History Commons^™

Juanita Stout Ray: Life On The Frontier, A 20th Century Latter-Day Saint Woman's Life, Karen Glenn, John Murphy, Elspeth Rayback-Maxwell, Hallie Davidson

Faculty Publications

This exhibit explores the life of Juanita Stout Ray (1891-1954), a Latter-day Saint woman whose journals, letters, photographs, and family records provide a rare and intimate view of women's experiences in the early twentieth-century American West. Born in southern Utah and raised in a polygamous family, Ray spent part of her childhood in the Mormon colonies of northern Mexico before her family fled during the Mexican Revolution. Her life was shaped by many of the defining events of her era, including revolution, pandemic, economic hardship, world war, migration, and profound personal loss.

The exhibit traces Ray's experiences as a teacher, …

Patriotism, Philia, And Stereotyping During World War Ii: Correspondence Between Black Composers, Selise Phillips, Joi Carr

Seaver College Research And Scholarly Achievement Symposium

The 20th century was a monumental time for Black composers, especially for those in the UK. Rudolph Dunbar was the first black musician to perform at Royal Albert Hall in London, England. During this time, correspondence between him and William Grant Still, a famous black composer based in America, exists. Still’s rhetorical choices in these letters demonstrate the attitudes of these composers, specifically Still, and how these choices reflect the success of Dunbar’s career. Still, whose compositions started gaining traction in the 1930s, often praised Dunbar for his achievements. These letters all take place during World War II and during …

Black Migration From Arkansas To Detroit: The Promise Of Prosperity, Justin Ripley

ATU Scholars Symposium

This presentation examines the experiences of Arkansans in the Great Migration of African Americans from the U.S. South during the twentieth century. My research examines Detroit, Michigan census records spanning from 1900-1950 along with archival records from Wayne State University’s Walter P. Reuther Library and Archives of Labor and Urban Affairs. These records tell a story that highlights and reveals the struggles along with familiar patterns which define migration experiences that many southern African American laborers faced in migrating to northern industrial cities such as Detroit. This presentation aims to reveal how African Americans adjusted and overcame trials while simultaneously …

Belle Époque French Fashion: Understanding French Clothing Labels In Historical American Media, Meg E. Smith

Scholars Week

A period of French prosperity know as the Belle Epoque followed the Franco-Prussain War from 1871-1914. Within this time, Parisian Fashion would blossom and flourish with couturiers, fashion designers, rising in fame and influence within textile and clothing markets. Credit to this prosperity can be given to the second industrial revolution, the end of a long depression, and a dominating industry of luxury market goods production in tandem with a sharp increase in foreign trade. Foreign media, such as American newspapers, would display the array of reactions to the success of Parisian styles. Retail progression and the commercialization of leisure …

Fragments Of Time: The Legacy Of Luna Kaufman, Ariel Espinoza Collantes

Cohort 2025-2026

Ariel Espinoza is a Junior in the Honors Program at Seton Hall University, majoring in Political Science with a minor in Legal Studies in Business. Her project explores the life and legacy of Luna Kaufman, a Holocaust survivor, educator, and arts advocate, through archival research conducted at Seton Hall. Using a podcast format, Ariel examines how Kaufman’s experiences shaped her commitment to music, theater, and cultural preservation, and how she used the arts as a means of promoting memory, resilience, and understanding. Ariel's work highlights the role of archives as “time machines,” showing how the past continues to inform the …

Jewish Resistance: Lions Not Lambs, Jacob Stein

Undergraduate Research Symposium

Characterized often as being led like lambs to the slaughter, Jews during the Shoah are further degraded by the myth that they never fought back. This research intends to investigate and track the myriad forms of resistance Jews partook in against the Nazi regime, from the ghetto wars to revolts within the death camps themselves there are countless acts of heroism and rebellion to be found in first hand accounts. By highlighting these moments the idea of Jewish passivity can be laid to rest.

