All right. Hi, everyone. Welcome back to the forum webinar series. My name is Priya Chai, and I'm the Associate Director of Content for the National Trust for Historic Preservation. In case you don't know, Preservation Leadership Forum is the professional membership program of the National Trust. This webinar series is made possible by members of Preservation Leadership Forum, and we sincerely thank all of you who are with us today. Today's webinar is the second of a series that we are calling Women Are Essential. This series focuses on interpreting the complexity of women's history and identity at historic places. For today's webinar, we will focus on interpretive strategies that reveal women are everywhere, which is the subheading for this webinar. We hope you will come away from this session with an appreciation of the historic impact of women, as well as some clear strategies and case studies to shape a fuller and more honest American story. But before we begin, bear a few technical logistics. We will take questions from the audience during the webinar. Please send questions via the Q&A function directly to the panel list that's located on the bottom black bar of your Zoom panel. You're welcome to submit at any point during the webinar, but we will be waiting until the Q&A section at the end to answer. However, you're encouraged to communicate with other participants through the chat function, or you can, if you have an issue, you can chat with me directly through the chat function as well. There's also closed captioning enabled for this webinar. Just select that at the bottom of your screen. Following this program, we'll send out a recording of today's webinar directly to the email you used to register, along with some additional information. And finally, all forum webinars are archived in our forum webinar library. And now, I'd like to turn things over to Chris Morris, Senior Feudal Director and Manager for the campaign for where women made history at the National Trust for Historic Preservation. Hey, Priya. Thank you so much. And thanks to all of you who joined us today for what I know is going to be a really illuminating conversation that's going to change the way that you think about historic places and challenge you to see women as omnipresent and vital to the actors who have shaped our history and our future. As Priya mentioned, I'm Chris Morris. And in addition to my role as Senior Field Director here in Los Angeles, California, I've had the honor of managing the National Trust campaign for where women made history over the last year and a half. Next slide, please. The National Trust for where women made history is a direct manifestation of the National Trust's commitment to tell a more full, truthful, inequitable American story. The trust and in particularly my colleague Priya have long been committed to recognizing and elevating women's roles in our work. So this year we've taken a much more focused and systematic approach to elevating and promoting the achievements of women and supporting the next generation of women preservation leaders. Virtually every aspect of our programmatic work from our grant making to our historic sites, our corporate partnerships to our annual list of 11 most endangered places, our advocacy efforts, our storytelling and our hands on preservation experience, also known as Hope Crew, and other endangered women in ways that also attempt to honor the complexity and intersectionality of their many identities. I hope you'll take some time after today's training to explore the projects, sites, people and stories of women's achievement that are featured on our website. And if you missed our first webinar back in June on strategies for seeing women in every place, don't worry, we'll be sending all registrants a link to both webinars and their companion in depth resource guides later this week. We'll be developing some additional information in the near future that will be featured on forum. So please look for all of that information in your inboxes. Next slide please. And now it's my honor to introduce our moderator for today. Come on and join us Heather, Dr Heather Hyke. Heather is not only the author of the recent book doing women's history in public, which you can see behind her and also on the screen. She's an educator and a staunch advocate for women's history. She's been leading the charge to reveal the essential roles that half the population have played in influencing every aspect of our society. She has worked with the National Park Service, her leadership of the National Collaborative for Women's History sites. Heather has been instrumental in showing historic sites how to see, reveal and communicates women women's presence for decades. And she is the ideal person to frame the issues and moderate our conversation today. Heather, take it away. Thank you so much Chris, and welcome everyone. Historic sites preserve so much evidence of past women, places where we can learn so much history. Unfortunately, historic sites have unevenly absorbed the dramatically enlarged knowledge of the history of American women. Our understanding of how our population remains profoundly distorted. Our history is more than colonial sermons and Civil War battles. This trust national trust seminar showcases three sites working to remedy our inadequate understanding. Our first webinar next slide. Our first webinar women are essential new ways of seeing women in every historic place showed women present at every historic site. We argued that we must respect their history, recognize their sites importance. We recognize that they must know their significance, knowledge base and tangible resources. As Salem, Massachusetts, an altered doorway and long lost pins and symbols provided evidence for a little recognized female economy. Pictures at Frederick Douglass's home reflected his staunch support for women's rights. The cemetery quit just above Paulie Murray's family home exemplifies structural racism places teach us. Next, today's webinar features women at and historic sites at different stages of transformation, showing how they are changing their dominant narratives to profoundly diverse ones. Ones that recognize the impressive variety of women's lives. When we encounter women on their own terms, we appreciate their commonalities antagonisms and complexities. We get to know them. This webinar emphasizes how