Historic material culture, or the things people used daily to survive, is fascinating to me. For the last 25 years, I have made a study of the different styles of clothing throughout history as well as the different fibers and methods used for processing that fiber into fabric. While I am by no means an expert, I do know quite a bit, and, as such, have been asked to help identify or date textiles for various local collections including those at the HGSIC. Identifying and dating these items...

The history books are full of stories about life on the frontier during the 1700s. They discuss life on the frontier during the French and Indian War, or a soldier’s life during the Revolutionary War, or the basic tasks of starting a homestead in an “untamed” land. However different the subject, one thing these stories have in common is that the main characters are usually men: the men who cleared the land and built the cabin, the men who enlisted and fought, the men who made the laws. ...

It’s that time again, time to tear down an exhibit. While tear down seems like such a harsh thing to say, that appears to be the acceptable terminology for the act of removing an exhibit, putting the artifacts back into storage, and taking the signs down. This always seems to happen too soon, as it feels like the exhibit just went up last week rather than three months ago, and all that hard work and effort will be stacked away for the next time we run something similar. Yet, part of what...