About The History List
The History List, which was launched in the Boston area in 2011, is one of several history initiatives from Lee Wright.
The History List is a platform historical societies, historic sites, and other organizations can use to attract and engage visitors and members through . . .
- Listing on the The History List
- Tools to power the events calendar on their own sites
- E-mails delivered to subscribers weekly that list history events in their state and region
- History Camps that bring together communities interested in history
- Resources that organizations of all sizes can use
While there are many lists of historic sites and many event calendars, The History List was built from the ground up to meet the needs of local history organizations.
- Open to all organizations—Any organization that presents history events, exhibits, and other history programming, including state and local historical societies, history museums, historic sites, libraries, walking tour operators, reenactor groups, preservation organizations, house museums, living history museums, sailing ship operators, national associations, cities and towns, government agencies and commissions, and genealogy organizations, along with history authors, costumed interpreters, and experts.
- No cost to add your organization and events.
- Easy for anyone to use. A typical local history organization can add their year of events in about 30 minutes. See a list of features and request an account.
- Weekly newsletters with upcoming history events deliver information on your events to subscribers every week. All content is drawn from The History List, so once an organization enters their events on The History List, they’ll be included automatically. Learn more about the format, the roll out across states and regions, and how you can participate.
- Power the calendar on your site or create an events calendar with different types of events, or events from different organizations with these tools.
- Resources for organizations of all sizes provide research, tool, and insight to support history programming across the country.
Timeline
2008: Put the city’s historic property survey records online—Marlborough was one of the first communities in Massachusetts to do this. Total cost: $40. All done by volunteers.
Idea Exchange—First gathering of history organizations throughout New England.
2010: Talk at BarCamp Boston—”History 2.0: Remaking the Study and Preservation of History Using Collaborative Web-based Tools”
2011: Launched The History List, built from the ground up to support local history organizations and help them attract new visitors and members to their events and exhibits. Here’s what some of them had to say about it.
→ Read “Why I started The History List”
2012: Ignite talk at MIT’s Media Lab—”History 2.0: Make History—Save History”
2013: Panel presentation at New England Museum Association Conference: “Collaborations for non-profit institutions: The who, what, when, where, why and why not”
2014: Launched History Camp with a sold out event in Cambridge.
2015: Added History Camp Iowa.
Launched the weekly “Guide to History Events in Massachusetts”—Expanding to other states, including RI, IA, NH, CT
2016: Added History Camp Pioneer Valley (Holyoke) and History Camp Colorado (Denver)
Launched The History List store in March.
2017: Expanded History Camp Boston to History Camp Weekend with the participation of local organizations, which programmed events on Sunday.
Presented at the Massachusetts History Conference.
Began offering The History List products to historic sites and history organizations for them to sell in their shops. The Old North Church, Historic Deerfield, the Maryland Historical Society, and the Missouri Historical Society are some of the organizations that now carry products from The History List.
Launched “The Historic America Collection,” helping historic sites and history organizations earn additional income online by offering their unique items to a national audience through The History List store. The Old North Church, the Newport Historical Society, the Susan B. Anthony Birthplace Museum are among the early participants.
Introduced design services, working initially with Longfellow’s Wayside Inn to develop products that are based on their historic site and appeal to modern tastes.
2018: Expanded retail partners, adding the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum (Springfield), Ford’s Theatre (Washington), Gettysburg National Military Park Museum and Visitor Center, The Museum of the American Revolution and the Independence Visitor Center (Philadelphia)
2019: Expanded retail partners, adding Fort Ticonderoga, the Lexington Historical Society, the Henry Knox Museum, the History channel store, and others. Introduced WWII-related products. Added History Camp Virginia. Established The Pursuit of History to create and manage all History Camps and new projects beyond in-person History Camps.
2020: Added Mayflower items to The History List Store in conjunction with the Pilgrim Hall Museum, and expanded the collection with a broader range of products covering more eras and historical topics, including our first design for Christmas. In March, just days away from the biggest History Camp ever, the pandemic forced the cancellation of this and the rest of the History Camps planned for the year.
