Reflective Essay

Rebecca Duke

Middle Tennessee State University Public History Program September 2013

Dissertation Committee: Dr. Carroll Van West, Chair Dr. Stacey Graham Dr. Jan Leone Dr. Brendan Martin

During my tenure as a Ph.D. student in the public history department at Middle Tennessee State University, I have gained knowledge, experience, and a greater passion for working in the field. The road to this point in my academic career has been long and winding. History has always been part of my studies, even if indirectly. As a fine art major in the undergraduate program at Jacksonville State University, I was required to minor in art history. I took eighteen hours of art history courses. The first two classes were general art history survey courses and were taught in a similar fashion to the way history is stereotypically taught. As an art history student, we were required to memorize the title of the work we were studying, the artist, the time period, and the style. Advanced art history courses explored various genres and time periods of art in more depth. Art historians talk about art in a very descriptive manner. They explain the arts style, the composition, the medium, but rarely do they give historical context to the period that a piece was created. While I found art history interesting, I wanted to know more about the people the artist who created the piece, the situations that inspired the artists creations and the people and places that were represented in the work. It was also during this time that my interest in museums blossomed. As an art student, I frequented art museums and galleries as requirements for my classes. After graduating with my Bachelor of Fine Art degree, I worked as a Montessori teacher for two years. Feeling that I needed to be more challenged, I decided to return to school and worked part-time as an art teacher at Saks Elementary School in Anniston, Alabama. Since I did not have the proper state certification, I could not obtain a full-time position in the public school system. So, I started graduate school in the fifth year teaching certification program. I quickly found out that the program was not for me. While I loved teaching, I found being in the

classroom everyday to be stifling, as well as the bureaucracy associated with teaching in a public school. The next semester I switched to the graduate history program. Graduate courses changed my entire view on the subject of history. For the first time, I was encouraged to formulate my own ideas and challenge what I read. I enjoyed the conversational format of the seminar courses. One professor was particularly influential, Dr. Harvey Jackson, by showing that history was the story of the people. He frequently used oral histories, journals, and historical photographs in his classes. I felt a connection to these sources and the stories of the people that they represented. I even developed a different view toward art history; art was a cultures collective creative history! I focused my studies on state and regional history, particularly Southern culture. I grew up hearing about my Dads childhood living in the towns cotton mill village and stories about my great-grandmother who worked as a sharecropper to support her four children. Being a life-long resident of the South, I felt a need to know more about the place I called home. After a year in the program, I began to wonder how my history classes translated to the real world, primarily the job market. I scheduled a meeting with a few of my professors to discuss possible career choices. It was during this time, that I was first introduced to the concept of public history. I knew that this was the career path for me. I could utilize my passion for art, history, and teaching and make a difference in my community. JSU did not offer any formal courses in public history, but I did not let that stop me. I decided that I wanted to do something that was unprecedented for the department at that time, complete a public history project for my graduate thesis. After consulting with my former art history professor, who also served on the Alabama Historical Commission, I found a great project right in my hometown of Jacksonville, Alabama.

There was a small, Greek-Revival style building that was used as antebellum doctor office, located just off the historic square in town. The building was the first property in Calhoun County to be placed on the National Register of Historic Places and was turned into a museum in 1970 by a local historical society and named The J.C. Francis Medical and Apothecary Museum. Unfortunately, the historical society that maintained the building disbanded and its collection had been unattended since the mid 1980s. The Alabama Historical Commission managed the property and was looking for someone to properly catalog and display the collection and formulate an overall plan for the museum. In preparation for the project, I took an independent study on public history, reading some seminal historiographical public history and museum studies texts including Freeman Tillmans Interpreting Our Heritage and The Power of Place by Delores Hayden, and An Introduction to Museum Work by George Ellis Burcaw,to name a few. The following two semesters I completed my thesis and coordinating project at the Francis museum. This project wet my palette for the field of public history; however, I felt that I needed a deeper understanding of the field and more advanced skills before I could embark on a career in the field. In January 2009, I sent in my application packet for admission to Middle Tennessee State Universitys Ph.D. program in public history for admittance during the fall semester. I graduated with my M.A. from Jacksonville State University on August 7, 2009 and moved to Murfreesboro two days later.

