places, and she created this amazing art GIS map that's fully interactive and available through Cumberland County Historical Society.
14:41:17 And then we really wanted to think a little bit more about you know how can the archives, be incorporated into the classroom and, and we started to build up this incredible relationship with a local nonprofit hope station and with Dickinson college and
14:41:34 bringing together college students and high school students, and just opening up the archive and putting things on the table and letting students really dig into some of the work, and giving them an opportunity to feel comfortable in an archive, learn
14:41:51 how to handle documents and to do a research project and see how that project can become part of the community, or a community outreach initiative. And, and even at the institution where I'm currently at which is where the bottom photos from now really
14:42:07 starting to to look at how can we be relevant to the curriculum within the classroom and utilize archival materials. And one of the things that I've been really pushing and starting to incorporate is taking archival materials that we have multiples of
14:42:24 and letting students have a chance to go through that, for our site issues of deliver hitter. You have lots and lots of multiple copies of delivery and letting students, you actually open them up and look at them and feel comfortable with these historic
14:42:38 objects and really engage with us through active collecting and then also showing them this kind of fun side of archives and museums and doing things like you're creating a curator for the day and letting students curate their own exhibit that we can
14:42:56 put on to display and getting them comfortable stuff when we get to the point where we are engaging in some of these difficult conversations, from the history of the town that they're living there they're feeling a little bit more comfortable and prepared
14:43:10 to have these conversations.
14:43:13 So with that, and I will end there and I will hand it over to Blair for questions.
14:43:22 Thank you so much. Lindsay, so the first question we have is from Tim, who asked whether industries or opportunities for work, other than working as domestics that attracted supported non white people.
14:43:36 I know care if you want to take that one. I can start there definitely were there's definitely a history of industry in Cumberland County.
14:43:44 Early on we have the iron industry and we know that both free people of color are men of color, predominantly and enslaved people work in that industry but that was still around, post Civil War was on the dying out at that point.
14:43:57 There was a brick industry, there was mining clay mining not coal in this area and there was also like in Holly paper mills, that were around and would have employed a variety of people so there of course there was other.
14:44:12 You also see, especially in Carlisle, you see, restaurants, operated by people of color barber shops and a variety of other things I don't know if Lindsay has anything else she wants to throw in agricultural work for sure.
14:44:27 Those are the big ones I can think of off the top my head.
14:44:30 Yeah, you hit most of them I know as we were doing the biographies of the individuals buried at Cedar street cemetery. And then you have the paper mills you have the railroad, and you have the hotel, being in a major thoroughfare.
14:44:47 So, and a lot of people are being just listed as laborers and that's multiple industries all across the area so I industry I think our region things such a huge hole of both the movement of people, and it's a major reason why the Mount Tabor community
14:45:04 even existed about Holly spreads was the fact that there was a large amount of industry that was starting to grow host civil war in Cumberland County and there was opportunities for work.
14:45:22 Right. Alright so the next question from Melinda is, how do you work with descendants of the staff of the Carlisle Indian School to navigate that relationship with the past and to reconcile the actions of their ancestors I imagine people can feel defensive
14:45:35 over the, over the personal connection to their ancestors role and the cultural genocide.
14:45:42 We've been dealing with descendants from the Indian School longer than I've been here that has been something that's been going on for students though right yeah for students but that that interaction is new, although how we talk about the school has
14:45:57 changed drastically obviously.
14:45:58 But the interaction with stuff here are volunteers earlier.
14:46:03 It's been ongoing. I don't know how many people realize that they have connections family connections to the Indian School. You do get that with some of the outing families, but a lot of the outing families aren't local.
14:46:17 They're more eastern Pennsylvania where there's a higher quicker population.
14:46:21 And some of those families are very aware of that they had outing families there are families around that know that some of them had almost, they remained friendly with former students that were outing so continue to correspond for a year so it's definitely
14:46:39 a complex history there. I think what you see at the most, with is the churches who realized that they were part of that and kind to reconcile their part of that as the students were had to attend churches and typically came into town to do that so the
14:46:57 Presbyterian churches the Episcopal Church the Catholic Church, are all apart, and I think you see it more kind of trying to reconcile that history within the churches more than the out the greater community the greater community has come to come to agreement
14:47:11 about what happened at the school.
14:47:15 But trying to, I think, come to terms of what happened you see that more with the local churches.
14:47:23 Nothing to speaking of I mean non local I mean most of this stuff too I believe where I mean, it was a government civil service job so a lot of these individuals are also not local, and they tended to move around so they didn't miss their staff, you know,
14:47:38 some of them were local but others. You know came from out west and then move back out west when the position was finished, I don't think we've gone too much engagement with descendants of the staff but I might be mistaken.
14:47:53 Now, there was early engagement when we got the bulk of the collection in the 30s for with perhaps daughter, there was correspondence with her but then again there was earlier correspondence with the founder of the school as well.
14:48:07 By the our leadership at the time, and then to you have some staff members who were, you know, either former students or who were also, I mean that was a big employer for indigenous communities at that time was working in the Indian School service.
14:48:21 So, I mean it's it's a complicated story.
14:48:27 Um, so the next two questions are kind of similar. So, Lindsay if you want to take these on from po Bray, and Nicole Smith, kind of, what were what steps would you take our recommend for archives, attempting to seek history and agency for similar stories
14:48:43 in their communities.
14:48:46 Pu brave mentioned in particular that they're having conversations in anticipation of their Centennial and are seeking to search and represent underrepresented communities but not sure where to begin.