Stonewall:The Spark Of Queer Culture, Mariah M. Geisler

Undergraduate Research Symposium

The rebellion classified as Stonewall didn’t birth the gay liberation movement but spread it farther than it had gone before. Stonewall challenged people’s understanding of the laws pertaining to gender expression. The history was portrayed as being a reflection of white centralism, while the reality is that the event was built off the backs of racial minorities. Through a further understanding of 1960s gay counterculture, people can better realize the reasons for Stonewall. Stonewall was the historical event that popularized the spread of gay liberation movements, it gave people hope for a more accepting future. The present still feels the …

King’S Wigwam: Atlanta’S Forgotten Black Summer Resort, Andrew J. Bramlett, Seneca Vaught

Symposium of Student Scholars

From 1915 to 1920, the only summer resort for Black Atlantans was King’s Wigwam, located north of the small farming community of Kennesaw. Situated on over forty acres owned by Auburn Avenue entrepreneur Cornelius King, the summer resort saw a host of notable visitors during its short five years of existence. During the 1919 season, a guest named Bertram Hamilton was falsely accused of rape in nearby Cherokee County. He was taken to the county jail as an angry mob gathered. The county sheriff, who had been part of the mob that lynched Leo Frank four years before, believed Hamilton …

From Directory To Database, Simeon A. Betapudi

SPARK Symposium Presentations

Using Optical Character Recognition (OCR) technology, I attempted to scrape Memphis City Directories images into text and to sort that data into an organized data table. While the project was ultimately unsuccessful, the purpose of the project extended beyond an organized data table. Incorporating interdisciplinary elements - in this project, a data science skillset - into historical research has become a useful, if not essential, aspect of the discipline of history. The second half of the presentation deals with the idea of the changing role of history after the advent of big data.

Leiker Sabbatical 2022, James Leiker

Sabbatical Projects

Attached is the Power Point describing Jim Leiker's sabbatical project from 2022. This was a research project on the history of Kansas for a publication with University of Kansas Press.

Selected Artificial Intelligence Provisions In U.S. Fiscal Year 2025 National Defense Authorization Act, Bert Chapman

Libraries Faculty and Staff Presentations

The 2025 Fiscal Year National Defense Authorization Act contains multiple provisions relating to artificial intelligence (AI). These congressionally mandated provisions direct various sections of the Department of Defense (DOD) and individual U.S. armed service branches to execute congressional intent for AI policymaking. Examples of such intent include identifying and planning DOD's AI workforce, demonstrating AI biotechnology applications for national security, improving the human usability of AI systems, and establishing an AI security center. This presentation will note that reports on these initiatives must be prepared for relevant congressional oversight committees, and, in many cases, are in many cases, publicly released …

Emma Ody Pohl: The Untold Story Of “Miss Mscw” And Her Influence On Southern White Women, Anna Sandlin

Undergraduate Research Conference

I conducted an in-depth research project on Emma Ody Pohl, the Director of Physical Education at Mississippi University for Women from 1908 to 1955. I wanted to highlight Pohl's significance on her students and the college. I used the records, letters, and documents in the Pohl Papers at the Beulah Culbertson Archives and Special Collections to analyze Pohl's importance and create a biography of her time at the college. I also conducted further research into the idea of Southern White Womanhood throughout the twentieth century. Through this information, it is evident that the life and teaching of Emma Ody Pohl …

Researching The U.S. Senate Presidential Nominee Confirmation Process, Bert Chapman

Libraries Faculty and Staff Presentations

The beginning of 2025 has seen renewed public attention and emphasis on the constitutionally mandated U.S. Senate confirmation process. This stems from the beginning of the second Trump Administration as its nominees navigate this process. The presentation provides historical background on this process, demonstrates what nominees, Senate oversight committees, and the full Senate in administering this process and enables readers to find out how to access information resources documenting this process. The confirmation process continues throughout presidential administrations and may involve little public attention and controversy or acute public attention and controversy. The contrasting 2025 confirmation experiences of Secretary of …

Weeding Out Dishonesty: Rhetoric And Information Literacy For The Age Of Disinformation, Victoria M. Tischio