Doctoral Coursework and Assistantship My coursework in the public history program not only provided a deeper exposure to the historiography of the field, but also supplied the skills for practical application in the real world. Each course required projects that offered real world experience working with local communities and cultural organizations to produce quality products including museum exhibits, educational programming, grant proposals, and heritage development plans. This part of the program was the most beneficial for me personally. Having a sound historical knowledge base obtained during my Masters program, I was able to focus on the application of this knowledge through these community projects. During my first semester I took the Public History Seminar with Dr. Rebecca Conard. The class explored the professional field of public history and its place within the discipline of history as a whole. The class was immersed in the historiography of public history and was assigned texts that included topics such as leaders in the field, the changing purpose of institutions such as museums and archives, and the involvement of the government in the field through agencies such as the Department of the Interior. Knowing that I wanted a career in museums, I took the Museum Management Seminar and the Museum Essentials courses with Dr. Bren Martin. These classes provided an in-depth look at museums and their changing role in society from curious displays to centers for educational centers. Over the course of two semesters, I worked on a team to develop an exhibit called Sowing the Seeds of Change that focused on the homefront in Rutherford County during World War II. Using my previous background in education, I developed preliminary educational materials, as well as historical research for the project. Additionally, I learned new skills in photoshop and designed eight exhibit panels for the project.

I also took Public Programming for Historical Organizations, also taught by Dr. Martin. I loved this class because it challenged me to develop more engaging educational programs. One of the major projects in this course was to create a curriculum packet for a local historic institution. I worked with Mary Beth Nevills, Educational Director at Oaklands Historic House Museum to develop a scouting program for girl, cub, and boy scouts. To broaden my understanding of the field even further, I took classes in historic preservation and archaeology. The Seminar in Historic Preservation, taught by Dr. Carroll Van West, focused on Glen Leven, a historic estate that served as a field hospital during the Battle of Nashville during the Civil War. The class was tasked with writing a historic building report and archeological reconnaissance survey for the property. Students were divided into groups that focused on a specific area of the estate. I served on the exterior house team. Not only did I benefit from the expertise of the courses professor, Dr. West, but I also learned so much from my fellow classmates that had previous experience working in historic preservation. The class also presented their work to the Land Trust of Tennessee, the organization that manages the Glen Leven property. The Summer Field School at Cemetery Community (Current Issues in Public History) brought many valuable experiences in a short expanse of time. Students worked in three areas of public history for this project: historic preservation, cultural resource management, and oral history. Cemetery was an African American community located on the present day site of the Stones River National Battlefield in Murfreesboro, Tennessee. The class worked closely with local community members and public history faculty to produce work products at the end of a four week summer course. I worked on a two person team to write the framework for a National Register Historic District nomination.

Dr. Dawn McCormack taught the Archaeology and Public History class, with the assistant of Middle Tennessee State University Provost, Dr. Brad Bartel. This course took me completely out of my comfort zone. Having no previous coursework in archaeology, I drew heavily from the American Material Culture class I had the previous semester with Dr. West. I was accustomed to working with artifacts in a museum environment, but didnt think much about where the artifacts were found. This course helped me think about the history in the ground and ways that public historians could work with archaeologists to develop a more comprehensive community history. In addition to the hands-on experience offered in every public history course, the program encouraged participation in regional and national professional and academic conferences. My first conference presentation was at the National Council on Public History annual meeting in Pensacola where I participated in the poster session. My poster was entitled Connecting Educational Communities: Museums and Formal Learning. The poster illustrated preliminary research conducted regarding partnerships between museums and classroom teachers. I was encouraged by the response at this session and was inspired to present at other conferences. During my tenure at MTSU, I read papers and presented at the Popular Culture Association/American Culture Association meeting, the Tennessee Association of Museums meeting, and the Alabama Museums Association meeting. Because of my attendance at these conferences, I grew my professional network, heard the latest research in the field, and obtained new ideas for possible public programming. The Association of Graduate Students in History (AGSH) is a professional organization for history graduate students that offer student funding for conferences, provides professional development, and serves as a social outlet for masters and PhD