research, restorations and new interpretive exhibits are reinvigorating historic sites. In Montana, Nancy Russell expertly marketed her husband Charlie Russell's paintings in Minnesota. Fort Snelling will soon open expanded exhibits and lengthy storylines. Louisiana shadows on the test sugar plantation now recognizes owner Mary weeks and the enslaved women there. These sites look beyond cowboy paintings to see black feet women beyond military forts to see encounters among women of such dissimilar tribes and countries. Shadows on the test is shifting from mansion weddings to interpreting black women, such as heady Vena and Charlotte, whose lives purchased the elegance that we see there. Today, we asked different questions, analyze male filtered sources and fill in huge slaps, huge gaps with slave inventories and floor plan analysis. We challenge to simultaneously share difficult stories and provide welcoming visitor experiences at different stages of research, interpretive design and inclusion. These three sites provide insights for us. We cannot alter our four mothers actions, whether inspiring or appalling. We cannot avoid those dreadful parts of American history that still reverberate. We are responsible for our actions now. And we must tell the full story. Note that I am saying the history of all American women, rather than women's history. Some mows males of the species or men find women's history exclusionary and possessive. We need to learn our history too. We want everyone to fully appreciate the history of all American women. We hope that you will find today encourages you even nudges you to do more and to join us in telling our full story that helps us appreciate how far we've come, and how much further we must go. And now I'd like to ask Brenda Kornick to speak. Here. And hello, everyone. My name is Brenda Kornick and I am the collections and exhibitions director at the CM Russell Museum in Great Falls, Montana. Next slide. What we have here is to collect, preserve and interpret the life in times of Charles Marion Russell. We have here Russell's original studio and his house on our campus and we've recently reinterpreted both the studio and the house and the house is where we have highlighted Nancy Cooper Russell's story and Nancy is Charlie Russell's wife and business manager and a very critical part of his career and success with the American West. So I'm really happy to be here. And I would like to thank the National Trust for having me and for thinking of Nancy Russell and the CM Russell Museum. So thank you. I can't hear you, Canita. Can you unmute? Okay, there we go. Hi everyone. I am Canita Harrington. I'm a doctoral student at Louisiana University in the Louisiana State University in the Department of Anthropology. A major focus of my studies is anthropology and archaeology where I study sites connected to African descended people in the 19th century. I include rural and urban plantation spaces. I began working with the shadows in 2019, and I was hired as an intern to help research and organize the information related to the African descended people who were owned by the Weeks family who were the also the translating family at the Shadows on the Tesh. This year I was recently invited back to conduct additional research in order to assist in the design of new tours and a new introductory exhibit that would help to expand our interpretation and our knowledge of the diverse lives on the plantation, including women's history. The Shadows on the Tesh is an antebellum mansion that was constructed in 1834, New Iberia, Louisiana, and it was funded by the profits from a sugar plantation which was located about 15 miles away called Grand Coat. This plantation was sustained by the labor of hundreds of enslaved African American women. And today we have more than 17,000 documents, letters, and voices at this site that help us understand how slavery operated in the 19th century and help us understand about the lies of those marginalized people. I'm going to go ahead and let the next panelists introduce themselves and thank you very much everyone thank you National Trust, and I'm excited to be here. Good afternoon, my name is Nancy Cass it's a pleasure to be here and I really appreciate the opportunity. I'm the site manager at historic Fort Snelling in the twin cities, St. Paul Minneapolis. I've been here for 21 years, I will say I started as a site interpreter, moved on to program writing development and now the site manager and I have to say those years as an interpreter gave me invaluable experience for the work that I do with the site. Fort Snelling is a 46 and a half acre national historic landmark located at the confluence of the Minnesota and Mississippi Rivers were part of the Minnesota Historical Society, and the fort itself and you can see it in the top right hand corner and also in the inset. It was built in 1820. The post expanded considerably through the Civil War World War One World War Two, and there's still a modern presence here with the Army National Guard etc. So our history spans 10,000 years and we have many many layers to our program we started as first person and moved to third person now. We're really expanding to multiple arrows and broader stories. We're approaching, you can see the strong the completion of our revitalization project, and we're going to be moving visitor center into the barracks one of the barracks buildings and all the new landscaping. Not only about military stories but also the story of slavery here with the dread and Harriet Scott story, Native Americans women stories. So we have a lot of content that we are delivering and looking at ever changing and new ways to do that. So thanks. And oh I guess we are going to take some time now for some group discussion and I will pass it along. Thank you all so much. And again, thanks to the National Trust for Historic Preservation for having these two webinars. So we have a series of questions and I would really like to start by asking about your tangible resources, your landscapes, your structures, architecture and objects that most tell the history of American women. I can go first this is Nancy. When I thought about this I thought what are those powerful tangible resources, and I have to say interpretive spaces they're so powerful in connecting visitors to the stories. And they can evoke such strong emotion, for example, in our