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Colorado Hires a New State Historian: Is New York Next? Apply by March 16!!!!!!!

March 1, 2016
by Peter Feinman
unnamed
History Colorado Center
NYSED
NYS Museum

 

 

 

 

 

 

In January, Colorado hired a new state historian. When I saw the notice, it prompted me to examine what being a state historian in Colorado meant and what that might mean for New York. As it turns out, although the title is the same, there are significant differences in how the two states operate. Technically the Colorado state historian will be part of History Colorado which according to its website is a twenty-first-century historical society. Its mission is:

Inspiring generations to find wonder and meaning in our past and to engage in creating a better Colorado

History Colorado is a private organization:

Established in 1879, History Colorado is a 501(c)(3) charitable organization and an agency of the State of Colorado under the Department of Higher Education. We offer public access to cultural and heritage resources of Colorado, including statewide museums and special programs for individuals and families, collection stewardship of Colorado’s historic treasures, educational resources for schools, students and teachers, services related to preservation, archaeology and history, and the Stephen H. Hart Research Library.

As a private organization it operates under the authority of the State Department of Higher Education so there are immediate differences with New York.

The additional areas of responsibility according to its website are:

History Colorado’s statewide activities support tourism, historic preservation, education and research related to Colorado’s rich western history, offering the public unique opportunities to interact with Colorado history through its network of museums [9] which offer engaging exhibitions and special programs for adults and children.

Through our education programs, we work with schools across the state to provide classrooms and teachers with important resources and curriculum related to Colorado history, and offers local communities resources that help them to enrich historical-related community based programs.

Through the State Historical Fund historic preservation grants program, History Colorado has awarded millions in competitive grants to all 64 counties across Colorado, which has resulted in a more than $1.5 billion impact on Colorado’s economy.

As the State Historic Preservation Office, the Office of Archaeology and Historic Preservation handles the processing and documenting of statewide archaeological and historic preservation related projects.

These functions exist in New York as well but are not concentrated in one area.

In his recent post to New York History Blog on the state of the state historian

former state historian Bob Weible wrote that New York moved its State Historian from the Governor’s office to the newly formed Department of Education in 1911. According to Bob, after World War II, besides increasing support for the state’s many historians, historical societies, and history museums, the newly revitalized Office of State History took on the weighty responsibility for managing thirty-two state-owned historic sites. This configuration more closely matches what Colorado does today with the primary difference that one is a private 501(c)3 and the other a state entity.

To push the comparison further, Bob reports that:

a blue ribbon commission appointed by Nelson Rockefeller would even recommend the elevation of the State Historian position to assistant commissioner status with responsibilities for overseeing historical research, the state archives, a state history museum (separate from the existing, scientifically oriented State Museum), field services, and historic sites.

Clearly nothing like that exists with the current dysfunctional organization.

Bob went on to report that attempt to create something substantive did occur recently:

SED’s Office for Cultural Education, which oversees the State Archives, Library, and Museum, presented a 2011 strategic plan to SED’s Board of Regents that included the reinvention of the Office of State History [This link is to a site which can not be found.] And the Regents approved. The plan for State History was supposed to have been initiated in 2013 however, and it wasn’t, thanks principally to the Museum’s bureaucratic foot dragging.

The Legislature did get involved in its own way to no avail. When Assemblyman Steve Englebright chaired the committee on Governmental Operations, he sought to consolidate the history operations into something more closely resembling what the blue ribbon commission had recommended, the Regents had approved, and what Colorado now has. That effort went nowhere. He subsequently sought to create the equivalent of a history steering committee encompassing the disparate history functions scattered among the state bureaucracy. I attended and wrote about such a History Roundtable meeting held in May 2014. That effort went nowhere either.  New York continues to remain dysfunctional with no end in sight. The silos rule.

One change is happening. Bob became the state historian after the position had been vacant for seven years. However when he did so, technically he was not hired as state historian regardless of the press release to contrary. As far as the state payroll system was concerned he was the Chief Curator of History at the New York State Museum. In practice the majority of his time was spent as the curator of history exhibitions at the museum in Albany who occasionally would be allowed to leave the premises to attend statewide conferences such as APHNYS and NYSHA. He really did not have the staff, funding, or time to operate as a true state historian providing leadership to the history community in the state.

