Meet the new president of the Missouri Historical Society

On July 11, Dr. Jody Sowell officially took over as president of the Missouri Historical Society following the retirement of Dr. Frances Levine. He previously served as an oral historian, Director of Exhibitions and Research, and Managing Director of Public History during his 16-year tenure with the Society. During his time at MHS, Sowell has helped shepherd some of the museum’s most successful exhibitions, including 250 in 250, #1 in Civil Rights: The African American Freedom Struggle in St. Louis, The Louisiana Purchase, and A Walk in 1875 St. Louis. He was also the writer behind the popular MHS social media series #UpliftingSTL, which shared inspiring stories from the city’s past throughout the pandemic. 

During a busy first week as president, Sowell took some time to chat with us about his new role, the future of the historical society, and his love for his adopted home.

First off, congratulations on the new role. Tell me a little about taking on the position of president.

Well, I had been with MHS for 16 years in a number of different positions, so I have certainly seen the work from different perspectives and with different tasks. But you know, what I think has united all of that work is how much I love talking about St. Louis and how much I appreciate the real contribution that the Missouri Historical Society makes to this community. It is my favorite city in the world, so I think a lot about how the historical society can build a stronger St. Louis. That is what excites me the most and what makes me most excited to take on this president role.

What drew you to the Missouri Historical Society to begin with, and what’s kept you there these 16 years?

My family and I moved to St. Louis so that I could get a doctorate at Saint Louis University in American Studies. We weren’t that familiar with St. Louis. We had lived in Columbia, Missouri, but just had not come to St. Louis that often. We didn’t plan on staying very long, but it did not take long for us to absolutely fall in love with St. Louis. We fell in love with this community as a place to raise our kids, so it didn’t take us long to say, “We need to figure out a way to stay.”

The Missouri Historical Society was looking for someone to do oral histories for an exhibit about the history of aviation in St. Louis, and they reached out to SLU and asked if they knew anyone. They said, “Well, Jody’s done oral history work and used to be a journalist, so he might be a good option.” We knew that that would slow down the progress on my doctorate, but we thought, Well, maybe if I take this, it will allow us to stay in St. Louis. And that gamble paid off. We really fell in love with St. Louis first, and then the Missouri Historical Society position was a way to stay. Then, of course, over these 16 years I’ve gotten a chance to see what an important part of the community the Missouri Historical Society is.

It’s funny how St. Louis will do that to you. It grabs folks and doesn’t let go.

It does. We see it when we have visitors from out of town come in. My favorite thing to do is to show off St. Louis and take people to all of the different treasures in this community. And I tell people, I love nothing more than when they leave feeling a little bit less happy about where they live, because they see all St. Louis has to offer, and they don’t understand why their community can’t have these things. 

What we want to do here is show people how special this community is and what a rich history it has, and sort of how much inspiration you can draw from the past of this place. But what we hope to do is make people more connected to the present and more invested in the future. Because if you believe a place is special, if you believe a place is fascinating, you want to do everything you can do to make sure that place stays that way. So that’s what we want to do. We want to connect people to the past, but we’re doing it because we want you to care about the present and the future of this community as well.

Many of your past projects have centered on community engagement and getting people connected to the historical society. Tell us about that focus and why it’s important.

That’s what drives my work. I want to make history accessible and engaging and interesting and entertaining for everyone, whether they think they like history or not. Lots of people had bad experiences in high school history classrooms where they thought history was a bunch of dates and a bunch of names and faces and people they weren’t connected to. Research has shown that the place where people feel most connected to the past, most engaged by history, is family reunions and family gatherings. And I tell people, that’s not because they think their grandma knows more than a professor with a PhD. But when they’re at those family gatherings and family reunions, they’re hearing stories about the past and they’re hearing about how the past affected people like them. They’re not hearing about the Great Depression as a stock market story, they’re hearing about the Great Depression from the grandmother who is talking about how she went without food because she wanted to make sure the kids had enough to eat. It’s that sort of personal nature, that history as storytelling, that I think drives all of our work…It’s tapping into those stories that people don’t know or where St. Louis goes unnoticed. It’s also about surprising people with how much of a contribution St. Louis made. I think you see that right now in our St. Louis Sound exhibit. All I have to do is give people the list. This was the home of Scott Joplin and Josephine Baker and Tina Turner, Fontella Bass and Miles Davis and Chuck Barry and Uncle Tupelo. There aren’t many cities that can compare to that. What I love about Soldiers Memorial Military Museum downtown is that we don’t just tell you a story about war and international conflicts, we tell those stories through the lens of St. Louis. Even if you’re not interested in military history, I can show you those images of returning World War I soldiers walking down Tucker in these huge parades. And you connect in a different way when you say, “Oh, the same ground that I’m walking on, the same streets that I travel, I’m seeing in these pictures, or seeing people who lived in my neighborhood. I’m hearing their stories and seeing their artifacts.” That’s where I think those connections come into play. That’s where I think we can make our work feel like a great, big St. Louis family reunion, where people will feel those connections to the past.

