Join artist and educator Jen Berger for a presentation that places monuments within the broader field of public art, examining how objects in shared space shape memory, belonging, and power, and how monuments, often permanent and officially sanctioned, are mistaken for neutral history.
CALLING is a participatory, interdisciplinary humanities offering that invites communities to reflect, create, and reimagine what it means to be American at the threshold of our nation’s 250th anniversary.
Consuelo Northrop Bailey (1899-1976) was a national pioneer among women in public service. Born and raised in Fairfield, Vermont, a 1921 graduate of the University of Vermont, Bailey was one of the first women in America to serve as a state’s attorney, as speaker of a state house of representatives, and as lieutenant-governor. Historian Kevin Graffagnino details the life and career of this extraordinary Vermont role model for women in politics and the law.
Historian, naturalist, professor, and minister, Zadock Thompson (1796-1856) played a significant role in how nineteenth-century Vermonters viewed their state’s heritage and appreciated its natural resources. Kevin Graffagnino looks at Thompson’s life and career, with particular emphasis on how his work shaped several generations of Vermont attitudes toward our state’s eighteenth-century beginnings.
Land speculator, revolutionary, pamphleteer, politician, and empire-builder, Ira Allen was a key figure on the late eighteenth-century Green Mountain frontier. Based on his 2024 book, “Ira Allen: A Biography,” J. Kevin Graffagnino’s lively talk evaluates Allen’s checkered career and makes the case for including him in our picture of Vermont’s formative decades.
“We The People” are invited to learn the history of printing the American Revolution! Join letterpress printer John Vincent in conversation around an old printing press, pull a broadside, and imagine what the Next Revolution could be.
Needlework samplers are a visual record of the values that guided early female education in Vermont, including its focus on needlework as an essential skill for all girls and women. Textile conservator Michele Pagán shares her research into the Revolutionary War ancestors of the girls who made 19th century schoolgirl samplers.
In the years running up to the current 250th commemorations of 1776, the Lake Champlain Maritime Museum has focused its research activities on the American Revolution. This presentation will share information on a number of previous, recent, and current research efforts focused on the Revolutionary War in general, and the Battle of Valcour Bay (October 1776) and its aftermath in particular.
On August 4, 1929, the Queen City’s street car era went up in literal flames. More than 5,000 attendees witnessed the spectacle of an unforgettable farewell party that made headlines worldwide. Author and filmmaker Jim Jones shares Burlington’s public transportation story, beginning with a horse-drawn street railway in 1885, followed by a state-of-the-art electrified system just eight years later.
Experience with author and filmmaker Jim Jones the colorful ups and downs of Vermont’s famous “Island Line” railroad featuring four drawbridges, three causeways, breathtaking scenery, and fascinating anecdotes.
Our seasonal “Words in the Woods” program allows Vermonters and visitors to enjoy our state’s natural beauty while listening to and reading literature in the outdoors.
Humanities Camps are filled with reading and writing projects, field trips, and outdoor activities.
We won a 2020 Schwartz Prize for best public humanities programming in the U.S. for Vermont Reads 2019: “March: Book One.”
We supported the Chandler Center for the Arts’ Global Connections Youth Outreach program, which highlights artists from around the world.
Our free public events help bring the power of the humanities to communities across Vermont.