kitchen in the commandant's house where we're cooking food and people walk in there and it's such a powerful connection to their own lives, but also enables us to go into some of the dialogue we have talking about about enslaved people, women who are cooking there. And I will say it's one of our biggest challenges is maintaining all of the spaces we have in the site so for me it's maintaining all those incredible spaces. Thank you. And I'd like to go ahead, Canita. I want to chime in on that, specifically here at the shadows on the test, the most prominent tangible resources at our site would actually include the Chattels on the test mansion, as well as the weeks family papers, which is the over 17,000 documents that detail the history of the site. However, for us and our challenge has been that they allow a limited view of the lives of the enslaved population, enslaved women. While visitors see the antebellum mansion they don't see the sugar plantation that funded the antebellum mansion they don't see the over 100 enslaved men and women who toiled under very extreme conditions to finance this this particular mansion so today grand coat, the sugar plantation is actually a working thought line so it's not even accessible publicly so we can't go there and identify those historical components. Additionally, with the weeks family papers which are very beneficial and informative. They really reflect the perspectives of the enslaved the enslaved women, the letters the inventory and other documents located in this manuscript are primarily based on the weeks family perspective so once again we're dealing with an imbalance in tangible resources at the shadows on the test. So what we are working to do, thankfully is to illuminate those invisible spaces. We have to look at these imbalances as indicators of different things so for instance the shadows may represent wealth but it also represents labor and production that's attached to that wealth and that means that there was an enslaved community responsible for that labor and production and so now we can start to envision this community and think about ways we can add them and insert them into our narratives. Likewise, the family papers we have to try and fill in the gaps of understanding and realize this is just one perspective wasn't the entire perspective, and we need to utilize other tangible resources such as slave narratives to counteract that imbalance and those tangible structures. And I understand that you've been doing oral history with some of the descendant community to help make bridge that gap. Yes, absolutely. One of the things that I've understood through working with the descendant community is that we need to broaden our ideas of what we consider as ballot sources. The descendant communities are our partners and their collaborators, and they can provide very valuable expertise and insight, and specifically, there are two enslaved women at the shadows Louise and charity who I've been able to trace their descendants and interact with their ancestors, and they've been able to provide some illuminating information about, you know, what life may have been for those enslaved women. And so I think that we sometimes take those types of things for granted. And we need to include the descendant community as part of that process of storytelling and history making and knowledge making. Great. Thank you, Brenda. Well, I was just going to add that. Yes, I think and we're doing something or trying to attempt to do something similar with that in getting some oral histories from some of the members of the tribes around this area that have family members that specifically knew the Russell's and while they're still living in there passing those stories down to their families, trying to get some of some of that information and their stories and capture that so that we can try and interpret that in, in, in what we're doing with the home but also the studio as well as that was the really key part or place for the Russell's Charlie in particular to get together with people and share stories. But the other part for us that I think is real tangible outside of the artwork in the house itself and what we've done with that preservation work but it's also the place the sense of place that we have in that Charlie Russell his subject matter really was this land. And the people in it, the people that lived here the culture but in the wildlife and we still have that here today, fortunately. And so trying to bring that back to where, how we're living today and how is it relevant to us today and making those connections but having that still here for us that is tangible is, is kind of the real challenge and something we're continuing to try and do more and more of. Those are wonderful comments y'all. So I'm interested in knowing, as you are all changing your approaches in some fundamental ways. What kind of support what is your process and what kinds of support or lack have you gotten from various stakeholders. I can start with that. Our process, it actually had it started about six years ago for us with the interpretation of Josephine trig. Josephine was a very close friend of the Russell's. She was their neighbor as well. Her parents, Albert and Margaret trig lived right next door, and Josephine was actually just a few years younger than Nancy so they were close in age, but Josephine preserved all of her personal and her family's personal personal collection of Russell artwork and really with that she continued on the legacy that Nancy had in preserving Charlie's work by she held on to all of that she cared for it, and then she willed it. And she put it in her will that she would like to donate her collection of about 153 works of art is what it came to donated that collection to the city of Great Falls if they could develop a safe place for the collection to be housed and for the public to be able to see and so that happened in 1953 and really was the impetus for the museum today and she's such an important part of that story and really about that time that we were opening this exhibition in 2016, we were developing another project which was the reinterpretation of our home and studio, and we were lucky very fortunate to receive a national endowment of the humanities grant, or for the humanities grant to do a planning grant, or to do the planning work for the reinterpretation of the home and studio. And