As goes the state, so go the counties. The situation in the history community involving the public historians is one where the state law continues to be flouted similar to the seven-year vacancy on the state level. Although officially the state takes pride in requiring all municipalities and counties to have an historian the requirement is disrespected by either not having one or not providing resources to make the position effective especially at the county level. In the recent APHNYS newsletter, President Gerry Smith who is a county and municipal historian who has a day job in a library where he actually can earn a living, wrote:

One initiative that we will work on in 2016 is a push to have every vacancy filled for every community. We will also be trying to ensure that those vacancies are filled by individuals and not museums, historical societies, etc.

Good luck with that effort. Worthy as it is, what incentive do mayors, town supervisors, or county executives have to comply with the law when New York State history is such a low priority in Albany?

As previously reported in a post by Orange County Historian Johanna Yaun, I said in a county history at Sullivan County, that I knew of only two full-time county historians in the state and they were in the audience: Johanna and Will Tatum of Dutchess. They thought there were a few more so I contacted a few people I knew who answered for themselves and some others they knew. So while this is not state survey here are the results:

Fulltime County Historians
Dutchess County Historian Will Tatum
Livingston County Historian Amie Alden who was once the subject of a post to New York History Blog
Orange County Historian Johanna Yaun
Wyoming County Historian Cindy Amrhein

Part-Time County Historians
Cayuga County 3 people
Putnam County Historian Sarah Johnson and 3 people

Fulltime Government Employees as County Historian and Records Manager
Chautauqua County as per Aime Alden
Genesee County as per Aime Alden
Montgomery County Kelly Yacobucci Farquhar
Wayne County Peter Evans

Gerry Smith informed me that a survey will be taken in January of all the counties so it will be good to have that information. Such a survey was last completed in 2001 by the then temporary state historian. Don’t you think that the state historian should have a database of all the government historians. Perhaps we can suggest that to the new state historian.

Yes, there will be a new state historian. I was just contacted by:

Patricia Polan
Associate in Instructional Services
Office of Curriculum and Instruction
New York State Education Department
Patricia.Polan@nysed.gov
Telephone: 518-473-0741

She requested I disseminate a job posting for:

Position: NYSED::Senior Historian, SG-22

Salary: $64,302 to a maximum salary of $81,415 based on annual performance advances

Location: Albany

The New York State Education Department (NYSED) is seeking to fill the position of Senior Historian in the New York State Museum. This position will serve as the Historian for New York State. The State Historian will have broad researched based knowledge about New York State, conduct research, provide statewide coordination and leadership of the historical communities in New York, promote collaboration, and a scholarship that ensures a greater understanding of the history of the State. Under the direct supervision of the Chief Curator (History), duties of this position will include, but are not limited to, the following:

  • Perform historical research about New York State;
  • Provide guidance and leadership to New York State academic organizations, institutions, and local government historians appointed pursuant to Arts and Cultural Affairs Law 57.07;
  • Review annual reports submitted to the Commissioner of Education by local government historians;
  • Advise and assist any state agency, board, commission, office, civil subdivision, institution or organization in the planning and execution of any commemorative, scholarly conference or other gathering event relating to the history of the Colony and the State of New York;
  • Examine historical material to determine its significance and validity; and
  • Publish information concerning the history of the State of New York and regarding collections of historical materiel for academic and popular publications and (media) outlets.

MINIMUM QUALIFICATIONS:

For provisional appointment candidates must possess a Master’s Degree in History, Public History, Art History, American Studies**, or Museum Studies**, and three years of professional experience in collections management and/or research OR a Ph.D. in History, Public History, Art History, or American Studies**.

**Including or supplemented with nine credit hours in history.

PREFERRED QUALIFICATIONS: Special consideration will be given to candidates who possess the following qualifications:

  • Doctorate in American History showing a concentration of research of New York State history.
  • Five years of experience in the university level lecturing about New York State history.
  • Evidence of published peer reviewed historical research.
  • Editing of publications about New York State history.

