Adam Arenson

Review of Empire's Edge: American Society in Nome, Alaska 1898-1934 by Preston Jones

Adam Arenson — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 11:04:12 PST

A review of Empire's Edge: American Society in Nome, Alaska 1898-1934, an extremely valuable portrait of an Alaskan community, seemingly on the edge of the world but dreaming of itself as an ordinary American town.

The Double Life of St. Louis: Narratives of Origins and Maturity in Wade's Urban Frontier

Adam Arenson — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 13:32:13 PDT

A half-century after Richard C. Wade's landmark history The Urban Frontier: The Rise of Western Cities, 1790-1830, this retrospective essay considers the development of St. Louis in relation to evolving notions of the frontier as a space of intercultural encounter, and the maturation of a city economically in relation to its cultural and political conflicts. It reviews the scholarship on the city of St. Louis since Wade wrote, and suggests new avenues in the city's history.

The Cultural Civil War: St. Louis and the Failures of Manifest Destiny

Adam Arenson — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 21:40:32 PDT

In the mid-nineteenth century, the conflict to define the promises of Manifest Destiny and the reach of slavery politics ignited a cultural civil war between advocates of the North, South and West, a conflict decades in coming and generations more in consequence. Throughout, St. Louis uniquely mirrored the nation's regional, political, and ethnic diversity, and its leaders tried, briefly succeeded, but ultimately failed to steer the course of the nation toward those solutions advocated by the West. This "Gateway to the West," situated on the frontier of slavery, reveals the forgotten western agenda, essential to understanding the Civil War era beyond the clash of North and South.

Saving the Bank's Artistic Assets

Adam Arenson — Sun, 26 Apr 2009 12:51:34 PDT

Save some memorable banks! For three decades, Millard Sheets and his studio artists created mosaics, murals, and sculptures for the Home Savings banks in California. Sold in 1999 to Washington Mutual, some of the locations were decommissioned as banks. Now, with the sale of Washington Mutual to Chase being completed, this artwork is again under threat. Historians, preservationists, and partisans of public art should work to identify and preserve these unique looks at California's history and memory.

Celebrate their freedom, not the ugly case bearing their name

Adam Arenson — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 15:49:13 PDT

One hundred fifty years ago, Chief Justice Roger Taney announced the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Dred Scott v. Sanford. Yet then something changed the lives of Dred and Harriet Scott and their daughters, Eliza and Lizzie, at least as much as the Dred Scott decision did: They became free. The day should come when their emancipation is more celebrated than their court defeat is observed.

The Power of Oklahoma City

Adam Arenson — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 15:33:56 PDT
I can't remember what I was doing at 9:02 a.m. Central Time, on April 19th, 1995, when the bombing happened. It was a Wednesday. How did I hear? I think I knew of the tragic events only later in the day. I did not stand around the television that morning, as I and so many did on 9/11. Last week, a business meeting took me to Oklahoma for the first time. The impact of the memorial was instant and visceral. The memorial works. And my hopes for such a successful memorial at the World Trade Center site are fading. I pray that those in New York can succeed at this unwanted task at the level that Oklahoma City has.

Blog Posts and Interviews

Adam Arenson — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 15:13:14 PDT
Ongoing contributions on the resources and methods of writng engaging history. See posts and podcast interviews.

Ansel Adams's Eucalyptus Tree, Fort Ross: Nature, Photography, and the Search for California

Adam Arenson — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 15:01:50 PDT
This article considers the image of California evoked in the unusual Ansel Adams photograph Eucalyptus Tree, Fort Ross, California (1969), a Polaroid Land image of the garrison fence and an aged eucalyptus tree. Considering the participation of Russian occupation, Australian cross-pollination, Carleton Watkins's early photographs of redwoods, automotive and tourist images in the creation of this distinctive California place, the article argues that to understand Ansel Adams's work, we must not remember his Yosemite images and forget him at Fort Ross. Eucalyptus Tree, Fort Ross, California is still beautiful even as it jars the human presence back into the frame. California--vast, sprawling, variegated--can only be contained in an accretion of images, emotions, and people, as their hopes, their dreams, and their fears form this puzzle of a place.

The Role of the Nossa Senhora Aparecida Festival in Creating Brazilian American Community

Adam Arenson — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 14:51:37 PDT
Once a year, the Brazilians who live in the Boston area come together at St. Anthony Church in Cambridge to celebrate the festival of Nossa Senhora Aparecida (Our Lady who has Appeared), view the statue of the Virgin Mary that has brought miracles to the people of Brazil, and honor to this patroness. The festival, attended by hundreds, is primarily religious but also seems to have important cultural aspects. Is there a Brazilian community? If so, what role does this festival play? The researcher attended the festival in 1997, providing questionnaires in Portuguese and English, taking photographs, and arranging to interview the parish priest. With references to studies of the Brazilian community in New York city, he determined that the festival plays an important celebratory role for a Brazilian community that is mostly hidden but not nonexistent, a group of people who maintain ties to Brazil through interacting with each other, worshipping together, and speaking Portuguese, carving out a distinctive space despite issues of immigration law and the influence of the other Luso-American communities in the Boston area.

Libraries in Public before the Age of Public Libraries: Interpreting the Furnishings and Design of Athenaeums and Other 'Social Libraries,' 1800-1860

Adam Arenson — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 13:40:04 PST
Before public libraries became common in the United States, both elite and striving men sought out social libraries to read business newspapers, attend lectures, appreciate art and good company, and generally learn or relish in respectability. For single male clerks living in rented rooms, the library served as a crucial "third place," away from home and work, where sociability and education could flourish. This chapter describes how elements of the private library, the parlor, and the bookstore informed the furnishing and design of the social library. It reveals how the spaces were intended to be utilized--and what legacies remained for the design of public libraries.