students in the history department. I served as the President of AGSH during the 20112012 academic year. During my coursework, I was granted an assistantship with the history department. For my first year, I served as a graduate teaching assistant for a U.S. history survey course and Historians Craft. But it was with my work with the Center for Historic Preservation that provided the opportunity for my residency and subsequent dissertation topic. In the fall of 2011, I began working with the Skyline Farms Heritage Association to develop the framework for their community heritage museum. The spring 2010 Historic Preservation graduate class, directed by Dr. Carroll Van West, wrote a Heritage Development Plan for the community and I continued this work as a graduate research assistant for the Center. Skyline Farms, located near Scottsboro, Alabama, is a New Deal farming community established in 1934 by the Resettlement Administration. Federal officials established this cooperative, agricultural colony atop a plateau on the Cumberland Mountain in the Appalachian region of Northeast Alabama.1 Skyline was one of 43 rural resettlement projects that were created in order to provide jobs for out-of-work farmers during the Great Depression. The concept for the project developed from the back to the land movement that gained popularity during the 1910s and 1920s.2 According to the 1940s census, population in this area grew from 128 residents in 1930 to 1,495 in 1940.3 During this time, the landscape endured tremendous

Wayne Flynt, Poor But Proud (Tuscaloosa, AL: University of Alabama Press, 1989), 307.

David Campbell, Skyline Farms, Encyclopedia of Alabama, http://encyclopediaofalabama.org/face/Article.jsp?id=h-1546 (accessed December 1, 2011).
3

Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census. 1940 Census, http://1940census.archives.gov/viewer/show.asp?signature=08eb22ca14b6f900407fe801f3e08d9c&mode=norma l (accessed April 16, 2012).

changes, including the clearing of land and the construction of roads and structures throughout an 18,000 square-acre area. Many of Skylines current residents were children during the project years and continue to have great pride for the area. Several of these people, including local teachers and businessmen, formed the Skyline Farms Heritage Association (SFHA) in 1998 in reaction to the possible razing of the communitys school, which was built during the colony years. Together with the Alabama Preservation Alliance, the group filed an injunction that saved the building. The building was then listed on the Alabama Register of Landmarks and Heritage. The mission of the Skyline Farms Heritage Association is to preserve, restore, protect, and promote the history of the Skyline and Cumberland Mountain area in order to inspire residents to shape the communities future with a greater appreciation and respect for their shared heritage, and to foster among all Cumberland Mountain residents and visitors a deeper appreciation of the important historical role that the mountains people have played in local, state, national and world history.4 During my assistantship, I met with members of the Skyline Farms Heritage Association weekly to work on a strategic plan for the museum. The museum is housed in the original commissary building, built in 1935. The location served as a communitys general store until 2005 and stayed vacant until it was purchased by the SFHA in 2010. Both the exterior and interior of the building needed much work. The roof leaked in several locations, windows were missing, and drainage issues caused damage to the foundation. The issues with the roof led to many problems in the interior including deteriorating ceiling tiles and rotting floor panels. In spring semester of my assistantship, the board was approved for a grant to replace the roof.
4

Skyline Farms Heritage Association, Membership Pamphlet, accessed at the Commissary, Skyline Farms, Alabama.