CONDITIONS OF EMPLOYMENT: This will be a provisional appointment. Promotions and transfers may change appointees’ negotiating unit. Applicants should be aware that changes in negotiating units may affect their salary, insurance, and other benefits.

APPLICATION: Qualified candidates should send a resume and letter of interest by March 16, 2016 to ocejobs@nysed.gov (email applications are preferred). You must include the Box number (OCE-937/27442) in the subject line of your email to ensure receipt of your application.

If you are interested in the actual PDF which I received, please contact me. This job posting is a step in the right direction but let’s see what resources the new State Historian to actually function as the state historian the way the Colorado State Historian does. The Conditions of Employment suggest other changes may be in the works.

This person will report to the Chief Curator of History. To see that job description go to the state website.

That position went to Jennifer Lemak who had been filling in for Bob since his retirement last summer.

Bob Weible optimistically ended his post on the state of the state historian with:

Maybe something good will happen. Maybe not. Stay tuned.

Recent Lower Hudson Valley History Meeting Highlights

December 15, 2015
by Peter Feinman

In recent weeks I have had the opportunity to attend and participate in three regional and county history community meetings:

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October 16: Greater Hudson Heritage Network (GHHN) annual meeting
October 24: APHNYS Region 3 also covering mainly the Hudson Valley
November 14: Sullivan County History Conference

These three meetings provided venues to meet with colleagues, discuss issues and topics, and learn what is going on. What follows then are some highlights from those meetings and this post is not intended to be a full report on what transpired.

Greater Hudson Heritage Network

This organization conducts an annual meeting in the Hudson Valley region and draws from people outside the region as well. It is a day-long conference with plenary speaker(s), concurrent sessions and includes lunch. These past two years it has been held at colleges so presumably there is no rent or it is nominal. This year Prof. Lisa Keller of Purchase College was the host. There is a fee to attend.

At the conference, Priscilla Brendler, Executive Director, spoke, among other things, on the Path through History. There were flyers for the June 18-19, 2016 dates and she urged people to participate in this program which helps provide vital statistical information on the state of history tourism in the state.

At the Women’s Suffrage Centennial Conference, Gavin Landry, Executive Director, I Love NY, mentioned that based on my posts on the Path through History, some changes had been made. He didn’t identify them but I suggest two such changes were on view here. One is based on my criticism of the “Simon says” aspect of the date selection leaving history sites and others scrambling to guess when the Path Weekend will occur. The second was organizations not having sufficient lead time to plan or having their June event on the correct date. The decision now is for Fathers Day weekend with plentiful advance notice.

Another change which I did know about was the relationship of GHHN to the Path through History weekend.  The flyer distributed at the meeting lists a GHHN phone number and email address for contact, questions, and updates. It would seem that the work for operating the Path Weekend has been outsourced to GHHN presumably for which GHHN gets paid. GHHN already operates some programs on a statewide basis and this appears to be another example of its expansion beyond the Hudson Valley. The history community would benefit from having a NYHN, a New York History Network although it should be noted that GHHN tends to focus on the backend of  history site operations and less on history itself or outreach. Teaching the Hudson Valley (THV) used to do that before it shifted its focus to the environment. So while there is (or used to be before the 2016 cancellation) a state history conference (NYSHA), regional and/or county ones are hard to find.

The keynote speaker at the conference was Professor Ken Jackson, Mr. New York State History. He was the keynote speaker at the launching of the Path though History in 2012. He had been personally recruited by Governor Cuomo to participate in the now defunct Path through History Taskforce which never really did much and was more for show. His talk addressed the same considerations as his keynote address three years earlier now with some perspective on the Path project he helped launch. Jackson referred to the project as one of “noise” and “not much else.” It was not well run or thought through. Cuomo takes credit for it but doesn’t do much for it. The financial support is down. Nothing Jackson said was new to regular readers of my posts

The contrast between the talks of Priscilla and Ken could not have been greater. Here in the briefest of time spans, one was able to experience the official view from the Albany-Manhattan bubble and the reality outside the bubble. Admittedly, I enjoy moments like this because they make writing posts so easy.

