Historic New Orleans Collection

New Orleans, LA

A Dollop of History in Every Bite

The Historic New Orleans Collection created a dynamic culinary preservation project entitled: A Dollop of History: An Oral History Project to Preserve the Culinary Heritage of New Orleans. The project was funded through a grant from The History Channel. This oral history exploration continues to invite students to conduct intergenerational conversations in which they can learn more about the culinary roots of their families and communities. The project artifacts, including video and audio recordings, recipes and photographs, will be saved and permanently archived at The Historic New Orleans Collection. The gathered information will be used in creating a cookbook that will be nationally distributed and that will serve as a historical record.

Paul Wilgenkamp, Minnesauke Elementary School

East Setauket, NY

Teaching from the Grave

The Three Village Historical Society teamed up with Paul Wilgenkamp's sixth grade class at Minnesauke Elementary School on the project, Teaching from the Grave, a local preservation project at a historic cemetery. The students used hands-on research to collect data and then used this data to draw conclusions and present findings in the form of Document Based Questions (DBQs.) The historical society and the elementary school worked additionally with local historians, Cablevision and government officials in order to bring this project together.

The Friendship Fire Department

Silsby, NY

The Silsby Restoration Project

The Friendship Fire Department based in Friendship, NY, undertook the Silsby Restoration Project, focused on preserving the first pieces of fire equipment purchased by the community in 1881. The community worked to preserve a Silsby steam powered fire pump, a hose cart, 1,000 feet of 2" fire hose, and a pre-heater for the steamer. This is the only community in New York State that still has the original pieces of fire fighting equipment purchased by their ancestors. This project united the community, involving almost all of the students at The Friendship Central School as well as community leaders and local historians. The students have helped with fundraising in addition to helping with the actual restoration, research, recording and photographing.

Crossville High School

Crossville, AL

The ninth-graders of Crossville High School located in Crossville, Alabama, worked with Landmarks of DeKalb County to preserve and record oral history. Together, they worked to find WWII veterans in the local area and proceeded to record these veterans' histories and stories on videotape. Landmarks of DeKalb County specializes in bringing awareness to the historical significance of the area. They are currently working to create a video memoir of the country's WWII veterans.

Discovery Middle School

Madison, AL

Mooresville Walking Tour

The Discovery Middle School of Madison, AL, worked with the Madison Historical Society, the Town of Mooresville, and the Madison African-American Alliance Group on the Mooresville Save Our History Project. These students worked as volunteers for Mooresville's Walking Tour, donating their time to research and coordinating a Children's Section, complete with "traveling trunks" filled with books and kits and activities that create another layer of history and a unique way of learning about the town for visitors--particularly kids.

Alta-Dutch Flat Elementary School

Alta, CA

Dutch Flat: An Old Town Through Young Eyes

The Alta-Dutch Flat Elementary School in Alta, CA, worked with the Golden Drift Historical Society on Dutch Flat: An Old Town Through Young Eyes. Third graders interviewed members of the adult community about various historical sites, hoping to preserve the history of their community through interviews and recordings.

City Life Downtown Charter School

Los Angeles, CA

Sacred Spaces of Wilshire Boulevard

The City Life Downtown Charter School in Los Angeles, CA, partnered with the Los Angeles Conservancy to work on the Sacred Spaces of Wilshire Boulevard project, a project that focused on learning about a number of different religious, historical institutions in the area. The entire school participated, taking field trips to these churches and temples, taking photographs, making sketches, writing in their journals, and doing research about these places.

Lewiston High School

Lewiston, ID

The 5th Street Cemetery Necrogeographical Study

A group of seventh graders at Lewiston High School in Lewiston, Idaho worked with the City of Lewiston and Nez Perce County Historical Society on the The 5th Street Cemetery Necrogeographical Study, plotting and mapping the graves of those who had been originally buried in one cemetery before their remains were transferred to a new site in the 1890s. These students used ground-penetrating radar to find out new information about these gravesites, searching records in primary sources and conducting radar and magnetic induction surveys.