Throughout my assistantship year, I reviewed the SFHAs unorganized collection of artifacts that were both found on site at the commissary and donated by community residents. The museum collection was piled on shelving units throughout the interior of the building. Cotton pick sacks were suspended from the ceiling using metal wire and quilts were draped over boxes and shelves. Pictures and maps of the area were displayed on a clothesline in between two columns. One of the first things I did with SFHA board members was to take out the textiles and paper artifacts in the building. Until the building was secure from outside elements and an HVAC unit was installed, these items needed to be stored in a protected environment. While the majority of my assistantship was spent reviewing the collection, I also assisted in some of the deep cleaning and preparation of the interior of the building. I scraped walls, patched holes, and primed and painted shelving units. Shortly after my assistantship began, I drafted a preliminary collections management policy. I could see that while many items were donated to the museum, a large portion of them did not directly relate to the Skyline community. In January, I held a workshop for the SFHA board and interested community members where I discussed the purpose of a collections management policy and museum mission statement and what the museum should collect based on this policy. I saw that some members of the SFHA board had the mentality that all old things from Skyline Farms belonged in the museum. This needed to be addressed immediately. The most important experience that occurred during this year long assistantship was the relationship that I built with the community members. It took some time for some of the members to warm up to the idea of an outsider coming in and telling them how to exhibit their communitys history. I drew heavily from my experiences and in the public history program regarding my place in this project as the public historian. It was important that the community

had agency in the overall planning and final product. I knew that my role as the public historian was to monitor historical accuracy while the public partners sought understanding and meaning of the project.5 During the assistantship, the staff from the Alabama State Archives toured the museum. They were very excited to see this part of the states history was being preserved. Because of this visit, the Skyline Farms community is now represented in the new exhibit, Alabama Voices, at the Museum of Alabama at the state archives. In addition to my work at Skyline Farms, I worked with Dr. Stacey Graham, Research Professor, and Kira Duke, Education Specialist, with the Teaching with Primary Sources Across Tennessee Program. During this time I contributed to the TPS newsletter and wrote preliminary lesson activities. As the end of my coursework drew near, it was a clear choice to continue my work at Skyline Farms as my professional residency.

Professional Residency and Colloquium As a part of the degree requirements for the Doctor of Philosophy in Public History at Middle Tennessee State University, students are required to participate in a two-semester residency program. The residency year for the program requires students to take on a project related to Public History that will help the student meet her requirements for the program and relate to future dissertation research and career goals. The residency is an integral part of the degree program because through it, students are able to gain hands-on experience in their chosen fields and build their doctoral portfolios. My career goals as a public historian are to gain curatorial and educational experience through research and hands-on projects that empower communities not only to identify and interpret their past, but also preserve and exhibit that past

Howard S. Miller and Katharine T. Corbett. The Public Historian. A Shared Inquiry Into Shared Inquiry. Vol. 28, Winter 2006.

in sustainable ways. I particularly intend to share it with K-12 and adult audiences in public education programs. While I did a lot of research on the collection and devised an overall plan for the Skyline Farms Heritage Museum during my assistantship, there was still much work to be done. This is why it was such an easy decision to continue my work at Skyline for my professional residency. Having worked at Skyline Farms as a graduate research assistant for a year, I built a relationship with many of the Skyline Farms Heritage Association board and community members. While I usually made the trip to Skyline during the week, I would occasionally schedule a weekend visit so other members of the community could be involved. Skyline residents assisted in much of the physical labor that was necessary to clean the interior of the commissary building. They also donated a large percentage of the museum artifacts from their personal estates. Conversely, because of my previous involvement with the site, I also knew the challenges associated with the museum. The heritage association that manages the museum has a very limited budget. The Association generates much of its funding through small donations and nominal membership dues. In summers of 2012 and 2013, the SFHA board was awarded a grant from the Bynum Foundation to cover major expenses including the replacement of the roof and foundation work. However, they have not attempted to seek funding from other avenues. The second challenge is the lack of volunteers. While the museum has a small, dedicated number of volunteers, but they often carry the brunt of responsibility regarding museum responsibilities. Additionally, many of the Association members are elderly and are unable to do a lot of physical work or work in an uncontrolled climate environment. Perhaps one of the biggest challenges associated with this project was the SFHAs board lack of focus for the vision of the museum. The majority of board members were interested in understanding and learning about museum

