This Week @MHS

Here is a look at what is going on at the MHS this week:

- Monday, 8 October, 10:00 AM to 3:00 PM: MHS Open House in conjunction with Opening Our Doors celebration in the Fenway Cultural District. Please note that the library will be closed for the day.

- Tuesday, 9 October, 5:15 PM: Panel: Native American Environmental History with Lisa Brooks, Amherst College; Strother Roberts, Bowdoin College; Ashley Smith, Hampshire College; Thomas Wickman, Trinity College, and moderator Cedric Woods, University of Massachusetts--Boston. This panel will explore the intersections of environmental history and indigenous studies—the questions that each field engenders in the other, as well as the perspectives that native and non-native scholars bring to their research as they traverse both fields. Questions of race, gender, geography, and sources enliven this growing body of scholarship. This is part of the Boston Seminar on Environmental History series. Seminars are free and open to the public. 

- Thursday, 11 October, 6:00 PM: Writing Presidential Biographies with Evan Thomas. The author of 9 books and a former writer and editor for Time and Newsweek, Evan Thomas is the first speaker in our new MHS Speaker Fund annual lecture series. Having published books on Roosevelt, Eisenhower, Nixon, Clinton, and Obama, he will offer his insight into writing presidential biographies. A pre-talk reception begins at 5:30 PM; the speaking program begins at 6:00 PM. There is a $20 per person fee (no charge for MHS Fellows and Members or EBT cardholders).

- Saturday, 13 October, 10:00 AM: The History & Collections of the MHS. Join us for a 90-minute docent-led tour of our public rooms. The tour is free, open to the public, with no need for reservations. If you would like to bring a larger party (8 or more), please contact Curator of Art Anne Bentley at 617-646-0508 or abentley@masshist.org.

Stop by to see our new exhibition Fashioning the New England Family.  

This Week @MHS

There is a lot going on at the MHS this week including the opening of our next exhibition Fashioning the New England Family on Friday, 5 October.

- Tuesday, 2 October, 5:15 PM: The Protestant Cult of the Dead in New England, 1800-1848 with Erik Seeman, State University of New York at Buffalo, and comment by Kenneth Minkema, Yale University. Many 19th-century Protestants in New England held religious ceremonies venerating deceased family and friends, in addition to their orthodox worship of God. This paper examines women’s desires to connect with their deceased loved ones, and argues that this drove important developments in Protestant belief and practice. It shows how pious Protestants maintaining connections with the dead made séance Spiritualism a transatlantic sensation in 1848. This is part of the Boston Area Seminar on Early American History series. Seminars are free and open to the public.

- Wednesday, 3 October, 12:00 PM: Native Citizens: Race, Culture, & the Politics of Belonging, 1884-1924 with Lila Teeters, University of New Hampshire. As the 19th century gave way to the 20th, Native activists played an essential—yet overlooked—role in shaping constructions of American citizenship. Some pushed to harden the political boundaries separating Native nations from their American foil, while others sought to remove those boundaries completely. Still others sought a more permeable relationship. This talk traces those debates from the 1884 Elk v. Wilkins decision through the 1924 Indian Citizenship Act. 

 - Wednesday, 3 October, 6:00 PM: American Honor: The Creation of the Nation's Ideals during the Revolutionary Era with Craig Bruce Smith, William Woods University. The American Revolution was not only a revolution for liberty and freedom; it was also a revolution of ethics, reshaping what colonial Americans understood as “honor” and “virtue.” As Craig Bruce Smith demonstrates, these concepts were crucial aspects of Revolutionary Americans’ ideological break from Europe, shared by all ranks of society. Focusing his study primarily on prominent Americans who came of age before and during the Revolution, Smith shows how a colonial ethical transformation caused and became inseparable from the American Revolution, creating an ethical ideology that still remains. A pre-talk reception begins at 5:30 PM; the speaking program begins at 6:00 PM. There is a $10 per person fee (no charge for MHS Fellows and Members or EBT cardholders).

- Thursday, 4 October, 6:00 PM: Fashioning the New England Family: Sneak Preview Reception. MHS Fellows and Members are invited to the the opening of Fashioning the New England Family. The exhibition uncovers stories as told by various samples of clothing, fabric, accoutrements, and associated manuscripts—many shown for the first time. Join us and explore several family narratives as well as the cultural, social, and economic history of Massachusetts through the lens of fashion. This event is open only to MHS Members and Fellows.

- Friday, 5 October, 10:00 AM: Fashioning the New England Family opens to the public. The exhibition explores the ways in which the multiple meanings of fashion and fashionable goods are reflected in patterns of consumption and refashioning, recycling, and retaining favorite family pieces. Many of the items that will be featured have been out of sight, having never been exhibited for the public or seen in living memory. The exhibition is organized as part of MASS Fashion, a consortium of cultural institutions set up to explore and celebrate the many facets of the culture of fashion in Massachusetts. 

- Friday, 5 October, 12:00 PM: Liverpool, Slavery, & the Atlantic Cotton Frontier c. 1763-1833 with Alexey Krichtal, Johns Hopkins University. This talk follows the enslaved peoples who toiled on cotton estates in the Caribbean, Northeast Brazil and the American South, the planters who owned cotton plantations, the mariners who crossed the Atlantic basin shipping the fiber to Europe, and the merchants who linked enslaved producers to the Manchester manufacturers and fashion-orientated consumers in the Americas on a scale never see before, helping to usher in the first Industrial Revolution.

