It has been an intense and rewarding summer 2014, and I have been so busy finishing my book, beginning new projects, and talking about history far and wide that I am overdue at posting an update on where you might learn more about my work. So with this post, let me quickly review this summer’s publications and press mentions.
In June, the National Park Service launched an LGBT History Initiative, and as a companion, the Summer 2014 issue of National Parks, a publication of the National Parks Conservation Association, published an article about LGBT history in the programs of the National Park Service. In the course of writing the article, author Rona Marech, and I had a long and inspiring conversation on the topic, and some of my thoughts are quoted in her article, “Untold Stories.”
In July, I made my guest-blogging debut by contributing an article to Public History Commons. This online community, sponsored by the National Council on Public History (NCPH), is a remarkable clearing-house of the latest thinking on the presentation and interpretation of the past to a wide audience. My particular contribution was in response to a call made by Robert Weyeneth, recent NCPH President, for public historians to “lift the veil” on our work and share with museum visitors the actual process by which professional historians learn about the past. My article, “Lifting Our Skirts: Sharing the Sexual Past with Visitors,” argues that LGBT history is a subject that is particularly well-suited to this enterprise.
In August, as I mentioned in my last blog post, I gave a talk on “Historic Preservation as a Green Alternative,” and, happily, this topic sparked some local interest. WFHB, Bloomington, Indiana’s community radio station, recorded my talk and later aired it on their regional news show, “Standing Room Only.” It’s now available as a podcast. In addition, my local newspaper The Bloomington Herald Times followed up with me and ended up publishing an article on the subject in their weekly environmental column. “Environmental Sustainability Also Applies to Buildings,” by Laura Slavin, offers a local perspective on some of the larger issues I touched on in my talk.
I am so happy that the work I’m doing is being recognized in the press; it is rewarding to share the larger relevance of history with a wide audience, and media outlets help with that effort by spreading the good word. You can keep current on my latest publications and press mentions any time by consulting the “Media” page of this web site.