best practices. But a select few of these members did not understand or want to understand the big picture for the site. They have a deep love for their community, but want to put everything old, and therefore historic in their minds, in the museum. Lastly, the physical condition of the commissary building is in dire need of repair. The replacement of the roof in 2012 brought forth a renewed desire to continue the Skyline project. But the building needs other major repairs before it is in an appropriate condition for a museum environment. My primary contact for the project was Cindy Rice, SFHA historian and board member. She also served as the museums acting site director. Much of the research housed in the museum archives relating to the New Deal community was found by Mrs. Rice in state and local archives and deed offices. Mrs. Rice is one of the friendliest and most enthusiastic advocates for the Skyline Farms community. She greeted me every week anxious to learn the best museum practices. However, because of this enthusiasm, she often carries the brunt of the work and responsibility for making sure things were done properly. She would become quite overwhelmed with other board members who would bring in items or rearrange an exhibit without regard for the overall plan. However, she was often hesitant to stop the offending board members for fear of offending them. I explained to her that instead of thinking of these incidents as offenses that needed reprimanding, use them as teachable moments as to the reasoning behind our plan. I had specific goals for each semester when I started my residency year. The first half would focus on mostly curatorial duties: archive the paper collection, catalog each artifact in the museum6, create object labels for items on display, and organize a best practices folder as a future resource. I also finalized the collections management policy. During the second semester I created an interpretive plan, drafted text for exhibit panels, and wrote lessons plans for the Teaching with Primary Sources Across Tennessee program on Skyline Farms. I presented at two
6

The collection inventory totaled 625 entries at the end of my residency year.

conferences in the spring of 2013: the Tennessee Association of Museums annual meeting and the Alabama Museums Association conference. Together with Skyline Farms Heritage Association Historian, Cindy Rice, we spoke at the Alabama Museums Association meeting about the importance of local history museums and how we established the framework for a sustainable heritage museum at Skyline. This session was highly attended and we engaged in a dialogue with many board members and volunteers for museum similar in size to the Skyline Farms museum. One of the biggest obstacles I faced during my residency was knowing when to step away. I spent two years working with the community and certain board members grew dependent on my advice and weekly visits for even the most minute details. Even though they had the tools to continue the work I had started, they were hesitant to continue without my guidance. Conversely, while some board members grew dependant on my recommendations, two community members would not heed my advice regarding collections management at all. These residents found it to be their personal mission to contribute the most items to the collection. My experience during my professional residency at Skyline Farms allowed me to implement my skills in museum curation, public programming, and community relations. I took an incredibly disorganized collection and set up a framework for a sustainable heritage museum and presented the work at a professional conference. Upon the completion of the project, I felt much more confident in my abilities as a public historian. Into addition to residency project, students must take a colloquium class that is lead by a member of the public history faculty. During the first semester of my colloquium directed by Dr. Bren Martin, I was the only student and therefore, able to choose readings that directly correlated with my dissertation topic. Since I was focusing on the Great Depression/New Deal Era, I