APHNYS Region 3

This was an excellent meeting organized by Suzanne Isaksen, regional coordinator Town of Montgomery historian and hosted by Mary Ellen Matise, Village of Walden Historian. The meeting was held in the historic village hall and public library and we were welcomed by the mayor. This was a day-long program with lunch on our own by walking to nearby places in the historic setting. There was a slight fee.

Three speakers from the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation (NYSOPRHP)  presented – Dan McEneny, Jennifer Betsworth, and Matthew Shephard. The program provided an overview of the Division for Historic Preservation and its programs, the process and criteria for National and State Register listings including tax advantages, and the new Cultural Resource Information Database (CRIS). We had the opportunity through CRIS to see maps identifying the cultural resources right in Walden where we were meeting. The database is a remarkable tool and if the history signs or markers could be added, it would be a terrific resource for the history community. You can not only see a site but access detailed information on it. This new website requires some thoughtful thinking and conversations with the history community on how it can best de used and developed. It can be located at https://cris.parks.ny.gov.

This session, which could be repeated throughout the state and at statewide conferences, made me realize a missing ingredient in the public historian training. As the New Historian session at the APHNYS state conference made clear, people become public historians in their communities often with little training or guidance. While there is some information at the APHNYS website (guidelines which need to be updated), municipal historians don’t necessarily know that APHNYS even exists. The challenges of being a municipal historian were the recent subject of Orange County Historian Johanna Yaun’s newsletter and post to New York History Blog

Recommendation – all public historians should receive and be required to receive state-funded training in Albany. Such training should include the NYS Archives, NYS Library, NYS Museum, NYSOPRHP and the NYS Historian. The program should include touring the facilities, meeting the staff, learning the resources available and the related rules, regulations, and requirements. This one-week training program will improve the professionalization of the municipal historian across the state, enhance the status of the position to the local mayors, town supervisors, and country executives, and help counter the isolation of the municipal historian. To establish the program actually is the simple part as each of the state entities in Albany could easily formulate such a program if asked. The challenge would be in funding. That would require a concerted effort by the history community to advocate for it, an activity which is conspicuously absent at present. At some point it would be beneficial to develop an agenda of what the history community wants from the state and then advocate for it.

Sullivan County History Conference

This was an excellent meeting organized by John Conway, Sullivan County historian. It was held at the Sullivan County Community College with the real credit belonging to Debra Conway as her husband repeatedly mentioned. Congratulations on a job well done. The program was funded by the Delaware Council and was free including lunch.

The stated intention is for this to be an annual event and it is an example of what every county should do. The attendance was over 70 people for this day-long event despite the snow flurries in the county and the near freezing weather. As I said in my keynote, when I left home in Westchester it was fall. When I arrived in Sullivan County it was winter.

This particular conference focused not on the history of Sullivan County but on the state of history. It included a video welcome from Congressional Representative Chris Gibson with whom I also shared the program when the Delaware Council was launched. Other speakers included fulltime county historians Johanna Yaun and Will Tatum III from Orange and Dutchess Counties. County history conferences were held there in 2011 before their time and I hope they will have one-day programs of their own soon. Johanna held a mini-conference in the summer which John and I attended and which partially served as a catalyst for this one.

The conference drew from a multitude of areas. Linda Oehler-Marx, a former teacher, spoke on the issue of finding a place for local history in the new social studies framework. This is a vital issue and there needs to be more discussion between the history community and the teachers on how to incorporate local and state history into the classroom even without field trips.

Social media was addressed in general terms by Johanna in her presentation and by Matt Colon, Director of the Historical Society of Newburgh Bay and the Highlands. I commented on when I first got involved in local history, the State Archive Records Administration (SARA) grants were to microfilm records. Times and technology have changed. Here is an area where county-level workshops on how to take advantage of new technologies really would be useful.

