History is under attack these days, yet everything that has ever happened is history. September is National Underground Railroad Month. Some people scoff at that, and I think, What? You don’t believe any story your grandma ever told you? The National Park Service, which maintains the National Register of Historic Places, also runs the National Underground Railroad Network to Freedom. The network includes more than 800 listings nationwide. Having written several successful submissions for both programs, I can tell you which one is more difficult. Both rely on the same thing: primary source documentation. It is much harder to document the story of a human being resisting enslavement and actively pursuing freedom. And while removing exhibits, closing regional branches of the National Archives, and limiting what the Smithsonian does will make the lives of historians more difficult, we never give up. Historians, librarians, and archivists have been telling the story for years, and we’re not quitting. It just makes me even more determined than ever.
It would take more than removing every historical monument in the database, closing every library and banning every book, and censoring every historical site and museum in the country. It would take eradicating every memory of every talk I have given in the last forty years, and that is a lot. I can still remember my great-grandfather and I researching our family history together when I was seven years old. So you see, no matter how hard they try, history happened, and America won’t forget it. We’ve celebrated 250 years of America’s history this year. Nobody forgot. So no matter how hard some try to make it, or AI changes the narrative, I know I won’t forget. I will continue telling the stories, true stories that are documented not only in property deeds, probate records, and other historic documents, but also in every history book ever written, photograph ever taken, or story ever told. Listen to your elders; write down their story and become part of history.
For more about the National Underground Railroad Network to Freedom see https://www.nps.gov/orgs/1205/index.htm
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