A SCHOLARLY BOOK REPOSITORY
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3 books about Swigger, Jessie
3 books about Swigger, Jessie
"History Is Bunk"
Assembling the Past at Henry Ford's Greenfield Village
Jessie Swigger
University of Massachusetts Press, 2014
In 1916 a clearly agitated Henry Ford famously proclaimed that "history is more or less bunk." Thirteen years later, however, he opened the outdoor history museum Greenfield Village in Dearborn, Michigan. It was written history's focus on politicians and military heroes that was bunk, he explained. Greenfield Village would correct this error by celebrating farmers and inventors.
The village eventually included a replica of Thomas Edison's Menlo Park, New Jersey, laboratory, the Wright brothers' cycle shop and home from Dayton, Ohio, and Ford's own Michigan birthplace. But not all of the structures were associated with famous men. Craft and artisan shops, a Cotswold cottage from England, and two brick slave cabins also populated the village landscape. Ford mixed replicas, preserved buildings, and whole-cloth constructions that together celebrated his personal worldview.
Greenfield Village was immediately popular. But that only ensured that the history it portrayed would be interpreted not only by Ford but also by throngs of visitors and the guides and publicity materials they encountered. After Ford's death in 1947, administrators altered the village in response to shifts in the museum profession at large, demographic changes in the Detroit metropolitan area, and the demands of their customers.
Jessie Swigger analyzes the dialogue between museum administrators and their audiences by considering the many contexts that have shaped Greenfield Village. The result is a book that simultaneously provides the most complete extant history of the site and an intimate look at how the past is assembled and constructed at history museums.
The village eventually included a replica of Thomas Edison's Menlo Park, New Jersey, laboratory, the Wright brothers' cycle shop and home from Dayton, Ohio, and Ford's own Michigan birthplace. But not all of the structures were associated with famous men. Craft and artisan shops, a Cotswold cottage from England, and two brick slave cabins also populated the village landscape. Ford mixed replicas, preserved buildings, and whole-cloth constructions that together celebrated his personal worldview.
Greenfield Village was immediately popular. But that only ensured that the history it portrayed would be interpreted not only by Ford but also by throngs of visitors and the guides and publicity materials they encountered. After Ford's death in 1947, administrators altered the village in response to shifts in the museum profession at large, demographic changes in the Detroit metropolitan area, and the demands of their customers.
Jessie Swigger analyzes the dialogue between museum administrators and their audiences by considering the many contexts that have shaped Greenfield Village. The result is a book that simultaneously provides the most complete extant history of the site and an intimate look at how the past is assembled and constructed at history museums.
[more]
Please Touch
A History of the First Four Children's Museums in the United States (1899–1965)
Jessie Swigger
University of Massachusetts Press, 2026
The Innovation and influence of the first children’s museums in the US
When it opened in 1899, the Brooklyn Children’s Museum greeted visitors with a new experience. Rather than carefully ensconcing artifacts and curios behind protective glass, the staff took the unusual step of moving the objects out of their cases and into the hands of the children, inviting them to “please touch.” Born out of the reformist spirit of the Progressive Era, the museum represented a new kind of institution, one whose primary purpose was not to collect, preserve, and display objects but rather to educate a specific audience. Over the next twenty-five years, three other children’s museums opened with a similar mission and approach: the Boston Children’s Museum (1913), the Detroit Children’s Museum (1917), and The Children’s Museum of Indianapolis (1925).
At a time when most museums were led by men, women played a critical role in overseeing this first wave of children’s museums. As the number of children’s museums grew, women rose to prominence in the museum profession at large, advocating for new ways for institutions to interact with and serve their audiences. By 1965, the children’s museum movement had succeeded in demonstrating rich rewards and had influenced all types of museums and continues to do so to this day.
Drawing on archival materials, newspaper accounts, and the writings of museum workers and professionals, Please Touch carefully chronicles the early histories of these four seminal children’s museums. Jessie Swigger provides thorough institutional histories of each and connects them to broader currents in education, such as the Progressive education movement, and to key events in early- to mid-twentieth-century US history, including immigration, the Great Depression, World Wars I and II, and the Cold War. She also demonstrates how these institutions were fundamentally shaped by women’s leadership, and how they challenged and expanded the definition of museums and pressed museum practices in new directions.
