Joshua L. Chamberlain Museum [ME]

Description

The Joshua L. Chamberlain Museum is located within the adulthood residence of Civil War officer Joshua Chamberlain (1828-1914). Best known for his strategic command of Little Round Top at the Battle of Gettysburg, Chamberlain also commanded the Union troops during the Confederate infantry's official surrender to the Union, served as President of Bowdoin College, and was elected Governor of Maine. Topics addressed include Chamberlain's family, career, and life story.

The museum offers guided tours of the museum and self-guided walking tours of Brunswick.

Dangberg Home Ranch Historic Park [NV]

Description

The Dangberg Home Ranch Historic Park is one of Carson Valley's first and largest ranches. The ranch was home to German immigrant Heinrich Friedrich Dangberg, who founded the site in 1857. A local businessman, rancher, and politician, Dangberg started his ranch with just a log cabin. At the time of his death in 1904, he had created a 20,000 acre ranching empire that his sons expanded to 48,000 acres. More than five acres of the ranch are now owned by Douglas County and managed by Nevada State Parks. The county and state are restoring the original buildings, including a main house, a stone cellar, a laundry building, a carriage house, a garage, and a bunkhouse. These buildings and original artifacts are on display.

The site offers tours.

San Pablo Historical Society [CA]

Description

The San Pablo Historical Society seeks to preserve and share the history of San Pablo, California. To this end the society operates two museums—the Alvarado Adobe, a replica of California Governor Alvarado's (in office 1836-1842) home, and the 1905 Blume House, a historic farm dwelling.

The museums offer period rooms. The website offers virtual tours.

Catoctin Furnace [MD]

Description

The Catoctin Iron Furnace operated from 1776 until 1903, and is located in Cunningham Falls State Park. The furnace site was once a booming industrial complex and community, and utilized the surrounding woodlands for fuel provision. Today, the state park encompasses both the old furnace and the surrounding landscape, and offers visitors an impressive variety of outdoor activities, from hiking to fishing. In addition, visitors can explore much of the Catoctin Furnace historic site.

The site offers visitor information and maps for the state park, along with a fairly detailed history of the furnace.

Arlington Historical Society, Knapp History Park, and Museum [TX]

Description

The Arlington Historical Society seeks to preserve and share the history of Arlington, TX, and its people. To this end, the society operates the Knapp Historical Park and a local history museum within the 1914 Fielder House. Exhibits include barbershop and general store settings and a reconstruction of a steam engine. The Knapp Park contains two mid-19th-century cabins and a circa 1910 one-room schoolhouse.

The society offers tours of the museum and of the Knapp Historical Park. The park welcomes school tours.

Senftenburg-Brandon House Museum [TX]

Description

This house reflects many different patterns, materials, and colors in its construction, decoration, furnishings, and apparel collection. Partially built before the Civil War in Greek Revival Style (a second story was later added), changes made in the early 1900s are best described as Stick Style with Queen Anne features. Highlights include a tub stenciled in an 1890s pattern created by Candace Wheeler, a well-known designer of fabrics and wallpaper; a basement that houses a children's toy exhibit; a bird's egg collection; Renaissance Revival, Queen Anne, and Empire style furnishings; and hand-cut English-style wallpaper.

The house offers tours.

Olympic Spirit: Teaching with the Olympics

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Poster, Up where winter calls..., c.1936-1941, Jack Rivolta, LoC
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The 2012 Summer Olympic Games begin on July 27 and continue through August 12. London hosts them this time, but in the past, the U.S. has hosted the Olympics eight times (four times in the summer and four in the winter), the most of any country! The U.S. also holds the greatest number of Olympic medals of any nation—more than 2,500.

What place have the Olympics had in U.S. history? The games can be many things: a focus for cultural exchange, a showcase for new technology and development, an economic boon (or bust), and a platform for international political tensions. Explore the history of the Olympics with these ideas:

  • Read oral histories of Olympic participants from 1932 to 1968 and official Olympic reports from 1896 to 2010 at the Amateur Athletic Foundation Digital Archive. What were the experiences of American women who competed in the early Olympics like? How did being Korean American influence the experiences of diver Sammy Lee, who competed shortly after World War II? How do the Olympic reports from Los Angeles in 1932 and Salt Lake City in 2002 compare? Do the reports from Berlin, 1936, show any signs of the tension between the U.S. (and other nations) and Nazi Germany?
  • Learn more about the 1936 Olympics and the significance of African American track-and-field star Jesse Owens's wins (and the wins of other African American athletes) in the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum's exhibit The Nazi Olympics: Berlin 1936. Here you can also learn about Jewish American athletes who competed in these Olympics.
  • Watch PBS's documentary American Experience: Jesse Owens online, and follow the supporting links for more about Owens and the Olympics.
  • Pick up quick facts on each of the past Olympic Games (and count down to future Olympics) at Olympic.org. What technological developments have changed how the Olympic Games are played, watched, and celebrated? You can also search for athletes, sports, and countries.
  • Compare and contrast the Olympics with other international sporting events, like the Paralympics or the FIFA World Cup. Where have these taken place? How do different countries, including the U.S., relate to these events? When did they begin?

Whether you use the Olympics to explore cultural and technological change, international politics, local history (if you're lucky enough to live in one of the U.S. cities that hosted the Olympics!), or any of the many other rich angles possible, take advantage of this opportunity! Though school may not be in session for you right now, investigating Olympics history can lead to primary sources and historical connections you can weave into your curriculum.

For more information

Teaching with sports history doesn't have to stop with the Olympics! Sports can help students connect to history and see how many different forces contribute to a person's life or a historical event. Browse our Website Reviews for sports-related primary sources, take a quiz on sports history, or watch historian Pellom McDaniels III connect athlete Jackie Robinson and Martin Luther King Jr. using primary sources.

Georgetown Loop Historic Mining and Railroad Park [CO]

Description

An engineering marvel originally built in 1884, the Georgetown Loop railroad fulfilled the hopes of Georgetown citizens to become a prosperous settlement connected to Denver and points east. In connecting Silver Plume and Georgetown, towns over 2 miles apart, the tracks scaled an elevation of 640 feet over mountainous terrain, requiring trestles, cuts, fills, loops, and curves totaling 4.5 miles. Today the Loop is once again a popular tourist attraction and an uncommon way to see the Clear Creek Valley. Along the route visitors may stop for guided tours of a historic silver mine. The park is located on 978 acres and includes an 1884 depot, the Morrison Interpretive Center, two 1860s mines, an 1871 mill building, four reconstructed mine buildings, a locomotive maintenance building, the 1874 Pohle House, and a new rolling stock shelter.

A second, individual website for the park can be found here.

The park offers a short film, train rides, tours, and exhibits.