Using historical documents, landscapes, buildings and artifacts as investigative tools, participants will examine the concerns, conflicts, dilemmas, decisions, and dramatic confrontations of people along the road to revolution. Presented by the Massachusetts Historical Society and partnering organizations, the workshop takes place in locations throughout Boston, Lexington, Lincoln and Concord. An outstanding group of historians, educators, and site interpreters will work with the group over the course of the four day workshop.

This workshop is open to teachers and the general public, and is funded in part by a grant from the Massachusetts Society of the Cincinnati. Educators can earn PDPs and 2 graduate credits (for an additional fee) through Framingham State University.

Registration

$125 ($100 for teachers and MHS fellows/members)

Workshop fee includes:

• Four-day program (daytime, plus one Thursday evening) with additional half day for educators
• Admission to all partnering sites
• Packet of reading materials
• Welcome breakfast on Monday at the Massachusetts Historical Society, lunches on Tuesday (Concord Museum), Wednesday (Lexington Historical Society) and Thursday (Old Manse), and a final evening with living history characters, colonial entertainment, and dessert in Minute Man National Park

To register, complete this registration form and send the form with your payment to:

Kathleen Barker
Massachusetts Historical Society
1154 Boylston Street
Boston, MA 02215
education@masshist.org

Complete directions for public transportation options, parking, and special lodging rates in Concord will be sent to all registrants. Questions? Call workshop directors Jayne Gordon (617) 646-0519 or Kathleen Barker (617) 646-0557.

Workshop Schedule

MONDAY, August 5: in Boston
Morning:

• Welcome breakfast at the Massachusetts Historical Society Introductions of participants, partners, places, and theme
• The Curious Newspaper Collections of Harbottle Dorr 
• Documenting the Coming of the American Revolution

Afternoon:

• Lunch on your own in Boston
• Background walking tour with Historian Bill Fowler (from the Common to the North End)

TUESDAY, August 6: in Concord
Morning:

• The Characters and the Community with Historian Bob Gross/ Part 1 (Concord Museum)
• “Reading” the artifacts in the “Why Concord?” gallery (Concord Museum)

Afternoon:

• Lunch at the Concord Museum
• The Characters and the Community with Bob Gross/ Part 2 (Concord Museum)
• “Reading” the Landscape: the world and worries of the Concord farmer with historian Brian Donahue (Minute Man National Park, Battle Road Farm fields)

WEDNESDAY, August 7: in Lexington
Morning:

• Paul Revere Capture Site and The Road to Revolution film (Minute Man National Park)
• Who Shot First 1? Depositions and other accounts with NPS Education Coordinator Jim Hollister (Lexington Green)

Afternoon:

• Lunch at Munroe Tavern (Lexington Historical Society)
• The experience of the British soldier (at Munroe Tavern)

THURSDAY, August 8: in Concord and Lincoln

Morning:

• Using primary source documents to (re)construct lost lives with Historian Mary Fuhrer (Major John Buttrick House, Minute Man National Park)
• Who Shot First 2? Depositions and other accounts with Jim Hollister (North Bridge)

Afternoon:

• Lunch and tour of Old Manse: William Emerson, Ralph Waldo Emerson and the Legacy of Revolution
• Research/Writing workshop: “People at a Crossroads” with Mary Fuhrer and Educator Joanne Myers (on the grounds of the Old Manse)
•  Break for supper on your own in Concord

Evening:

• Special living history program “Battle Road Heroes” (Hartwell Tavern historic area, Minute Man National Park)
• Dessert and colonial entertainment in the Hartwell Barn

FRIDAY, August 9: in Boston

• Optional morning for educators to work on lesson plans with teacher-facilitator Duncan Wood (MHS)

Prof. Stauffer’s lecture on Thursday evening will open a conference that will consider almost every major aspect of Massachusetts’ participation in the war: reform activities and the origins of the war; military life; the war, politics, and the economy; slavery and emancipation; and how the citizens of Massachusetts came to terms with the consequences of the conflict. It will feature established scholars as well as up-and-coming historians who will tackle new areas of emphasis, including the radical intellectual tradition, health and the environment, and the memory of the war.

Conference papers will be made available in advance to those who preregister. In six sessions on Friday and Saturday, panelists and commentators will offer brief remarks; a discussion with the audience will follow. Registration fee required to attend sessions. Registration available in late 2012. For information, contact kviens@masshist.org.

View the conference program.

The exhibition will display many important manuscripts, photographs, and artifacts from the Society's collections related to the Abolitionist movement in Boston. Visitors can view items such as the imposing table for The Liberator that has not been on display in the Society's building for many years.

In commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation on 1 January 1863, this exhibition features the pen Abraham Lincoln used to sign the document. Visitors can learn how the MHS acquired this extraordinary pen as well as view paintings, broadsides, engravings, and manuscripts that tell the story of how Boston celebrated Emancipation.

View documents and artifacts related to Abraham Lincoln. Featured items include Lincoln's letter to Joshua F. Speed explaining his evolving views on slavery as well as the casts of the life mask and hands of Lincoln made by Leonard Volk in the spring of 1860.

In Death Lamented features rings, bracelets, brooches, and other pieces of mourning jewelry from the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries, ranging from early gold bands with death’s head iconography to jeweled brooches and intricately woven hairwork pieces of the Civil War era. These elegant and evocative objects are presented in the context of their history, use, and meaning, alongside related pieces of material culture.

Drawn from the collections of the MHS and Guest Curator Sarah Nehama as well as loans from the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Historic New England in Boston, and the Adams National Historical Park in Quincy, exhibition highlights include the Adams-Winthrop commemorative seal ring containing the braided hair of John Quincy Adams and a gold memorial ring for Queen Caroline of Brandenburg-Ansbach.

A full-color companion book, In Death Lamented: The Tradition of Anglo-American Mourning Jewelry, available for sale at the MHS, features photographs and descriptions of all of the Nehama and MHS pieces, along with historical and stylistic backgrounds and essays pertaining to cultural practices around death and mourning in England and America.

View a selection of mourning jewelry at www.masshist.org/features/mourning-jewelry.