so they were kind of happening at the same time and a lot of ways that was just really organic because we found that is when we opened one door into the research of talking about the stories of these women in history, it would open another door to another woman. And it really kind of happened really naturally which I found to be fun, it was really the, the, the joy of that process. And we, at the same time we're developing the reinterpretation for the home and studio and that process really took the longest because we got we had a charrette that had formed various specialists in different areas, historians and architects. We had the historic artists homes and studios we had Valerie Ballant and Wanda corn participate in that charrette and it was really important information for us to gather these different voices and perspectives on how we could interpret Nancy Russell story in particular. We opened, we were getting ready to open the home and studio when really in the middle of all of that we developed an exhibition on Charlie Russell and the women in his life and art. And that was another opportunity for us to. Yes, and Heather's got the book behind her there was a really it was another opportunity for us to tell the story of women in Russell's life and how these women really shaped his the way that he presented women in his artwork and how he he really wrote about the story of women in the American West. We did put publish a book on the exhibition and I think anytime you can get some scholarship involved. It's really helpful and I think it helps with the support you get and we did I think because the process was a gradual process for us and everyone was learning along with us. We did get a lot of support and we didn't see a whole lot of pushback for that. Yeah, so you were very fortunate. We were fortunate in that respect, very much so yeah. Great, thank you. Thank you for a second to for us to it starts internally with having we have an interpretive plan that's that maps out our goals. Also within the historical society, a strategic plan. So not only internally but always looking for opportunities outside of our organization for connections. So I think we have a lot of stakeholders having that that conversation and connecting and just building off. What was just said, just through a connection, I am now connected with a descendant of one of the enslaved people who are here she's actually visiting the site tomorrow so without that connection to others just reach out all the time and and those connections are so important. Actually piggyback off of what what Nancy and Brenda said connections are very important and that's definitely revealed through my work with the descent and community but the shadows has been working and doing things and programming for a while to help I guess tease out these alternative stories and these narratives that have been kind of pushed behind and facilitating these change we realize that we do need working support systems and not just people who rarely are bought into the shadows or who are regular visitors but people in the community who may historically have felt excluded from from the shadows and it's narrative. And for that that has meant involving them in the creation process, as well as the final product involves creating advisory committees with with community members with with school personnel and administrators with students with indigenous leaders and members and things of that nature, and to begin asking questions that need to be asked to answer these larger stories that we can use to help further our narratives. One of the things I also appreciate in regard to the programming of the shadows is that and if you might pull up a slide I think it's called in the big house, or on the fields. One of the photos from the PowerPoint. Anyway, the shadows has really created a space for interdisciplinary engagement. So we're able to utilize different mediums such as the arts and the theater to, I guess, look at these stories in a different way for instance this image titled house and field was done by an artist named Linda freeze who was a resident at the shadows and she worked there she utilized the weak family papers and she was able to create this artwork based on her interpretation of the site. And what we have here is the shadows mansion and then we have an image of workers at Grand Cote. And so you're able to see that that distinction between what the shadows was and what was really funding its success. And so I think that if we continue to move forward and include multiple voices on diverse communities. That's the other image again and it's called in the big house and here again we have Mary weeks, who would have taken ownership of the plantation site and the weeks family estate after her husband passed away. And then we have an enslaved woman who, well she had been enslaved previously, but that was a picture that was taken after emancipation. So we again show those two distinctions between what we saw who was represented and who may not have been represented. But I say again, all that to say that the shadows has been taking steps to include diverse perspectives, diverse voices we have plays that we're working on that are going to help tell more of an inclusive story about the community and the descendants of the people who lived who worked at the shadows and things of that nature so I think it's all about using various mediums to bring the voices of the women to the forefront. So I'm hearing various mediums are there particular things you're doing to make sure that all of this is sustainable that in five and 10 years that it continues to be included. Well, and that's that's a very good question and yes we are it's this process isn't just one and done it's going to take continued persistence continued communication with the descendant community we're opening up a line of communication with them where we can create a descendant community group that we can continue to engage with throughout these changes so yes we are moving in the direction of making these permanent fixtures within our new structure. And it will take again persistence and it will take dedication and it will take involving the community and these various mediums every step of the way so yeah it is we're doing this for the long haul there's no turning looking backwards after this. No turning back, no turning back, not at