The conference ended with a presentation by Kristina Heister, the Superintendent of the Upper Delaware Scenic and Recreational River, NPS. Much of her talk was on the NPS which will be celebrating its centennial next year. She also mentioned Imperiled Promise: The State of History in the National Park Service, a study commissioned by the NPS. Marla Miller, one of the co-authors, spoke at a pre-conference workshop to the NYSHA conference at Marist in 2014. I spoke with her afterwards and then downloaded the 120-page report. I have read it but not yet written about it. Some of the recommendations are appropriate not only for the NPS sites in New York but for NYSOPHP as well. According to Kristina in terms of implementation the study is still a work-in-progress. I guess I have put off writing about it for long enough.

Of course, no history conference would be complete with noting the comments made about the Path through History. Although there were some perfunctory remarks made about its continued existence, the comments to the audience that it was an “ill-fated debacle” with no history community participation that fizzled out got right to heart of problem. One suggestion was a massive statewide letter-writing campaign addressed to the governor so perhaps he wouldn’t remain clueless.

History conferences are a lot of fun and I recommend more of them at the county and regional level. It also would be nice to have a master calendar for such county, regional, and state conferences. Maybe the new state historian once one is hired could take the lead here.

Heritage Tourism Lessons from Jurassic World

July 2, 2015
by Peter Feinman

Jurassic World, the latest tourism movie, has broken box office records. It showcases the plight of executive directors of destination tourist sites in continually developing newer and more exciting exhibits to attract an increasingly bored public with limited attention span and which wants to be stimulated. The exhibits at Jurassic World are even more dangerous than Yul Bryner in Westworld and create an even more thrilling experience than our best American Revolution or Civil War reenactments.

Jurassic World’s operations manager is Claire Dearing. She is apparently is best-known for wearing high heels and managing to keep them on no matter the circumstances…including when running for her life!  She has been referred to as a “business suit-clad executive” who refers to the dinosaurs as “assets.” She also is said to “describe the parks in terms of revenue, not awe.” She “spends most of her time… hosting potential sponsors.” Any resemblance to actual managers of destination tourism sites is entirely coincidental.

Lessons of Jurassic World

What are the lessons of Jurassic World for the New York history community? Contrary to the Flintstones and Raquel Welch, dinosaurs are not part of human history. Mastodons  (not mammoths) however, are. As previously discussed in New York History, they were present in the Hudson Valley and discoveries of mastodon bones were events of great significance in colonial times and early American history.  Mastodons posed important theological questions and helped dispel the accusation of America being an inferior land because it did not have the large beasts of the Old World.

While their remains have been discovered throughout the state including on Broadway, many of these discoveries occurred in Orange County. Museum Village along Route 17 displays mastodon bones and skeletons. The County Historian, a rare full-time position, has a degree in anthropology with a focus on the Orange County mastodon discoveries of the early 19th century. While the efforts to resurrect mammoths (mastodons) is still in the infancy stage, we should not overlook the appeal of mastodons, and their history, in tourism and education.

Another important lesson we can draw from Jurassic World is the importance of the blockbuster. This type of movie is distinctly different from the run-of-the-mill release. We are all familiar with museums launching blockbuster exhibits. The famous King Tut exhibit is perhaps the most well-known. A few years ago the New-York Historical Society had a blockbuster exhibit on Alexander Hamilton,an individual currently boffo Off-Broadway, soon to be on Broadway (I am attending the opening July 13 as will many members of the Alexander Hamilton Awareness Society), and now in the news for the wrong reasons.

In the Hudson Valley one of the biggest blockbusters has become Halloween. This is not the holiday of my childhood, but holidays are assets which can be leveraged into annual revenue streams. Consider this headline from last October:

Cashing in on Halloween: Holiday brings in tourists, money.

Historic Hudson Valley has made a decision to minimize its focus on traditional family weekend tourism and instead go all-out for blockbuster experiences. This means performances of the “Legend of Sleepy Hollow” at Halloween and “A Christmas Carol” at Christmas by Hudson Valley storyteller Jonathan Kruk and other events like Pirates of the Hudson (due to Johnny Depp) and Pinkster which has an historical basis.

The numbers speak for themselves. The visitors for these programs are over 100,000. The estimated average expenditure is $92 per person on dining, shopping, and lodging in addition to the ticket prices for the events. Rob Schweitzer, director of marketing for Historic Hudson Valley, estimates that one-third of the visitors stay overnight and make a long weekend of the visit. In other words, these events generate revenue – including tax revenue just as the Past through History is supposed to do.

