Archive for the ‘Spotlight’ Category

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Jobs for Historians

In Spotlight on November 21, 2017 by Randolph Hollingsworth Tagged: ,

The American Historical Association has given us the bad news about early career historians and the 2016-17 academic job market. Check out the blog post by Dylan Ruediger in AHA Today:

http://blog.historians.org/2017/11/another-tough-year-for-the-academic-job-market-in-history/

 

graph showing decline in AHA Job Ads vs. number of new PhDs in History

from AHA Today, Nov. 16, 2017, http://j.mp/2juhNCN

The AHA will give a fuller contextualization of those numbers, as well as compare their data with that from the H-Net Job Guide, in their newsletter Perspectives on History after the start of the new year. What we do need to keep in mind is that history PhDs need to be thinking more broadly than what their own advisors are doing in their careers – and find a way to describe their skills in a way that would be useful for many different kinds of employers, not just in academia.

Articles

Courage to do history

In Spotlight on October 16, 2017 by Randolph Hollingsworth Tagged:

Many Higgins

Mandy Higgins, KY Historical Society

Have you seen the wonderful essay on the Kentucky Historical Society’s blog by Mandy Higgins, a KATH board member? Check it out: “Community Engagement as Institutional Branding, Or Why I’m Not Brave.” It is a terrific description of what many of us in KATH do.

She writes about how historians ask tough questions and support ways in which their audiences (on paper or in person) can find answers. “It is about modeling good listening skills and providing space for disagreement.”

However, we must disagree with Mandy when she writes: “I am not brave. I am a historian, doing her job.” She is indeed an intrepid warrior on behalf of all of us here in Kentucky. Thank you, Mandy, for all that you do.

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KY Photos

In Spotlight on August 14, 2017 by Randolph Hollingsworth Tagged: ,

Some of the Oldest Photos Ever Taken in Kentucky – from Internet Archive Book Images et al.

http://www.onlyinyourstate.com/kentucky/oldest-photos-kentucky/

* Company D, Fourth Kentucky Volunteers, enlisted in 1861 in Louisville.

* 1862, soldiers crossing the Barren River.

* 1900, a snowy street in Columbus

* 1901, congregants from a Methodist church in Hopkinsville

* 1910, aerial view of Louisville

* 1910, Seelbach Hotel

* 1916, University of Kentucky

* 1916, one-room school house for African American students

* 1917, Omar Khayyam – winner of the Kentucky Derby

Articles

DAR Seminar

In Alerts,Spotlight on July 31, 2017 by Randolph Hollingsworth Tagged:

This just in from Brent Taylor, KATH President:
The Kentucky Society, Daughters of the American Revolution kindly requests your attendance on Saturday, September 16, 2017, for the first annual Heritage Preservation Symposium commencing at 1:00 p.m. in the Bourbon County Courthouse in Paris, Kentucky. $50 per seminar attendee, $15 for box lunch. Attendance limited. Questions? Contact Duncan Tavern, 859-987-1788. Use the printout below to reserve your seat today – or order online at https://duncantavern.eventbrite.com.

DARpreservationEvent-Sept2017

Articles

KWSP at LexHistory

In Spotlight on July 10, 2017 by Randolph Hollingsworth Tagged: , ,

On Friday July 21st as part of the Gallery Hop the Lexington History Museum will host an exhibit from the Kentucky Woman Suffrage Project. Focusing just on the activities and events in the Lexington/Fayette County area, and up only from 5-8 pm that evening, this exhibit will feature many items from Ashland, the Henry Clay Estate, especially on Madeline McDowell Breckinridge; Laura Clay and her older sisters; Mary E. Britton; and, Lucy Wilmot Smith.

This pop-up exhibit is held in the Offices of the Lexington History Museum, Suite 312 of The Square (corner of Main & Broadway), 401 W. Main Street, Lexington. There is a parking garage across Broadway and up one street to Short Street, turn right at Short and entrance is mid-block. If you come from the garage or the Broadway entrance, take floor 3A in the elevator (atrium side), or floor 3 from the Main Street elevator.