all. Right, other thoughts. Nancy, I want to second that just no turning back it has to be a goal. It has to be your team, your, your group, saying this is where we're headed and make it part of part of who you are part of the goal. And always checking to our assumptions against the ideas we might have I would that's a high, you know I think that comes across so strongly that always be checking ourselves on what we're, but we're working on reaching out to communities stakeholders, other people to help us with that so again that's that outside of our own organization effort but I agree. There's a profoundly different change in management that instead of seeing that those who are on staff are those who make the decisions. It's saying that you are a collaborative group with your partners and your allies who don't always agree with you or with each other, which is a challenge I think. But that that's how you're going to structure things and that's how you're living not simply doing it at the end. Is that right. And that's where the conversations, you know, are important and you know a lot of people see us as well it's a military site and, but it's so much more than that and that takes a lot of conversation it takes a lot of work. It's bringing in, you know, stakeholders, it's having advisory groups and really making that part of the mission. I love that I think that it's also in inviting other voices to the conversation, a big part for the Russell Museum. We've recently, we developed a focus group it was an American Indian and educators focus group. It's really important for us because we are primarily a white staff. And when we're trying to interpret and share stories that are really focused on indigenous people, we have to welcome in the people who really can speak to these issues and help raise awareness and that process is a very, it's a delicate process because it takes time. And that's one thing we really learned in our programming and our interpretation is that we really do have to take the time to build those relationships and have those connections because asking people to share stories that are oftentimes there, they're very difficult stories to share, because there's still a lot of pain involved in those stories it's something that you really do have to build some trust and spend a lot of time, really listening and with with our place as the museum, we can provide that platform and support, but it really is growing, growing that, I guess that that base that you have in your interpretation it's definitely not just the staff that work within the walls of the museum. But it really is this much bigger network of, you know, people like this that we're doing today and other things that we do as you know people getting together and talking about important issues and ways to continue to connect and tell these important stories about these important in particular so I would say yes connection is so important, but I would also say what we've learned is it takes time and to be patient, and you will make mistakes and and to try and learn from those and to still move forward. It's a real practice in practicing humility, and I think you took on the very difficult project of reaching out in terms of missing and murdered indigenous women, and there's a great deal of pain with that. How did you, how did you handle that. It was a really important project. I mean, in the West in particular there's a very serious problem with missing and murdered indigenous women and so it's a very relevant topic for today. And unfortunately there's a lot of stories out there and so we did we thought it was very appropriate. And so we did we spent time and part of that was those connections that we've developed. They really originated out of the focus group that we created, and we made contacts and our, our education manager at the time Eileen Laskowski, she spent a couple years really interviewing people and getting to understand what was happening and set up this great program to highlight this, this problem and it's not, it's not easy. It is very difficult and again I just have to stress the amount of commitment and time it takes to let that happen and you do get I would say, you know, that's maybe when we got a little bit of pushback, just in terms of what does this have to do with Charlie Russell's artwork and of course, that is a little bit of a not so direct question to answer but it has a lot to do with Charlie Russell's artwork and why he did what he did in documenting the life that he saw was was going away. And the things and the culture that he, he really was welcomed into the Native American culture so that he could witness what was really happening and wanted to try and document the story or a perspective that he saw and and so there is a real connection to the place that we live here in Montana and what's happening today so I think a part of that is, it is, you do have to go outside of what so directly what is in your walls and, especially as a fine art museum. It's much more than the paintings and the artwork that we display our programs do have to talk more about, you know, really what is happening in the world today and that's what we're trying to do with the, the home and studio in particular. And that makes it. Do you all have advice for people who are reaching out to other communities when you aren't a member of those communities yourself. I agree it takes time. Are there other things you think of that makes make can make a difference and help sites be successful. I would, the bit advice that I would suggest is that don't be afraid to ask questions in terms of, you know, how what is the best way to ask these questions, and I don't know how to ask these questions I don't even know what questions to ask, necessarily so if you have someone that you're, you're close to and you're able to ask them, you know, how do we even go about approaching. Let's say an elder in one of the tribes, how would we really, you know, go about asking them questions or to even gain access to being able to sit down and have a conversation and I think you just have to be willing to to be honest and say I don't know how to even start this process can somebody help me out. And I think that that's, that's where you start and then you just go from there. I agree with that it's reaching out and acknowledging that you're asking for for help and how to do this better