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Missouri Historical Society Photographs and Prints Collection. NS 28146. Scan (c) 2004, Missouri Historical Society.
This photograph of the beloved, and still greatly missed, Parkmoor on Clayton Road, was part of the Missouri History Museum's Route 66 exhibit.
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Photograph courtesy of the Missouri History Museum
Crowds wait in line to see Route 66: Main Street Through St. Louis at the Missouri History Museum during the last week of 2016. Route 66 was created in-house by the Missouri History Museum staff to tell the unique story of the Mother Road in St. Louis.
It’s become an old cliché that the humanities are under attack in America. Failing to see the relevance of studying culture and history in general seems, so the narrative says, is how our increasingly technologically-anchored economy suffers. But that seems to be totally illogical, judging from the positive reaction I receive from my own work; it is obvious that many Americans still appreciate the humanities. So logically, it seems to me, historians and humanists are failing their audiences, not the other way around. I think back to an email a student of mine forwarded to me written by a Harvard professor in defense of the humanities. It was so poorly written, so shrouded in Ivory Tower jargon and elitism, that I joked to my student that I would probably vote to cut funding for the humanities too if that was the best defense anyone could offer.
So how do historians make history relevant? For starters, historians need to remember that until only a few decades ago, their field was reserved for the wealthy, as no one else could afford to enter the discipline. In my own field of art history, some of the most notable figures in Italian Renaissance scholarship came from extremely privileged backgrounds. Take Sir Dennis Mahon, who revolutionized the study of 17th-century Italian painting; born into an inheritance of the Guinness Beer fortune, he was never placed into the situation of choosing between banking and academic pursuits. The point is, historians need to remember that their audience is not coming from the standpoint of the wealthy elite. Quite frankly, and I say this with all due respect, almost no one I know cares what that sixth spoon at the dining table of a wealthy socialite was used for. Yes, some people do, but it’s not enough to keep all of the historic house museums in America in fiscal solvency. The solution? Focus on the other people who lived in the house; most likely the carpenters, stone masons and in St. Louis, the slaves. Their stories are just as interesting as those of the wealthy owners.
Likewise, audiences can feel like they are a part of history if historians make the effort to include them. I’ve been impressed with many of the recent special exhibitions at the Missouri History Museum. The museum’s recent showings focus on history that normal people can feel a part of, and not be on the outside looking in. Take the Route 66 exhibition; while it is very much about history through the display of a wonderful display of artifacts, Route 66 it's also about the people who used the road. Just about every American can identify with Route 66 in some way, whether it is through their grandparents’ stories of automobile travel, or by living near one of the many Route 66 architectural icons that still feature in millions of Americans’ lives, such as Ted Drewe’s. The recent exhibition on Compton and Dry, with its huge reproductions of plates of some of St. Louis’s neighborhoods, allowed visitors to step inside history, as they looked for the location of their houses or businesses. What was there in 1875? I think everyone with a little curiosity wants to know the answer, and for St. Louisans, that exhibit helped answer that. Or take the History Museum’s partnership to renovate and operate the Soldiers’ Memorial in downtown St. Louis; everyone knows at least one veteran. The same goes for the “Little Black Dress” exhibition; it touched on a subject of near universal appeal, while still teaching history.
Finally, and perhaps where many historians fail most spectacularly, history must be able to offer “teachable moments.” Yes, it’s another old cliché that those who forget history are doomed to repeat it, but historians have the ability, if they choose to utilize that skill, to show people how the mistakes of the past can help us prevent future errors. And this takes courage. Recently, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch published an article on the East St. Louis Race Riots. They resulted in untold death and destruction, terrorizing the African-American population for generations (and I would argue that event still affects East Side politics to the present day). The comments section was predictable: the Post-Dispatch was trying to guilt-trip white people, they were using events from long ago to promote their “liberal agenda” and they were seeking to sow divisions that had already healed. But those divisions have not healed; they are still laid bare by recent events in Ferguson. Are some people made uncomfortable at the reminder that white people have done their fair share of rampaging and rioting over the centuries? Good, the point of history is to force uncomfortable truths, and if history requires making people uncomfortable for holding on to their prejudices, even better. In this era of “Alternative Facts,” historians are duty-bound to strive to show their audiences the importance of understanding the past. And to stop talking about which spoon to use at dinner.
Chris Naffziger writes about architecture at St. Louis Patina. Contact him via email at naffziger@gmail.com.
