A 1978 Ford LTD. Coppertone SPF 2 suntan oil. A cassette tape of Chicago 17 playing on an oversized, yet portable stereo. These three items of material culture help tell the story of my coming of age years in the 1980s. With them (or with images of them) I can engage students in a historical narrative that might come across something like this in a textbook: "In the 1970s, American auto manufacturers continued building the same large, tank-like cars with poor fuel efficiency that they had been making since the 1950s. The dangers of skin cancer were still not widely known or heeded as sunbathers used suntan oil as a means of accelerating the tanning process rather than blocking it. Cassette tapes replaced eight-tracks and portable 'boom boxes' crept into youth culture."

In the now classic The Presence of the Past: Popular Uses of History in American Life, Roy Rosenzweig and David Thelen argue that Americans place more trust in museums and what they say about the past than they do in history textbooks or even history teachers. (1) I see a clear link between their findings (Rosenzweig and Thelen interviewed over 1,000 Americans to come up with their thesis) and the value of using material culture in the U. S. history classroom.

Though good museums (and good teachers) have learning objectives in all that they do, the appeal of displaying artifacts, they argue, is the sense that the experience is unmediated and the viewer makes his or her own sense of the items, unlike a history textbook or classroom lecture where an authority tells one what is important. A picture of a funny-looking old car, a bottle of suntan oil, and a cassette tape are much more accessible and less intimidating to students as pieces of historical evidence than books and documents. But with these artifacts, I can still tell a story in which several themes of late 20th-century U. S. history come into focus—suburbanization, the ongoing struggle for desegregation in public schools, the 1970s oil crisis, the slow decline of the American auto industry, the advent of cancer awareness, and the last gasp of faceless music—that which came before MTV.

U.S. history teachers realize that students need to know more than just the names of important political figures or the dates when certain battles took place. The new social history of the 1960s, which continues to this day, means that we place value on the stories of all people, all perspectives. But to find out about all those different historical actors we must sometimes go beyond traditional primary sources.

Material culture can be an important piece of evidence to help students understand the lives of the not so rich and famous. As in my example, having students bring in a few items that help tell the story of their lives as an introductory activity can help broaden their idea of what a primary source is. To keep it from becoming just a trip “down memory lane,” insist that students choose their items as pieces of evidence that help answer a larger historical question, posed by you in the original assignment. The work of Daisy Martin and the Stanford History Education Group (SHEG) have greatly influenced my thinking in this regard.

While it is important to recognize that material culture, or artifacts, are a specialized kind of primary source and may require specialized analytical tools, basic questions such as who created this, who used it, when did they use it, and why did they use it fit well within the same “Reading Like a Historian” framework that SHEG developed for reading more traditional sources.

While my examples so far have focused on recent U. S. history, delving into 18th- and 19th-century U. S. history using material culture is also possible. Many museums have developed “traveling trunks” based on themes such as frontier life, Civil War soldiers, and immigration to Ellis Island, that teachers can request for free or just the cost of shipping. (2)

Resourceful teachers can assemble their own traveling trunks by gathering materials from antique stores, museum gift shops, yard sales, and attics. Giving students the opportunity to see and touch items of material culture provides a tactile, and even emotional, connection to the past that can be of great benefit to U.S. history teachers wishing to broaden students’ view of what history is and who played an important role in it.

1 Roy Rosenzweig and David Thelen, The Presence of the Past: Popular Uses of History in American Life (New York: Columbia University Press, 1998), 91.

2 See here for an example.

Coca-Cola ads used to say “Can’t beat the real thing.” At the Jewish Historical Society of Greater Washington, the real thing is our historic synagogue, and indeed, nothing can beat it for educating students about immigrant and neighborhood history in the nation’s capital city.

Originally built by Adas Israel Congregation in 1876, the 25-foot by 60-foot synagogue was a simple house of worship that served German and Eastern European Jewish immigrants in downtown Washington. President Ulysses S. Grant attended its dedication. Because of the building’s significance, the Society moved it three blocks in 1969 to save it from the wrecker’s ball. Today we run the Lillian & Albert Small Museum there.

Among our primary visitors are school groups, mainly from Jewish congregational schools and day schools, but private and public schools visit as well. The building is the focal point of all youth programs.

In Synagogue Story, K–2nd graders compare the restored 19th-century sanctuary with the 21st-century sanctuaries (or even theaters!) they know—and then make a model of the building to take home with them. In Building Detective, 3rd–7th graders look for clues about the building's function in its architecture. A separate balcony for women teaches them about gender roles in 19th-century American Judaism. A cobalt blue window and a photo of a crucifix in the sanctuary offer a glimpse into the synagogue's later life as a Greek Orthodox Church. Walking by the front façade, then seeing a photo of it with a pork barbecue sign, conveys the story of a continually changing urban neighborhood.

While we could just lecture about late 19th- and early 20th-century Jewish life in Washington, having students physically present in the space, sitting on wooden pews similar to those used over a century ago, seeing photos of how the same space once looked, walking on the old, creaking floors, and studying artifacts used in the space—nothing can top that experience, those sensations, that visceral connection to the past, and the power of the authentic. One teacher said her students will "remember the pews and the bench for President Grant and that he stayed for the entire three-hour service and wore a hat the entire time."

On walking tours, middle and high school students travel the same streets where Jewish, Italian, German, and Chinese immigrants lived, worked, and worshiped. They traverse blocks of modern office buildings and courthouses, then react with surprise to photos of brick row houses, the four surviving former synagogues, and other physical remnants of the past. Out-of-town students connect with Washington as a city, beyond the monuments and museums on the National Mall.

This is the educational theory of constructivism at work. Using material culture—whether a building, a historic artifact, or even a photograph—engages the senses and thus enhances learning. As we've seen by watching students beholding the synagogue's original ark and simple woodwork, they gain an emotional connection to the history. Another teacher told us that his students, spurred by the experience, asked "great follow-up questions" on the ride home.

So for teachers, we strongly recommend bringing students to historic sites—particularly those off the beaten path—and taking them on walking tours. We know that's not always possible, with school budgets being what they are. Alternatively, many teachers make effective use of "treasure boxes" sent out by museums. These include replica artifacts and photos, which still accomplish the most important goal: helping students connect to the past in a tangible way.