and creating that dialogue, but it's conversation and it does take time but that's so important. I certainly agree. It can be intimidating at times, especially without having a blueprint or some type of like structural format to go in and say hey how am I going to reach out to these different communities. But as Brenda and Nancy said you just you have to acknowledge that you won't have all the answers right away you won't know what to do. But you know make the effort, because the longer you allow the bridge to be grown between you and maybe those other communities that you could be reaching the longer it'll take to reestablish some of those relationships. And we're experiencing that currently at the shadows reaching out to be indigenous community, so to speak so there may not be one right way to do those things but you know I would say utilize resources online. And I'll go look up. I would even say archaeology site in your state to find out if they can maybe point you in the direction of different indigenous tribe usually we sometimes form relationships with these tribes we're relating to burials and different material culture related to indigenous site so there can be other resources you can utilize to help you make these initial connections. It may involve you know getting down in the community attending certain events. In the time of the pandemic that may include virtual events as well and you know be getting creative in terms of how you approach people but you know, start small, you know do something simple, just you know reach out to someone in your community and how do you think about, you know, how does this sound or you know, are you interested and, you know, go from there. It reminds me the first time I went in Williamsburg to the local NAACP, a little uncertain what kind of response I would get, and the woman who greeted me has become a mentor and a friend for decades now. I realized that I was coming, asking for help and wanting to do what I could and I think that that attitude that kind of cross cultural model makes a difference. And what you're all saying is you've got to keep at it. You've got to keep, you're going to, you're going to make mistakes and say things that people find appalling when you don't mean to, and you've just got to ask and say hey let's try again. I think this question is helpful and I can see that Priya has more questions that she wants to share with us. So thank you for your thoughts. I think they're great and I hope you will add some more as we proceed. Yeah, this is just a quick reminder that use the Q&A box at the bottom of your screen we've got a bunch of really good ones. I just wanted to add real quick to this whole conversation which has been great is don't walk into these communities thinking you know the answer. And I think that's probably the number one advice I can give you from hearing about community engagement over the years is the minute you walk in saying that I'm the expert, I know how the story should be told. That's the minute you've already failed. So just something to consider. We've gotten a lot of really great questions in the Q&A section so which remember it's at the bottom of your screen as that slide just told us but the one we really didn't really didn't talk about so far was about how visitors and the communities have reacted to these new programs and these new experiences. Valerie, I'm going to read a little bit of your question directly, but do you do they feel that these new experiences enrich their visit that they learn new things and the sort of feedback you've gotten and is there a specific instance of connection that has been especially poignant for you. Visitor reactions y'all. For our visitors. We've always had quite a, you know, big and positive reaction toward anytime we tell the personal stories and I think that that's a big part of that so you know with the Russell House. I wanted to talk a little bit more about how those main floor rooms were the, they were the public spaces and that real division between the public and private spaces and you can see that in the house really clearly where they put a lot of time and resources and into the living room and dining room which was really the gallery where Nancy Russell, she did her business and she's she sold Russell's artwork she engaged buyers and dealers and that is how she really made Russell's career and and got him to the level that he did reach was through her business, just her ability to be a wonderful business manager. Then you get to the upper level of the house which I think there's just one image there their bedroom upstairs where it's really just pretty basic. No real, you know no frills it's not fancy. They really spent the majority of their time with visitors trying to I mean Nancy would invite people over to get to know Charlie because she knew as soon as they got to hear his stories they might appreciate his artwork a little bit better, they got to know him as a person. And I think that one of the questions I saw there pop up about, you know how do you really interpret somebody, you know as Nancy, she was the artist wife. And really her story is so important because she was so much more, I mean she really was the complete business side of their partnership, and it started a year after they were married in 1897 she took on full, you know full responsibility of marketing Charlie Russell's artwork and did it brilliantly and so her story is so interesting because she really even their private life was all about, was all about business it was all about them, her doing whatever she could to elevate Russell's career and it became her mission. There's, there's a lot of great personal stories for them as well and they had one son Jack and they had wonderful friendships but it really always centered around Nancy, promoting Charlie's career in his life and so that we're able to do that in the house which I think is kind of unique for us and then we've got the museum and the museum galleries to really then show off what it was that she was working so hard to do. So they really had a companion at marriage at a time when there weren't a lot of companion at marriages. And that that makes a difference that what she did really marketed him. I would like, I would like to hear from one of the things that happens that sometimes we found is that when people market tours as women's history. There are