Another lesson from Jurassic World is that size matters. Right now New York is undertaking the largest construction project in America: the new Tappan Zee Bridge. This massive project involves monstrous-size equipment and a daily chronicle of events. It even has a name: the Left Coast Lifter.  It also has a nickname: I Lift N.Y. Recently the Historical Society of Rockland County held a second boat tour on the River Rose, a Mississippi paddle wheeler, which included 125 people, many of who were shut out of the last tour. A local front-page newspaper headline read “TZB Tourists See History in the Making.”

Think about the wasted opportunity here by Rockland, by Westchester County which could have cruises from the Tarrytown side of the bridge, and by I Love NY to see I Lift N.Y. Imagine morning and afternoon tours and a sunset cruise during the summer. That is a potential for over 10,000 people month on the River Rose who besides paying the cost of the cruise may do other things while in Westchester, Rockland, or both. How difficult would it be to create a weekend program that included a cruise to see the biggest erector set in America, visit nearby historic sites, and have a meal on a scenic river boat or in the historic Old ‘76 House? Food, lodging, shopping, revenue, tax revenue. Let’s take advantage of the tourist opportunities which are staring us in the face.

One final lesson from Jurassic World is storytelling. Steven Spielberg has made a fortune by being a great storyteller and historic sites also have great stories to tell. They may be primarily for local consumption, like the stories families tell on Thanksgiving or other family occasions. These are the stories of community heritage which should be celebrated as part of the social fabric by the members of a local community. There are also are stories of state, national, and global significance which can be told as well.

The history community needs to become better storytellers, to use its site as a stage, to invite the audience to become part of the experience. Jurassic World is an artificial reality of special effects; we have the real world with real objects that can be touched and places that can be visited. Let’s perform our stories. Let’s tell our histories. Let’s bring the past to life our way.

Bring Back the Mastodons!

April 1, 2014
by Peter Feinman

It is time for New York State to boldly go where no state has gone before and go back to the future to resurrect the now extinct mastodon. The effort to bring the mammoth back from extinction recently was the cover article in the New York Times Sunday Magazine.

Russia and Japan are working to create mammoths. New York should not be left behind in the de-extinction race. I hereby challenge Governor Cuomo to launch a new “Manhattan Project” so we are the first to bring the paleolithic era to life through the creation of Mastodon Park, our own Ice Age animal, the mastodon. Continue reading “Bring Back the Mastodons!” →

The Social Fabric: To Knit or Not to Knit?

June 13, 2013
by Peter Feinman

The Delaware Company’s president John Conway (Sullivan County Historian), invited me to speak at the newly formed nonprofit’s inaugural fundraising gala this week at the historic Ardmore Mansion/Mountain View Manor, in Glen Spey, the day after the NYSHA annual conference in Cooperstown ended.

The mission of The Delaware Company is to promote and support the history and historic landmarks of the Upper Delaware River Valley through education, outreach, and fundraising. Also speaking were U.S. Representative Chris Gibson and NYS Legislator Aileen Gunther. The audience consisted of various county and local officials, municipal historians, historic organizations, and at least one teacher, a true sampling of the history community in the region. Continue reading “The Social Fabric: To Knit or Not to Knit?” →

A Fork In The Path Through History

February 4, 2013
by Peter Feinman

On January 25, I attended the Mid-Hudson regional meeting of the Path through History project. What follows is my report on the meeting which may, or may not, be the experience and take-away of others who attended (or what is happening in other regions). The Mid-Hudson Valley region includes the Hudson River counties of Westchester, Putnam, Dutchess, Ulster, Orange, and Rockland, along with Sullivan County in the Catskills. Continue reading “A Fork In The Path Through History” →

Mary McTamaney:Archive Month, The Economy, and Irene

October 3, 2011
by Peter Feinman

October is Archive Month in New York State. The celebration raises several issues regarding the meaning of archives in state history: financial, technological, and promotional. Continue reading “Mary McTamaney:Archive Month, The Economy, and Irene” →