When it opened in 1899, the Brooklyn Children’s Museum greeted visitors with a new experience. Rather than carefully ensconcing artifacts and curios behind protective glass, the staff took the unusual step of moving the objects out of their cases and into the hands of the children, inviting them to “please touch.” Born out of the reformist spirit of the Progressive Era, the museum represented a new kind of institution, one whose primary purpose was not to collect, preserve, and display objects but rather to educate a specific audience. Over the next twenty-five years, three other children’s museums opened with a similar mission and approach: the Boston Children’s Museum (1913), the Detroit Children’s Museum (1917), and The Children’s Museum of Indianapolis (1925).
At a time when most museums were led by men, women played a critical role in overseeing this first wave of children’s museums. As the number of children’s museums grew, women rose to prominence in the museum profession at large, advocating for new ways for institutions to interact with and serve their audiences. By 1965, the children’s museum movement had succeeded in demonstrating rich rewards and had influenced all types of museums and continues to do so to this day.
Drawing on archival materials, newspaper accounts, and the writings of museum workers and professionals, Please Touch carefully chronicles the early histories of these four seminal children’s museums. Jessie Swigger provides thorough institutional histories of each and connects them to broader currents in education, such as the Progressive education movement, and to key events in early- to mid-twentieth-century US history, including immigration, the Great Depression, World Wars I and II, and the Cold War. She also demonstrates how these institutions were fundamentally shaped by women’s leadership, and how they challenged and expanded the definition of museums and pressed museum practices in new directions.
[more]
Please Touch
A History of the First Four Children's Museums in the United States (1899–1965)
Jessie Swigger
University of Massachusetts Press, 2026
The Innovation and influence of the first children’s museums in the US
When it opened in 1899, the Brooklyn Children’s Museum greeted visitors with a new experience. Rather than carefully ensconcing artifacts and curios behind protective glass, the staff took the unusual step of moving the objects out of their cases and into the hands of the children, inviting them to “please touch.” Born out of the reformist spirit of the Progressive Era, the museum represented a new kind of institution, one whose primary purpose was not to collect, preserve, and display objects but rather to educate a specific audience. Over the next twenty-five years, three other children’s museums opened with a similar mission and approach: the Boston Children’s Museum (1913), the Detroit Children’s Museum (1917), and The Children’s Museum of Indianapolis (1925).
At a time when most museums were led by men, women played a critical role in overseeing this first wave of children’s museums. As the number of children’s museums grew, women rose to prominence in the museum profession at large, advocating for new ways for institutions to interact with and serve their audiences. By 1965, the children’s museum movement had succeeded in demonstrating rich rewards and had influenced all types of museums and continues to do so to this day.
Drawing on archival materials, newspaper accounts, and the writings of museum workers and professionals, Please Touch carefully chronicles the early histories of these four seminal children’s museums. Jessie Swigger provides thorough institutional histories of each and connects them to broader currents in education, such as the Progressive education movement, and to key events in early- to mid-twentieth-century US history, including immigration, the Great Depression, World Wars I and II, and the Cold War. She also demonstrates how these institutions were fundamentally shaped by women’s leadership, and how they challenged and expanded the definition of museums and pressed museum practices in new directions.
When it opened in 1899, the Brooklyn Children’s Museum greeted visitors with a new experience. Rather than carefully ensconcing artifacts and curios behind protective glass, the staff took the unusual step of moving the objects out of their cases and into the hands of the children, inviting them to “please touch.” Born out of the reformist spirit of the Progressive Era, the museum represented a new kind of institution, one whose primary purpose was not to collect, preserve, and display objects but rather to educate a specific audience. Over the next twenty-five years, three other children’s museums opened with a similar mission and approach: the Boston Children’s Museum (1913), the Detroit Children’s Museum (1917), and The Children’s Museum of Indianapolis (1925).
At a time when most museums were led by men, women played a critical role in overseeing this first wave of children’s museums. As the number of children’s museums grew, women rose to prominence in the museum profession at large, advocating for new ways for institutions to interact with and serve their audiences. By 1965, the children’s museum movement had succeeded in demonstrating rich rewards and had influenced all types of museums and continues to do so to this day.
Drawing on archival materials, newspaper accounts, and the writings of museum workers and professionals, Please Touch carefully chronicles the early histories of these four seminal children’s museums. Jessie Swigger provides thorough institutional histories of each and connects them to broader currents in education, such as the Progressive education movement, and to key events in early- to mid-twentieth-century US history, including immigration, the Great Depression, World Wars I and II, and the Cold War. She also demonstrates how these institutions were fundamentally shaped by women’s leadership, and how they challenged and expanded the definition of museums and pressed museum practices in new directions.
[more]
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