These two themes have been adapted by PACSCL from the American Association for State and Local History’s Making History at 250 guide.
Power of Place
Place offers a powerful lens through which we can view the past. It challenges us to think beyond modern political boundaries and to consider the full history of the space we now call the United States. This theme encourages us to reexamine ideas about our natural and built environments and to reorient when and where we find our country’s history. For example:
- How did the natural environment—from rivers, lakes, and oceans to mountains, deserts, and swamps—shape past events, such as settlement and migration, imperialism and expansion, or economic development and innovation? How did those events affect the environment?
- How can Indigenous peoples’ past and present connection to places and environments inform our understanding of historical developments and contemporary challenges?
- What places are typically preserved today for their historic value? What other kinds of stories could be told there?
- Why has Philadelphia been a focal point of immigration? Why did certain immigrant groups or individuals come to Philadelphia?
- What was it about Philadelphia that attracted Black migration after the Civil War or during the Great Migration?
- How did industry/employment in and around Philadelphia affect your community?
- How did the status of slavery and/or the impact of the Civil War influence your institution or community?
- How has the built environment reflected efforts to expand or restrict liberty and equality?
- How has disease changed the face of the Philadelphia region over time?
Unfinished Revolutions
In the United States, the fight for liberty, equality, and justice has a long and complex history. Through formal politics, grassroots organizing, boycott, protest, litigation, war, and a wide range of other mass and individual actions, people have continually challenged America to live up to our highest ideals—often drawing on ideas expressed in our founding documents. These stories reveal the ways the American Revolution began before 1776 and reverberates through to the present. For example:
- How have America’s founding documents been used to press for social, political, and economic change?
- Beyond the Revolution itself, what were other revolutionary moments in the history of Philadelphia and the surrounding area?
- How have members of your community advocated for liberty and equality? How have those with power responded?
- When has there been progress—and setbacks—in the fight for rights and justice?
- How have protests (LGBTQ+, anti-Vietnam war, student protests, Black Lives Matter, for example) impacted your community?
- What educational reforms transformed your community or institution?