visitors who think they're going to miss something. And I think Nancy you've talked about that. And one thing we learned, and we have women's stories interwoven throughout our site. And I think people do get surprised when they come in and there's so much more to the stories and they might have anticipated but one thing we did we had a tour called to hear her stories. And one thing we heard was kind of a few people opting out, you know, most of the time men would say oh I don't want it yet. It's okay I'll pass on that. So, lesson learned on that one, not to set it apart, not to make it look like it's it's over over in a box somewhere. It's got to be part of the program so going forward. It's something we might market as their stories or they were here. So it's it's more it's part of it's not sitting alone. And I think for us that was something that we did find. But overall it's been, you know it's gradual. You know there's some people sometimes who, you know, you know everybody comes in with expectations, but it's overall very well received as we add more and more. And that really shows and some of what you're doing with your new exhibits as well. It does and our storybook this year, we had took 17 stories and we put them in a booklet, and we hand them out to visitors and out of 17 seven are about women. And there's been really great feedback on that and so much appreciation but making it front and center in part of the of the stories, including some of the Japanese American women. We've picked multiple areas so World War two the military intelligence service language school that was here, and make sure that we do talk about women's roles in that language school so very well received. Some comments about visitor reactions. Well, as we're still in the beginning stages of working on transforming our tourism program means the site is currently closed to new tours but you know once we reprogram and launch in September, October will certainly be able to get a little bit more information about how the visitors will react I can say from experience, working with other plantation sites and visiting plantations myself, sometimes change isn't easy to accept and that's why it's important again to involve multiple voices within the creation process so you know, we get an understanding of what our objectives and our goals are. I know that Nancy mentioned the idea about men may be declining to participate in a tour centered on women, not really understanding what that may entail or maybe having their own ideas about what that would relate to. I can see that happening similarly when when certain plantation sites create these tours that are maybe ancillary to the enslaved or just say this is an enslaved tour the slave life tour. And it's not a part of the larger narrative or the larger tour and so we kind of compartmentalize these things and you have people creating their own ideas about what they are and they may choose to opt out and so that may require us understanding or thinking about these to incorporate all of these stories into our official representation of the site so. And, and Monticello finds that at their tours of Mulberry row and the enslaved cottages there that the percentage of whites going or are lower and the percentage of visitors in general. I actually was talking to a hotshot man, very distinguished man about doing learning some more women's history, and he went. No. There are many ways to not bash people, but to invite them and to keep saying over and over, you won't understand our American history without telling the whole story, but once you if people are fearful then that that creates its own storm. Yeah. I wanted to I know it's 350 so we kind of have that final question but I did have something come in that I'm going to change a little bit because I think it'll help some people who are afraid about how do they make these changes when they're worried about funding. So we had a question from aims who is asking about how you all are funded and how you tackle some of the challenges of someone. If you're at a site that's funded where people are afraid for you to make those changes like how do you manage that sort of situation. And if you can talk about where your money comes from to right now because I think that'll help some people understand how the changes affect your sites themselves. And I can jump in so the Minnesota Historical Society, which we're part of is about 65% funded by the state of Minnesota, and the rest of our funding comes from admission. You know, as people coming to sites or, or tours or, you know, exhibits that type of thing from endowments etc. And it is a challenge because not everybody agrees with everything. We do, and some people feel pretty strongly about it. So it is, it sometimes can be difficult and that's where that conversation has to continue the dialogue and explaining this is what we're doing and the relevance and seeing stories as perhaps in the example of women's stories. It's not, there's interesting stories it's not just because it's about women, it's just interesting that everybody needs to hear and seeing, you know, some painful become a site of dialogue so it might not seem what everybody, you know, wants to hear but it's, it's too foster dialogue. And we're, we're the rest of the museum is a private museum so our funding is mostly through membership and private donations, and then grants is a big part of our funding as well and really with that. It's just the process in really putting together what it is that you're wanting to do in a way that you can communicate that out to the public to try and raise support for a project that's where we rely very heavily on our board members and friends in the museum to, you know, give them that information and help us go out there and try and raise money for these these specific projects but it's definitely it takes time. Yeah, I agree and shadows is also funded primarily by memberships donations and grants and it takes time when you have you know stakeholders involved who you want to include in the process and but though you want to, you know, make changes to the programming and different things of that nature. It takes time it takes patience and it just takes being open and honest about what it is you're trying to accomplish. And again, hopefully involving all of the different perspectives and hoping that it'll work out from there. Yeah, and