Greetings from the TRACES team!
In the next 1-2 weeks, we are bringing exciting Midwest-history programming to your region.
WHAT: mobile exhibit in a retrofitted school bus, the “BUS-eum”
WHAT ABOUT: “Hidden or Forbidden No More: Prequels to the ‘Greatest Generation’”
WHY: The goal is to generate deeper reflection on and discussion of socialization of WWII-era Americas, specifically popular movements and national experiences that shaped their worldviews and characters:
— anti-German hysteria of WWI
— flu pandemic of 1918-19
— Midwest Prohibition-era bootlegging
— “Second Wave” of the Ku Klux Klan in the Midwest
— farmer rebellions during the Great Depression
WHO: TRACES Center for History and Culture (based in Mason City/Iowa) in collaboration with the Humanities Iowa-funded Templeton-rye filmmaker-historians, Bryce Bauer and Dan Manatt
WHERE NEXT: Spencer, Ankeny & Council Bluffs/Iowa; Sioux Falls, SD; Kansas City/MO
WHERE EXACTLY: street addresses of showings listed below
WHEN: between 23 February and 3 March 2020
HOW to get further information: www.TRACES.org or Kristine at staff@TRACES.org or 515.450.1548
Thank you for publicizing this unique educational and cultural resource. If you’d like an interview with either Kristine or the BUS-eum driver/docent, please contact us soon. Related books will be available.
A marketing note: We have shifted our strategies for how we book and fund showings. Whereas previously it was solely through securing institutional hosts months in advance, for various reasons we now are utilizing a mixed approach: In addition to institutions which can host a showing for a set fee (visitors to the BUS may but do not need to make a donation), a “crowd-funding” model allows us more flexibility and spontaneity in sharing this resource, but then we depend on each visitor to pay a donation. A comprehensive exhibit catalog allows visitors to “take the exhibit home” with them.
Thanks for helping bring this unique experience to those who depend on you to know about such things,
Kristine, Michael and our interns, volunteers and board members (http://roots.traces.org/personnel)
PS: If you would prefer to get our Press Release via Word doc or PDF, contact staff@TRACES.org
PPS: Our next general tour of Iowa-showing sites will be in April. If you’d like to bring the BUS-eum to your community, contact Kristine about remaining slots and details related to hosting a showing.
PRESS RELEASE for immediate release contact: KristineZylstraTabke@gmail.com
A time of rampant epidemics, angry demos, “fake news” and anti-immigrant sentiment: Today’s world?
No, rather the era in which the Greatest Generation grew up—one soon to be featured in and examined by a new, traveling exhibit titled “Hidden or Forbidden No More: Prequels to the ‘Greatest Generation’.”
Five special showings (Spencer and Ankeny, Iowa; Sioux Falls, SD; Omaha-Council Bluffs and Kansas City), from February 23rd to March 3rd will launch a later, regional tour of five sub-stories of a larger drama.
Housed in a finely-retrofitted school bus, the “BUS-eum,” those five topics include: anti-German hysteria of WWI, which mostly erased what is still the US’ largest ethnic group; the influenza pandemic of 1918-19, with its 675,000 US deaths and up to 50 million worldwide; Prohibition-era bootlegging, with its accompanying desperation and deaths through gangsters; the Ku Klux Klan’s “Second Wave” of the 1920s, which had 3-4 million members nationwide; and “Cow Wars” fought by Depression-era farmers who took cues from other strikes as they tried to boost commodity prices through collective action.
The five foci of this exhibit are part of a larger project that examines connections between Germany (or Austria) and the American Heartland, 1914 to 1948. The Iowa-based TRACES Center for History and Culture brings to light unknown World Wars I & II history, under the motto “We bring history to life!”
Specifically, this project examines mostly overlooked influences that both shaped the much-touted “Greatest Generation’s” character and determined not only the biographies of those who comprised it, but the destiny of the United States. TRACES’ executive director and curator of this exhibit, Michael Luick-Thrams, says “Our ancestors’ pasts colored our present and, if left unconscious, could steer our future in ways no longer beneficial: By reconsidering them, we can better recognize ourselves.”
As Luick-Thrams explains, “This social-political review lends nuances to the legacies of a decisive generation in our nation’s history that otherwise too easily gets lost among the glow of a bigger-than-life mythos. By examining this shared heritage anew, we can see our origins and our possible fates in a new light: In seeking them, we might find us.”
The showings will take place from:
* 1-5pm Sun., Feb. 23 at Vander Haag’s, 3809 4th Ave W, Spencer/IA
* 9am-noon Wed., Feb. 26 at IA Iowa Assoc of Municipal Utilities, 1735 NE 70th Ave, Ankeny/IA
* 10am-5pm Sat., Feb. 29 at Vander Haag’s, 1423 East 54th St N, Sioux Falls/SD
* 1-5pm Sun., March 1 at Vander Haag’s, 50200 189th St, Council Bluffs/IA, and
* 10am-5pm Tue., March 3 at Vander Haag’s, 7501 US Hwy 40, Kansas City/MO
Each showing except for in Ankeny will be in a heated building; entry is open to all, but a donation is requested to cover operational costs. An exhibit catalog and related books will be available. For more information, see “events/current” at www.TRACES.org or call Kristine Zylstra-Tabke at 515.450.1548.
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