Honey Creek Middle School

Terre Haute, IN

Holocaust History Project

The Honey Creek Middle School in Terre Haute, IN, worked with the Candles Holocaust Museum on the Holocaust History Project which involved eighth-grade students writing poems, making a mobile, interviewing a local Holocaust survivor, Eva Kor; and writing reports. Additionally, the students helped clean Holocaust posters that were saved from the previous building that was destroyed by a fire.

Bartlett Middle School

Lowell , MA

Lowell Spindle City Heritage Trail Activity

The eighth-graders of Bartlett Middle School in Lowell, Massachusetts, chose to work with the Lowell National Historical Park and UMass Lowell to research and produce an activity guide entitled Lowell: The Spindle City Heritage Trail Activity that will eventually be available to the National Park for the use of family visitors and to the Lowell Public Schools. The Heritage Trail will include the Bartlett Middle School which happens to be located in "The Acre," a neighborhood for successive waves of immigrant workers in Lowell's textile mills in a historic district. The students have conducted oral interviews, researched key buildings, taken digital photographs, written interpretive texts, and created site-based activities.

Phoenix Learning Center

Buffalo, MN

Traveling History and the Rural Life Exhibit Stanchions

The Phoenix Learning Center in Buffalo, Minnesota worked with the Wright County Historical Society on their project, Traveling History and the Rural Life Exhibit Stanchions. This involved designing and building 15 stanchions, doing research, planning, asking for donations, interviewing community members, taking photos all around the county, and preparing the traveling display for Wright County's 150th anniversary.

Parkway South High School

Ballwin, MO

We Can Take It (Traveling Trunks)

54 students at Parkway South High School in Ballwin, Missouri, participated in a project, We Can Take It, in coordination with the National Civilian Conservation Corps Museum to create "traveling trunks." The students collected artifacts to create a traveling trunk to visit students across the country who might not have the opportunity to visit the museum.

Mississippi School for Math and Science

Columbus, MS

Tales from the Crypt

The energetic high school students at the Mississippi School for Math and Science took a unique approach to uncovering their town's local history through an original performance entitled Tales from the Crypt. With guidance from their drama and history teachers, along with staff at local archives, the students pored through primary documents such as courthouse records in order to develop original scripts drawing upon the local histories and biographies of those buried in the town's Friendship Cemetery.

Washington Senior High School

Washington Court House, OH

Bloomingburg Cemetery Preservation Project

The students of Washington Senior High School worked on the Bloomingburg Cemetery Preservation Project to compile a history of the cemetery, inventory veterans' headstones, and complete the "Network for Freedom" application for the cemetery. The school worked with both the Bloomingburg Cemetery Trustees and the National Park Services "Network for Freedom." The students identified the identities of some of the unmarked graves, applied for funds to purchase a historical marker for the cemetery and created a pamphlet.

Liberty High School

Bethlehem, PA

Illick's Mill Restoration Project

Over the past four years, more than 100 juniors and seniors of Liberty High School in Bethlehem, PA, have helped in restoring Illick's Mill through the Illick's Mill Partnership for Environmental Education, a non-profit organization run almost entirely by the students themselves. These students are working on the Illick's Mill Restoration Project in a variety of ways. They write business letters and grant applications, maintain a website, make PowerPoint presentations, give slide shows and speeches, and balance the budget.

Seattle, WA

Preserving the Kong Yick

The third grade students of Wing Luke Elementary School in Seattle, Washington, worked with the Wing Luke Asian Museum on Preserving the Kong Yick, investigating the history of the old Kong Yick building in Seattle's Chinatown district. The class conducted oral history interviews of former residents and business people. The students photographed the building and wrote about their experiences, eventually producing their own book with the help of a book artist, entitled, Coming Together: The Kong Yick. Many of these students are first or second generation immigrants to the U.S. and the immigrant past of the building seemed to interest and motivate the students to learn and understand more about its history.

Roane County High School

Spencer, WV

Stories All Around Us

One tenth grade class at Roane County High School of Spencer, West Virginia, chose to work with the local Hill and Hollow Garden Club to raise community awareness and appreciation of the community's heritage. The class began by visiting the State Museum of Culture and History, conducting research in the archives. They then designed an ad campaign for their project, entitled, Stories All Around Us, and developed and distributed Heritage Resource Surveys. They contacted those who responded and designed a system for archiving and displaying the information that had been collected.