- Saturday, 6 October, 10:00 AM: The History & Collections of the MHS. Join us for a 90-minute docent-led tour of our public rooms. The tour is free, open to the public, with no need for reservations. If you would like to bring a larger party (8 or more), please contact Curator of Art Anne Bentley at 617-646-0508 or abentley@masshist.org.

- Saturday, 6 October and Sunday, 7 October: Boston Occupied: The British Are Coming . . . Again! Join us as British Redcoats will land from tall ships at Long Wharf and march up State Street with drums beating and flags flying to "occupy" Boston as they did 250 years ago. Visit www.revolution250.org for more information.

Please note that the Library is closed on Monday, 8 October but the galleries are open from 10:00 AM to 3:00 PM. Stop by our Open House in conjunction with Opening Our Doors celebration in the Fenway Cultural District,

This Week @MHS

Join us for a program at the MHS. Here is a look at what is going on this week.

- Monday, 24 September, 6:00 PM: Under the Starry Flag: How a Band of Irish Americans Joined the Fenian Revolt & Sparked a Crisis over Citizenship with Lucy Salyer, University of New Hampshire. In 1867, 40 Irish-American freedom fighters, outfitted with guns and ammunition, sailed to Ireland to join the effort to end British rule. Yet they never got a chance to fight. British authorities arrested them for treason as soon as they landed, sparking an international conflict that dragged the United States and Britain to the brink of war. Under the Starry Flag recounts this gripping legal saga, a prelude to today’s immigration battles. A pre-talk reception begins at 5:30 PM; the speaking program begins at 6:00 PM. There is a $10 per person fee (no charge for MHS Fellows and Members or EBT cardholders). 

- Tuesday, 25 September, 5:15 PM: Radical Nonviolence & Interracial Utopias in the Early Civil Rights Movement with Victoria Wolcott, State University of New York at Buffalo and comment by Jason Sokol, University of New Hampshire.This paper examines how radical pacifists refined nonviolent direct action to challenge racial segregation and inequality in the United States. These activists adopted the methods of earlier utopian communities by living communally and practicing a prefigurative politics that called for immediate change. This seminar is part of the Boston Seminar on Modern American Society and Culture series. Seminars are free and open to the public.

- Thursday, 27 September, 6:00 PM: Race Over Party: Black Politics & Partisanship in Late 19th-Century Boston with Millington Bergeson-Lockwood. In late 19th-century Boston, battles over black party loyalty were fights over the place of African Americans in the post–Civil War nation. Party politics became the terrain upon which black Bostonians tested the promise of equality in America’s democracy. Most African Americans remained loyal Republicans, but a determined cadre argued that the GOP took black votes for granted and offered little meaningful reward for black support. These activists branded themselves “independents,” forging new alliances and advocating support of whichever candidate would support black freedom regardless of party. A pre-talk reception begins at 5:30 PM; the speaking program begins at 6:00 PM. There is a $10 per person fee (no charge for MHS Fellows and Members or EBT cardholders). 

The Library is CLOSED on Wednesday, 26 September, for for a staff development event.

Visit www.masshist.org/events for upcoming programs.

This Week @MHS

This week at the MHS we have an author talk, our annual graduate student reception, and a discussion among hisotrians about the musical Hamilton. Details below:

- Tuesday, 18 September, 6:00 PM: If I Survive: Frederick Douglass and Family in the Walter O. Evans Collection with Celeste-Marie Bernier of the University of Edinburgh. Bringing to light previously unpublished manuscript letters, essays, speeches, and photographs from Frederick Douglass and his sons, Charles Remond, Frederick Jr., and Lewis Henry Douglass, If I Survive casts Douglass in the role of dedicated family man and inspirational figure to his five children. This family biography as accompanied by these personal documents comprises the first extensive study of Frederick Douglass and his family’s fight for the cause of liberty during the Civil War and in the post-emancipation era.

A pre-talk reception begins at 5:30 PM; the speaking program begins at 6:00 PM. There is a $10 per person fee (no charge for MHS Fellows and Members or EBT cardholders). 

- Thursday, 20 September, 6:00 PM: Graduate Student Reception. Calling all graduate students and faculty in history, American Studies, or any related field! Enjoy drinks and hors d’oeuvres as you meet students and professors from other universities working in your fields. Take a behind-the-scenes tour to learn more about the Society's collections as well as the resources available to support your scholarship, from research fellowships to our six different seminar series.

The reception is free, but we ask that you RSVP by 19 September by e-mailing seminars@masshist.org or calling (617) 646-0579.

- Saturday, 22 September, 4:00 PM: Historians on Hamilton with Catherine Allgor, MHS; Lyra D. Monteiro, Rutgers University-Newark; Joseph M. Adelman, Framingham State University. The musical Hamilton has catapulted a founding father to the heights of popular culture. Three historians will explore this creative approach to discussing the stories of America's founding, the conversations that have been created by this phenomenon, and how the excitement can be used to inspire the public to look at American history in greater depth.

A pre-talk reception bins at 3:30 PM; the speaking program begins at 4:00 PM. There is a $10 per person fee (no charge for MHS Fellows and Members or EBT cardholders). 

Visit www.masshist.org/events for upcoming programs including Under the Starry Flag: How a Band of Irish Americans Joined the Fenian Revolt & Sparked a Crisis over Citizenship, an author talk on Monday, 24 September, and Radical Nonviolence & Interracial Utopias in the Early Civil Rights Movement, a seminar on Tuesday, 25 September.