14:48:57 Yeah, I think it really depends on the community and I the biggest thing that I now I look back and I think I should have been surprised but I was surprised was the level of trust that we needed to continue to build in the communities.
14:49:17 And I think that when para talked about the Johnson collection it's a really good example I'm here looking at a collection and it says it's hard to believe anybody you consider not taking that in a museum.
14:49:32 And that that has a long memory, and we would come up across it continuously, where people would say, Well, you didn't want to talk to me, five years ago 10 years ago 15 years ago.
14:49:41 Why on earth do you want to talk to me now. And, and that building up those just those conversations and relationship, and showing that your institution is turning over a new leaf is probably one of the most important things.
14:49:55 The first time Karen I gave a presentation, talking about our institutional history and looking at these difficult stories. We were petrified to what the reception was going to be we had an audience build with board members were probably around when they
14:50:10 were questioning taking back collection. And we suddenly realized how much does change institutionally over the course of that time. And I always recommend going out into the community.
14:50:24 At no point during our heart and soul process and throughout a lot of our story collecting where we asking people to come to the Historical Society. We went to where our community members were so places you would not expect to see a archive, or a cultural
14:50:45 institution we were street fairs, we had tables set up, we were going to volunteer cleanup days and was talking to people at those kind of updates. And then we also partner with organizations that typically wouldn't expect historical organizations to
14:51:00 partner with local nonprofits that focused on after school programming or the YWCA, and just building up relationships with nonprofits that are already working in community and finding ways to collaborate with them to get to meet new people and build
14:51:21 up that relationship, and it's a great writer to start showing people that you're there to to work with the community, and you pair and you're not just there to capture the story and then walk away.
14:51:33 And I think that was the one thing that we were really trying to be conscious of we weren't there to collect it an oral history and put it into the archive and then never talk to you again or potentially forget that we talked to you and come back 10 years
14:51:45 later, we were there to build a really.
14:51:51 Thank you, Lindsay, so I see there are some other questions so if you do have any questions. We're not going to get to because we're running out of time, feel free to send me a particular an email and I can disseminate it to either Carolyn Zi will put
14:52:06 my email in the chat, but quickly it's just bl Williams at Historical Society. com.
14:52:13 Um, So another question from Benjamin is has the Historical Society reached out to collect records of local labor unions or indoor union activists, how have you handled conservative pushback from the community.
14:52:35 And do you have the material that it's Jim Thorpe's time at the Carlyle school.
14:52:33 We haven't ton of done to excuse me, done a ton of outreach with labor unions at this point, that may change here soon but that hasn't been something we've done a ton with yet, but hopefully soon.
14:52:47 There has definitely been some pushback. I know we've lost at least a few people have dropped their memberships because they're tired of us doing like quote trendy topics, and you know, we're not just talking about the scotch Irish Presbyterians and the
14:53:00 Pennsylvania Dutch anymore. And so we've had some walls there but we're not going to stop telling these stories, so we'll bring everyone with us kicking and screaming if we have to because these stories matter.
14:53:13 And so we're going to keep telling them and hopefully everyone will see that learning more about our community and having a greater understanding of our community is better for everyone.
14:53:23 And then yes we definitely have items from Jim Thorpe's time at the Indian School and he came back to Carlisle multiple times after he left the school and the world premiere of Jim Thorpe real American starting Burt Lancaster premiered in Carlisle, so
14:53:39 there's a long history with Jim Thorpe in Carlisle that's for sure and there's there's definitely records.
14:53:48 I am going to quickly I think going off of that on.
14:53:51 If I can get the name.
14:53:53 Barbara asked if you can take a sort of behind the scenes and talk a little bit about decisions and policies that may have had to be made internally, for example with trustees, while planning for the Indian School exhibit or making digitize material public,
14:54:09 knowing that difficult histories would likely be considered controversial by some.
14:54:15 I think a big step was one the creation of knowledge.
14:54:20 And then the creation of the community outreach plan was a guide that clearly laid out what was happening, and then the one benefit with CSS is that there is a committee system and Karen can speak more to what was the conversations within archives.
14:54:38 But I we were before the Historical Society created the outreach department. The Mount Tabor project was already well underway, it was a year and a half.
14:54:58 In, it was creating publicity and creating these much bigger conversations and it did, it really was, you know, this push, so we had to be having these conversations we just couldn't sit and not talk about the, the lack of diversity in the histories that
14:55:08 we had been telling, and then also within the collections that we've actually research. So I don't know if you wanna add that we thankfully didn't get a ton of pushback and the director at the time was supportive of the work we were doing.
14:55:26 And I think everyone could see that the conversations needed to happen, and were well received. Generally, even if, you know, as an institution, we didn't always look good in these conversations but owning up to that, I think, to help move forward.
14:55:41 And I think, as a community, there's been a history going back to some of the slides, when I Lindsay slides where people would realize there's a problem there be a discussion about it and then that's all that was happening and then we'll circle back to
14:55:54 go realizing that same problem was still happening, it'd be a conversation about it, and then nothing happened. So, realizing that some of these conversations had started and stopped multiple times, and they just needed someone to help carry them forward,
14:56:08 and we have been lucky enough to be able to do that and hopefully we'll continue doing that, within the community and hopefully that will help us to reach out and build collections and engaging with additional communities that we are still working to
14:56:23 really connect with.
14:56:27 So I don't want to intrude on the next session, which I think is the sponsored the Cydia session. So, again, I think there are still a couple questions that we weren't able to get to, so feel free to email me on HBO Williams at Historical Society, calm,