This Week @ MHS

The coming week will see the opening of a new exhibit as well as a few public programs to take in. Here is what's on the calendar:

- Tuesday, 7 March, 5:15PM : Come in for the next installment from the Early American History seminar series, "A History of Violence: The Harpe Murders and the Legacies of the American Revolution." Kate Grandjean of Wellesley College shares information about this project which looks at a series of murders in Appalachia in the 1790s committed by former Loyalists. By following the lives of the Harpe borthers, who left a trail of blood through early Tennessee and Kentucky, it explroes the violent legacies of the American Revolution - especially in the southern borderlands. Eliga Gould of the University of New Hampshire provides comment. Seminars are free and open to the public; RSVP required. Subscribe to receive advance copies of the seminar papers.

- Wednesday, 8 March, 12:00PM : "Inventing Citizens: Patents, Investors, and Civil Rights" is a Brown Bag lunch talk with Kara Swanson of Northeastern University. Swanson's project examines the foundational relationship between the growing republic and its accessible patent system by demonstrating how the patent system became a resource for marginalized groups making claims to full civil rights, particularly women and African Americans. This talk is free and open to the public. 

- Thursday, 9 March, 6:00PM : SOLD OUT - "The Irish Atlantic" Fellows & Members Preview Reception. MHS Fellows and Members are invited to a special program, reception, and chance to preview The Irish Atlantic. The exhibition explores 175 years of the Irish in Boston. Guest curator William Fowler will give an overview, beginning with a look at the Irish community in Massachusetts stretching back into the 18th century, through famine relief efforts led by Capt. Robert Bennet Forbes at the helm of the Jamestown, to a mass migration movement, decades of community and institutional building, and a rise in political power.

- Friday, 10 March, 10:00AM : The Irish Atlantic begins. This exhibit is open to the public free of charge, Monday-Saturday, 10:00AM-4:00PM, through 22 September 2017.

- Friday, 10 March, 12:00PM : Stop by for the second Brown Bag lunch talk of the week, this time with Stephen A. West of the The Catholic University of America. "A Constitutional Lost Cause: The Fifteenth Amendment in American Memory and Political Culture, 1870-1920" examines how Americans - across lines of race, region, and party - placed the voting rights amendment at the center of their memores of Reconstruction, and how those memories shaped their debates about citizenship and the very nature of the Constitution. This talk is free and open to the public. 

- Saturday, 11 March, 10:00AM : The History and Collections of the MHS is a 90-minute, docent-led walk through the public spaces of the Society at 1154 Boylston St., providing information about the historic building, collections, artwork, and architecture of the MHS. This event is free and open to the public with no need for reservations for individuals or small groups. Larger parties (8 or more) should contact Curator of Art Anne Bentley in advance at 617-646-0508 or abentley@masshist.org. While you're here you will also have the opportunity to view our current exhibition: The Irish Atlantic: A Story of Famine Migration and Opportunity.