The Imperial War Museum in London is pretty much my favorite museum in the world. But I’ve been there often enough over the past few years that last month I looked for new ways to enjoy familiar exhibits on the wars of the 20th century. Soon I found myself noticing how many artifacts were connected … More Childhood and the World Wars
Today I’m helping to host the 2019 Minnesota Undergraduate History Symposium, an annual one-day conference that features the research of students from church-related colleges in the Upper Midwest. We’ve got about 45 students from 12 schools presenting on a dozen panels throughout the day. But we opened with a plenary session on “The Future of … More Saturday’s Podcast: The Future of Public History
Sam and I are back from our Thanksgiving to talk through the next stop on our “World Wars in Western Europe” tour: Paris, France. After trying to decide whether or not Paris is our favorite city in the world — and why American college students rarely recognize it as anything like a contender for that … More Thursday’s Podcast: Paris
The fourth season of The Pietist Schoolman Podcast is here! Today Sam and I started our four-episode travelogue. After reflecting on the origins of the “World Wars in Western Europe” tour that we’ll be leading in June 2019, we took turns sharing our favo(u)rite memorial, museum, masterpiece, and meal from the great city of London, England. (I … More Thursday’s Podcast: London
As you might have noticed yesterday, I enjoy fusing my interests in history and travel. Besides writing about Moravian Bethlehem, I’ve used this blog to share images and thoughts from trips to the Blue Ridge Mountains, the former Western Front, and a few of the many historic sites I’ve taken our kids over the years. (And to … More Looking for Some Historic Sites to Visit This Summer?
Over the weekend I took the long way from Washington, DC to New Haven, CT in order to spend an hour in an 18th century outpost of Pietism in America. In 1741 Moravian emigrants came to the North American colony of Pennsylvania. It had been almost twenty years since Moravian refugees had first settled on the … More Moravian Bethlehem
I’ve written before that “I’ve dreaded the day I’ll finally need to write a chapter or two on [Charles] Lindbergh’s response to the rise of Nazi Germany.” That concern came back to mind yesterday, when I visited the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum and went through the temporary exhibit on “Americans and the Holocaust.” About halfway … More Was Charles Lindbergh Anti-Semitic?
So much for the idea that Americans don’t care about their past. One of the hashtags trending today on Twitter complained about the dangers of #ErasingHistory: Is it wrong if I watch these morons kicking a statue & wish they'd break a toe or two? 😒#HeritageNotHate#DurhamNC#Durham#ErasingHistory https://t.co/LRGqDYXml6 — 🐸 RedPills4All 🇺🇸 (@RedPills4All171) August 15, 2017 … More How History Is Actually Erased
It’s not quite the “forgotten war” that the Korean War is, but World War I is certainly overshadowed in American memory by WWII, the Civil War, Vietnam, and the Revolutionary War. Nevertheless, the United States’ relatively short involvement in “the Great War” intersected with some of the most significant social, cultural, political, and economic shifts in American history. And now … More Go See the WW1 America Exhibit!
Next month is a big one for Americans with an interest in World War I, since it marks the 100th anniversary of the U.S. belatedly joining that war. Here in St. Paul, for example, I’ll be taking a group of Bethel students to the April 8th opening of WW1 America, a major new exhibit from the … More Commemorating Catastrophe: Jay Winter on Remembering WWI
The Pietist Schoolman 