Here’s the Facebook event page for more information:
https://www.facebook.com/events/383466885382283/

photo of suffragists marching on both sides of the street

“Suffrage Parade on Main Street, Miss Dorothy Fitzgerald Bugler, and her little sister driving her golden chariot,” Lexington Herald, May 7, 1916, page 1. Photo from newspaper archived at the University of Kentucky, courtesy of UK Special Collections and Research Center.

 

H-Net blog icon - a megaphone

Click to hear PSA

Foster Ockerman, Jr., the President and Chief Historian for the Lexington History Museum, worked with Chuck Clenney at the Lexington Community Radio station to produce a Public Service Announcement (PSA). Foster’s wonderful voice is recreating a small piece of the speech given by suffragist orator Walter J. Millard in Cheapside plaza in Lexington on May 6, 1916, after a large suffrage parade that morning through the downtown area. You can read more about this historic event on H-Kentucky.

 

Articles

Teaching of Slavery

In Spotlight on May 18, 2017 by Randolph Hollingsworth Tagged: ,

Eleven graduate students across the nation were selected recently for research fellowships by the Southern Poverty Law Center’s Teaching Tolerance project. The fellowships are part of a multiyear initiative to improve the teaching of slavery in K-12 schools across the nation. The fellows curate historical documents and other teaching materials on American slavery to provide teachers with a resource of free and well-researched materials to use in the classroom.

Three graduate students working with Dr. Kathy Swan at the University of Kentucky College of Education – Carly Muetterties, Ryan Lewis and Kenny Stancil – are part of the cohort. Swan serves on the advisory board for the Teaching Tolerance project, and is the national fellows coordinator.

For more information about the Southern Poverty Law Center and the Teaching Tolerance project, visit www.splcenter.org.

Articles

Dupont’s Op Ed

In Spotlight on March 27, 2017 by Randolph Hollingsworth Tagged: ,

Check out the Lexington Herald-Leader op ed by former KATH President (leading the 2009 KATH meeting at EKU), Dr. Carolyn DuPont. It’s a call for us all to be brave: “… we must insistently advance our more complete story [of U.S. history]. Tell it loudly, tell it clearly, and tell it often.”

Originally titled: “Honoring Black and Women’s History in the Trump Era” it ran on March 24th with this title:

“Our half-true history serves privileged white males”
http://www.kentucky.com/opinion/op-ed/article140661298.html

Backlash in the online comments as can be expected…

Articles

KATH Writing Awards

In KATH Awards,Spotlight on February 13, 2017 by Randolph Hollingsworth

Many thanks to those on the 2016-17 KATH Board who volunteered to serve as committee chairs for the 2017 KATH Student Writing Awards.

Heidi Taylor-Caudill will chair the Tolson Award committee. This writing award competition is for high school students and is named after a charter member of KATH and retired social studies teacher, Mrs. Anita Sanford Tolson.

Dr. Pattie Dillon and Crystal Culp will be chairing the two undergraduate student award competitions, the Clark Award committee and the Betts Award committee, respectively. Dr. Clark was an Americanist who was the first State Historian in Kentucky. See the AHA’s In Memorium article on Dr. Clark here. Dr. Betts was a French colonialist historian who first created KATH and was dedicated to the education of Kentuckians on the importance of history. See a blog post by Alan Cornett, on the impact Dr. Betts had on his students and everyone around him.

Amanda Higgins will chair the Herring Award committee who will be looking at submissions from this year’s graduate students. Dr. Herring is a great mentor and scholar whose work in foreign policy continues to serve as the bedrock for our understanding of the U.S. and the world around us. See the several videos of his presentations for C-SPAN here and you will get a sense of why his colleagues and students so respect him.

You can see past award winning papers on the KATH website in relationship with each year’s meeting – or you can see the links to the papers listed together on the bottom of the page here.

We look forward to seeing our new crop of winning papers for this coming fall.

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