Georgia International Conference on Information Literacy

We live in what some call a post-fact world where what is presented as true becomes true and circulates widely. Politicians lie because they have calculated that they gain more than they lose, and media outlets repeat those lies because they profit from them (Adair 2024). Fear and suspicion make individuals vulnerable to these lies (Young 2017). Like an invasive species, it is nearly impossible to eradicate these lies once released into the media ecosystem. While fake news is not new (think P.T. Barnum and 17th-century canards), its virulence has reached epidemic proportions, infiltrating all aspects of society. This constitutes …

Federal Election Commission And Indiana Secretary Of State Campaign Finance Information Resoures, Bert Chapman

Libraries Faculty and Staff Presentations

This presentation covers campaign finance information resources produced by the Federal Election Commission (FEC) and Indiana Secretary of State. It describes how these agencies began, details how they oversee and regulate U.S. federal and Indiana state elections, and documents contributions made by individuals, organizations, political parties, and political action committees to individual candidates and organizations. Reporting documentation on these election races is also included.

Your History Department & America 250, Christy L. Spurlock

Faculty/Staff Personal Papers

"Your History Department and America 250," a presentation made at the Ohio Valley History Conference, hosted by Austin Peay State University.

Dr. Christy Spurlock, Education Curator at the KY Museum, has hosted several America 250 programs and offers practical suggestions for history departments wanting to host programming.

Scla 521 Ai In Society, Bert Chapman

Libraries Faculty and Staff Presentations

Provides access to information resources on societal impacts of artificial intelligence from multiple libraries databases covering multiple disciplines including government information resources.

Podcasts Reclaim Literature By Women: A Comparative Study, Joanne E. Gates

Presentations, Proceedings & Performances

This presentation samples some prominent podcasts which highlight my longtime academic specialty, literature by women. At least three podcasts on Individual writers, Emily Dickinson, Zelda Fitzgerald, and Elizabeth Robins receive attention. At least two podcast series that examine collections of women writers deserve acknowledgment. These are: Lost Ladies of Lit hosted by Amy Helmes and Kim Askew in Los Angeles and one sponsored by Women's Fiction Writers Association, the Debut Author Podcast hosted by novelist Maggie Smith, "Hear Us Roar." I am interested in not only the content and how it is presented, but the ease of use and reach …

The Plague Of Athens, Cameron Drylie

Student Academic Conference

The purpose of this study is to use historical analysis, biology, and linguistics to evaluate the reason one of early humanity's greatest civilizations fell. 449 BC marked the end of the Greco-Persian War and the crowning of two new dominate city-states in the Mediterranean, Athens and Sparta. The tensions of these two ideologically different civilizations rose for eighteen years before the two clashed in the bloodiest conflict the world had ever seen at the time. Led by the great Pericles, Athens struggled to resist the most powerful land force of the time, causing him to retreat into the city walls. …

Recognizing Traps And Frightening Wolves: Foxes And Lions As A Representative Of Machiavellian Political Ideology In Shakespeare’S Comedies, Grace A. Powell

Student Scholar Showcase

While William Shakespeare’s plays and sonnets have been discussed time and time again over the past few centuries, one topic that has been less traversed is the connection between his Comedies and Niccolò Machiavelli’s political ideologies. This project will explore references of lions and foxes in Shakespeare’s Comedies and the leaders and monarchs within them to determine how beliefs about Machiavelli’s political ideology influenced Shakespeare’s literature and became symbols for leadership and power. This project will be important for gaining historical context on Machiavellian political discourse and how it was represented in the contemporary dramatic literature of William Shakespeare. I …

U.S. Government Agency Podcasts, Bert Chapman

Libraries Faculty and Staff Presentations

Presents podcasts from U.S. Government agencies which can be discovered through the U.S. Government Publishing Office's Catalog of Government Publications. Agencies whose podcasts are presented include the National Institutes of Health, U.S. Peace Corps, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Government Accountability Office (GAO), National Park Service, Department of Justice, Federal Reserve System, and U.S. Naval War College.

Searching Govinfo.Gov/, Bert Chapman

Libraries Faculty and Staff Presentations

This U.S. Government Publishing Office (GPO) database provides access to information legal, legislative, and regulatory information produced on multiple subjects by the U.S. Government. Content includes congressional bills, congressional committee hearings and prints (studies), reports on legislation, the text of laws, regulations, and executive orders and multiple U.S. Government information resources covering subjects from accounting to zoology.