What are your initial goals in your new role?

What I’m probably most excited about is how transformative the 2020s are going to be for the Missouri Historical Society and how we are going to serve audiences in new ways. At the Missouri History Museum, we are going to open three new signature galleries: A brand new World’s Fair exhibit, a new artifact showcase gallery, and then, upstairs, starting later in the decade, we are going to open a decade-by-decade walkthrough of St. Louis history. For every decade, you’re going to learn the major stories, the major headline-making events, but you’re also going to learn how life was lived in St. Louis, what people were wearing, what they were eating, how they were talking, and how that changed over the decades. It really is going to help us introduce you to a St. Louis you’ve never met, even if you’ve lived here all your life. We are going to showcase more of our collection than we ever have before. A lot of that comes through digitization efforts…We can digitize our archives so that people can see [all our artifacts] and learn those stories, even if they don’t visit our museums. And then at Soldiers Memorial, we will continue to share military history through that St. Louis lens. I’m particularly excited about an exhibit that’s opening later this year about the Vietnam War. It’s something that people have asked us for from the very beginning…I think it’s going to be a chance to get people back to that museum, especially after the pandemic.

So there are lots of projects. Telling history in new ways, showcasing more of our collection, always with that focus on this place in this region—that’s what I love. It’s why I’ve been here for 16 years. Every day, every week, every month, every year is different. You’re always looking for new ways to tell these stories and to connect with people. I once had a friend who said, “Aren’t you worried about running out of stories?” That will never happen because this is such a fascinating community, but also because we’re always looking for different ways to tell that history.

I will also say that I think we have the best staff of any historical society in the country, so continuing to bring in talent and make sure that we are fostering the talent that we already have—that kind of staff work is incredibly important to me. And then all of these projects and all of these initiatives, they take money to get done. We are incredibly grateful for the tax dollars that we get through the ZMD, but it takes a lot more than that to keep these museums and this library running. But I see that as part of the same mission. That is me going out and talking to potential donors and sharing what great work we’re doing here, and just asking them to join in the mission with us. It’s all the same piece [of the mission], which is: How can the Missouri Historical Society best serve St. Louis?

With all those many pieces of its mission in mind, in your ideal world, what does the future of the Missouri Historical Society look like? 

The future of the Missouri Historical Society is about the future of St. Louis. The future of the Missouri Historical Society is about finding new ways to build a stronger St. Louis by connecting people to their shared past and connecting them to one another. If historical societies are going to survive, they have to show how they are part of building civic engagement and civic pride, and how they are an essential part of building community. It’s no longer good enough for historical societies to say, “We have a lot of great stuff that you should care about, and history is important.” That doesn’t do it. You have to show why you are a major part of a community and a major part of that community’s present and future, as well as its past. So that’s what the future of MHS is. It’s about finding ways for us to connect more with St. Louis to really be seen as a driver of building civic engagement and civic pride, and for us to find new and compelling and exciting ways for people to connect to their shared past and to connect to one another. I think we are one of the best historical societies in the country, but the only way to remain one of the best is to always be changing, to always be thinking of new ways to approach this work.

Is there anything else that you really want folks to know about you or this work?

You know, I tell people all the time that I wasn’t born in St. Louis, but I got here as fast as I could. Because I think this is the most fascinating city in the country. It is a city that has become my home, that I have adopted. I was born in Memphis, grew up in Arkansas, went to school in Texas. But I have never felt at home the way I feel at home in St. Louis. And I’m incredibly grateful for what this community has given to me personally. It is the place that helped raise my kids. And so to be able to give back, that’s what I appreciate most about this position. This really is my way of serving St. Louis. It’s why I wanted to become president. It’s because I want to serve this community in meaningful and memorable ways. And that’s what I challenge our staff to do each and every day.