Within a few weeks, The Pursuit of History, the non-profit organization now responsible for History Camp, launched a weekly discussion series, History Camp Discussions, with noted history authors, which are streamed every Thursday night at 8 pm (Eastern) at HistoryCamp.org/discussions. These are presented by The Pursuit of History, and to support the organization and do so in a way aligned with the mission, a series of limited edition silk screened, signed, numbered prints featuring original art of our nation’s great historic sites was launched. In the fall the organization created America’s Summer Roadtrip, a free event with tours and live interviews from 12 historic sites across the country. Running from 9 am to 9 pm, this was the first event of its kind and drew people from accross the country. Despite the pandemic and historic sites across the country closed, greatly reducing our sales to historic sites, The History List Store had the best year ever.
2021: Added more designs and products, including a Christmas ornament and cards, to The History List Store. With in-person events looking questionable, The Pursuit of History held the first History Camp America, a major online event with more than 30 sessions and seven tours of historic sites, well-known social media personalities focused on history, chefs with historic recipes, and even yoga from a historic tavern to start the day. Nearly 500 people registered for this paid event, which included an optional box full of products—a shirt, hat, glass, magnet, bookmarks, poster, small print, and more—that people loved. We finished the year with a “The History List On The Road” video at Fort Ticonderoga.
2022: In-person History Camps returned in 2022 with History Camp Boston 2022. In the fall, History Camp America 2022 welcomed participants from across the country for our second all day, all online History Camp with sessions on a wide variety of topics and behind-the-scenes tours of historic sites in the US and UK.
2023: In May, The Pursuit of History introduced the first Pursuit of History Weekend with The Pursuit of History: Forging the Continental Army. This was an unparalleled opportunity for 40 people from across the country to experience a historic site and learn about the individuals involved in a way never offered before. The following day the organization held History Camp Valley Forge, and on Sunday, two tours were offered, “Forward Operating Base Valley Forge” and “Revolutionary Philadelphia.
In the fall, The Pursuit of History held three days of events in Boston, starting with a reception for the 2023 Friends of History Camp Friday night, History Camp Boston 2023 Saturday, and two special tours Sunday, “The Maritime History of Boston and Salem” and “The Witch Trials: Salem Village and Salem Towne.”
The History List launched a series of limited edition prints marking key events of 250 years ago on our road to becoming a new nation. The first print was on the Boston Tea Party and was stamped exactly 250 years after that famous meeting was held in Old South Meeting House, after which “Indians” broke open chests and dumped tea in the harbor.
2024: The first Pursuit of History Weekend for our nation’s 250th was held in May with The Pursuit of History: Rebellion in New England, which took place at Washington’s Headquarters in Cambridge and was attended by people from across the country.
To mark the 80th anniversary of D-Day, The History List introduced one of its most popular designs ever. This year The History List two new types of products, a Washington inaugural address porcelain desk or dresser tray and an advent calendar with Washington’s Christmas Crossing.
History Camp Boston 2024 set a new record for the number of presentations (50) and the number of special tours on Sunday (4). That October we held our first Pursuit of History Weekend outside of the East Coast with The Pursuit of History: Santa Fe.
2025: The History List launched special products for the 250th anniversary of the Battles of Lexington and Concord, including a limited edition print stamped on Lexington Common on the 250th anniversary.
History Camp Boston 2025, with more than 350 people coming from 25 states across the country, will take place on Saturday, August 9, and the following a day there will be four different tours to choose from.
The Pursuit of History Weekends for our nation’s 250th continued with The Pursuit of History: The Outbreak of War in the Spring and The Pursuit of History: The Siege and Liberation of Boston in August.
Earlier volunteer efforts include . . .
- The Massachusetts IMLS Connecting to Collections Statewide Planning Grant Advisory Board
- The Board of Trustees of the Des Moines Public Library System
- The Board of Directors of the Evening Associates of the Art Institute of Chicago
- Member of the United Way/Crusade of Mercy Campaign Effectiveness Council (Chicago, IL)
- The Board of Directors of the Association for Retarded Citizens (now called “The Arc) for both Dallas and the state of Texas
Some of the volunteer efforts with historical societies in New England were covered in the Boston Globe a few years ago.
Contact information
Twitter
@TheHistoryList
Facebook
TheHistoryList
E-mail
Lee@TheHistoryList.com
Mail
787 Concord Road
Marlborough, MA 01752
→ Are you interested in contributing articles to The History List? Please send me a note with information on what you’d like to cover and links to other things you’ve written, or include a few examples as attachments.
Thanks for your interest. I look forward to hearing from you.
— Lee Wright | Founder