Frozen In Time: The History Of Frozen Food In America During The 1940s To 1950s, Mahyoub N. Gobah

The Exposition

Frozen foods are a powerhouse when it comes to the food industry. In 2020 Frozen foods registered $65.1 billion in US retail sales, which marked a 21% increase when compared to the previous year. Frozen foods have always been big and popular, and they are available in most stores around the world. The history of frozen foods can explain how they became a powerhouse in the present day. Frozen foods history started with the Clarence Birdseye. Clarence Birdseye is considered the founder of the modern frozen food industry; he was able to invent a new way to freeze food. The …

Poetic Portraits Of Older Women In The Great Black Swamp, Sandra L. Faulkner

ICS Fellow Lectures

Dr. Faulkner discusses the importance of oral histories and listening to older women by presenting poetic portraits of older women in the Bowling Green area that she co-created from oral histories. This was a collaborative project with The Wood County Committee on Aging, the BGSU archives, and local women Faulkner interviewed about their experiences across their life course and contributions to our community. These poetic portraits and oral histories will be archived at the BGSU libraries for all of us to learn from.

Pathways To Discovery: Exploring Transdisciplinary Learning With Primary Sources, Matthew Strandmark

Library Presentations

No abstract provided.

Summarizing Tribal Histories Using Chatgpt, Cynthia Prescott

AI Assignment Library

Students summarize a previously-completed research-based writing assignment. They then ask ChatGPT to produce a summary on the same topic, and compare the results generated.

Harry And The Rómulos: Relations Between The United States And Venezuela, 1946-1948, Ross Seidenschwarz, John Linn

ATU Scholars Symposium

This presentation briefly explores diplomatic relations between the United States and Venezuela during the period 1945 and 1948. While these years may seem arbitrary to United States historians, within Venezuela the three years were noted for a brief period of democracy, sandwiched between two periods of authoritarian rule. Known as the Trienio in Venezuelan history, the national government was headed by Rómulo Betancourt from October 1945 to February 1948 and Rómulo Gallegos from February to November 1948. Within the United States, this time period corresponds with parts of the first and second administrations of Harry S. Truman. This time period …

The Media Intervenes: Tulsa's 1921 Massacre And The Destruction Of The Greenwood District, Maclain M. Wheeler

ATU Scholars Symposium

This scholarly presentation and research paper focuses on the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre, specifically the ways in which the media progressed and intensified the events the Greenwood community faced. A vibrant community filled with opportunity and promise, Greenwood welcomed any African American who accepted its warm embrace. Ransacked and burned to the ground within two days, Greenwood residents were forced to reckon with the destruction. Greenwood became unrecognizable. Properties and possessions that had taken people many years to acquire were gone within a matter of hours. The framing put forth by the Tulsa Tribune provoked much of the white public …

U.S. Government Information Resources For Accountability On U.S. Assistance To Ukraine, Bert Chapman

Libraries Faculty and Staff Presentations

Provides detailed coverage of U.S. Government information resources documenting accountability for U.S. civilian and military assistance to Ukraine. Includes U.S. laws, agencies involved in U.S. arms export policy, Defense Department resources and data, Defense Dept. Inspector General reports, Government Accountability Office reports, congressional committee hearings, a letter from a congressional committee to the Secretaries of Defense and State and U.S. Agency for International Development administrator, congressional debate, and congressional recorded votes.

Facets Of Feminist Biography, Joanne E. Gates

Presentations, Proceedings & Performances

This is a brief overview of how I continue to be engaged with research on Elizabeth Robins in the context of other women writers, post-retirement. The presentation's subtitle might be phrased as "From my study of the one-woman show in graduate school to creative and poetic approaches as emerita researcher." I maintain the Elizabeth Robins Web at JSU and have presented two papers (virtually at recent SAMLA conferences) since leaving the classroom. I outline several of my creative approaches to women's biography through my academic career. I am particularly interested in the format of several poetry collections that piece together …