decided to read Dancing in the Dark: A Cultural History of the Great Depression by Morris Dickstein.7 The book provides a survey of great literary works, movies, radio shows, music, and art during these tough economic times and strongly defends the arts in their ability to raise morale. Dickstein describes the art of the Great Depression as one that portrays the story of the common man, a story with a range of complexity. While the author never explores any single topic too deeply, he offers a general review of the culture across the nation. In his work, Progressive Museum Practice, George Hein examines how Progressive education, specifically the teachings and philosophy of John Dewey, has influenced current best practices in museum education. From 1880 1920, a reform movement developed across the United States that resulted in response to the various economic and social problems caused by the rapid immigration, industrialization, and urbanization throughout the country. Among one of the top priority for these Progressives was a quality education for all of the nations children. Education was the best tool for improving society in terms of developing a greater social justice and more equitable opportunities for all of the citizens. The first chapter of the book examines educational theory that influenced Deweys view of progressive education. Hein describes four main components of progressive education.8 First, schools must broaden its scope by including instruction and concern for health, vocation, and the quality of family and community life. Second, classroom pedagogy must include new scientific research, social sciences, and psychology. Third, instruction should accommodate multiple learning styles and be tailored for the individual. Finally, faith must be placed in the democracy and that education would improve society toward a greater social justice and a more equitable dispersal of benefits derived from progress in science and technology. John Dewey echoes these
7 8

Morris Dickstein. Dancing in the Dark. New York, WW Norton and Company, 2009. Hein cites Lawerence Cremins book, The Transformation of the School: Progressivism in American Education , 1961 when discussing the definition of progressive education.

tenets repeatedly in his writings. Preserving the democratic society is the primary concern of Deweys educational theories. Chapter two discusses how museums are involved with Deweys overall educational theory. Dewey was a strong proponent of museums and their benefit to practical education for both children and adults. Free, public education during Deweys life was still not guaranteed for many states and museums were another institution of learning besides the traditional classroom. Chapter three examines the history of museums in the United States and specifically focuses on the career of Charles Willson Peale, the man attributed with starting the nations first museum. Additional biographical sketches of early museum educators are discussed in Chapter 4 including the careers of John Cotton Dana, Louise Connelly, Anna Billings Gallup, and Laura Mary Bragg. Art museum education programs are discussed in Chapter 5 in conjunction with the relationship between John Dewey and Allen Barnes. The surge in new museum programs during the 1960s is examined in chapter 6 and the final chapter explains how the evolution of museum education programs affects modern day outreach. This book is recommended for students and new professionals in the museum field to understand the context of museum education within the overall movement of progressive education in the United States. It offers a concise history for museum education, something that is not widely researched. Although I had read selected chapters in a previous class, I read Historical Thinking and Other Unnatural Acts by Sam Wineberg in its entirety during the colloquium. Wineburg poses many questions regarding the student of history including: What is history good for? Why should we teach it in schools? Why is history relevant to our daily lives? These are questions that I had considered myself as a historian. He recalls the typical experience of the average history student in high school: memorizing a list of dates, reading textbook summaries of historical events and

answering multiple choice or short answer questions that reflected such readings.9 In addition to these books, I researched the growing archive at the Skyline Farms Museum. Many of the documents in the collections come from private collections and new documentation is brought in periodically. The skills utilized during my professional residency was the result of years of study in the Public History program. I was not only able to perform on an individual assignment, but led and educated a group of people in the methologies needed to preserve and interpretive their community history. I am so appreciative for my time as a PhD public history student at Middle Tennessee State University. I feel confident in my abilities to work as an authority in the field. Through professional community partners for class projects, experiences during my departmental assistantship, and attendance of regional and national conferences, I have developed a network of colleagues throughout the Southeast that I can now call on for support during my career as a public historian. The culmination of my experiences at MTSU provided me with a more diverse professional portfolio, expanded my knowledge base, and inspired a greater passion for the interdisciplinary field of public history. Additionally, the program taught me a lot about myself and my ability to perform in a demanding environment.

Sam Wiseburg, Historical Thinking and Other Unnatural Acts. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press, 2001.

Bibliography Campbell, David. Skyline Farms, Encyclopedia of Alabama. Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census. 1940 Census. Dickstein, Morris. Dancing in the Dark. New York: WW Norton and Company, 2009. Flynt, Wayne. Poor But Proud. Tuscaloosa, AL: University of Alabama Press, 1989. Wiseburg, Sam. Historical Thinking and Other Unnatural Acts. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press, 2001.