I will just say about the shadows because it is one of the National Trust historic sites is part of our commitment to tell the full American story writ large. And in particular our historic department is working with historic site department is working with all the sites, especially the sites of enslavement to really dramatically change the way our stories are told and really have some deep thinking about the best practices, the best way to do that. Preservation leadership forum and the National Trust we're going to share some of that information, hopefully in the coming month we're working on some information about the wedding symposium that happened last year, and sharing up some follow up follow up with that and it all connects back to this conversation we're having about telling women's history and telling the full American story so I just want to drop that in there to let you know that it is coming. But since we're at about 354 I wanted to ask sort of the last question which is, this is also the audience members that are here is now that you've heard this conversation. And we've all been talking about this for about 45 minutes. We know that this work is difficult, it is not easy. But what is sort of one takeaway that you and the audience are going to do. What's the first thing you're going to try and do if you want to just drop that in the chat first to look at that'd be great. And I'm going to ask our panelists and Heather to also respond to that but what is the one idea or suggestion for concrete action that you have for audience members to take. And we're going to go in the order of introductions and we're going to start with Brenda, and then end with Heather. Sure. I would challenge you to ask maybe 10 people that you know to name one woman in history that they and it could really be anybody just to name one person one woman in history, American history and then I would challenge you to then pick somebody a woman from your site.  Thank you. Well, yes. I would say start reaching out to community members. Maybe choose, you know, and community members can include schools. And maybe find organizations, maybe find women's organizations to connect with and things of that nature and start a contact list for yourself to maybe build on and to hopefully create some type of dialogue and collaboration among, among yourselves. Nancy. I'm going to talk to others so kind of piggybacking off of that talk to others, listen, listen, and listen, and really just try to learn as much as you can and also look for ways to help staff, because they're the people who are talking to visitors and it's tough, and they work a lot on that we are part of the international sites of conscience. They have webinars. We've been taking and they have been very helpful with us to help staff talk to visitors which they are the people who have been out there was those that don't care for what you know we're, we're talking about on our sites. It really helps get the message out. If we help the staff do that, but talking to others and listening I would say. I really add that, you know, I think of historic sites as having significance knowledge base and tangible resources the physicality. And so I've hearing a lot about significance. We've talked about some tangible resources. I think, in terms of the knowledge base, really reading some of the secondary literature, and some of the having the primary sources, reading the weeks list of enslaved people is very powerful. There's primary sources and and mastering the basics of that and the women involved. There are, there's a great book on women in Montana. Beyond school marms and madams, for example, there are lots of those kinds of books that are quality, really brief having that knowledge base and as part of that, when you have local schools or no, no historians and anthropologists who are expert in science history. Here's an opportunity. Excuse me the history of women. Here's an opportunity to build your knowledge base and have ongoing research inspiration and insights. Great. Thank you so much. I think now Chris is going to hop out and close us out. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you all. First of all, for I just want to express my gratitude to all of the panelists today, Heather Brenda, Canita and Nancy for the incredible work that you're doing and how it's really bringing people together increasing our appreciation, the public's appreciation, understanding and empathy for all of these critical contributions of women both past and present and it's you are so effectively demonstrating what we were saying earlier that women's history is American history that we should be separating it out as a separate category. We need to really think about how we are telling that full American story so thank you for sharing your expertise and your advice today. I have learned so much and I'd also like to extend my thanks to all of our attendees for joining us and for all of your great questions. And I hope you all and someone mentioned in the chat thank you very much that International Women's Day is coming up on the 26th. So I hope you come out of this webinar feeling inspired and energized to go apply some of these great challenges and issues to the work that you're doing. Maybe perhaps make that a challenge for you and your staff coming up for the 26th in honor of International Women's Day. And I hope you all are now feeling, feeling the urge to make that long term commitment to the histories and stories of women and so in your underrepresented communities and make that a part of your goals as our panelists said as they pointed out, this is a long term project, it takes a lot of time but there is no turning back we are all in this together. And last but by no means least just a final reminder that the recordings of these two webinars and their companion resources guide Heather made reference to some of the amazing resources that we pulled together. They will be available for everyone later this week for all attendees so I hope you will make use of them share them with colleagues, and then also pay attention to all the other amazing content the preservation leadership forum has to offer, including our past forward conference which is coming up this November. And so with that, I just want to say thank you to everyone and have a wonderful day.


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