Presentations

The Houghton County Democratic Party added this caption to the above photo on their website, "Our Keynote Speaker was historian and author, Gary Kaunonen, who spoke about events during the 1913 mining strike in Houghton County."

The May presentations have come and gone with two presentations given to two outstanding audiences. The first presentation given in mid-May was to the Houghton County Democrats as part of their program, "1913-2013: A Century of Solidarity." I was one of four speakers at the event, and though I gave the keynote, any one of the four speakers could have fit this billing. The presentations were an excellent accounting of organized labor's past, present, and future in Houghton County. Among the other speakers were former Michigan Senator and Steel Workers member Mike Prussi, current Michigan House of Representatives member and union member Scott Dianda, and Michigan Education Association member Terry Lajuenesse.

My keynote included updates on research from Community in Conflict, the 1913-14 Strike's national significance, and why a strike that happened 100 years ago has relevance today. The 1913-14 strike's relevance to today's labor situation is very noticeable in Michigan, where we are seeing our rights to free speech, freedom of assembly, and the right to collectively bargain being whittled away, and sometimes shamelessly stolen in the middle of the night by autocrat governor Rick Snyder and his anti-labor goons. Today, organized labor is in the fight of its life, and lessons of solidarity and commitment to a cause can easily be appreciated and understood by examining the efforts of working-class families during the 1913-14 Strike.

I was graciously given a standing ovation for my remarks by the 60 or so people in attendance, but getting to talk with folks after the program was the real "payoff." Copper Country residents are so proud of their history, regardless of political affiliation, and talking with folks at this event really highlighted the importance of remembering the past to inform our future.

Giving a presentation as part of Keweenaw National Historical Park's Fourth Thursday in History series. The presentation location, in Calumet's Visitor Center, was a unique experience in a historic venue.

There were 75 plus people in attendance for this presentation, which was a part of Keweenaw National Historical Park's 4th Thursday in History program. I spoke on the work I did as Project Historian for the "Tumult and Tragedy" traveling exhibit's project team, which was rounded out by Project Manager Erik Nordberg and Project Graphic Designer Mike Stockwell. After the presentation I joined people in the Visitor Center's traveling exhibit space to answer questions on the exhibit. 

The local newspaper, the Daily Mining Gazette, covered the event, and the story on the presentation can be read by clicking on this link: http://www.mininggazette.com/page/content.detail/id/529934/Telling-stories-of-the-strike.html?nav=5006. 

 

Tumult and Tragedy Public Materials

(Right click and select open in a new window to read larger version of images)

In addition to the traveling exhibit, the Project Team (Erik Nordberg, Mike Stockwell, and I) also created materials for public consumption that include: a brochure, a handbill, a poster, and a web site.

The web address for the "Tumult and Tragedy" exhibit is: www.1913strike.mtu.edu 

Handbill created by Project Team 

As part of the grant, the exhibit will be "traveling" to other sites in the Copper Country. The Project Team decided to use a poster and handbill to announce these next stops after the exhibit leaves Michigan Tech. Included on the poster and handbill are dates, speakers, and topics for exhibit openings as the exhibit visits other sites in the Copper Country.

I'm (Gary) giving a presentation on writing the interpretive text for the exhibit at the Keweenaw National Historical Park on May 23, 2013, at 7 pm in the Park's Visitor Center in Calumet.

The front and back covers of the brochure. The back cover, seen on the left-hand side of the image contains names of the Project Team as well as the Narrative Committee. This entire project was truly a collaborative venture from beginning to end and displays the power and importance of having as many voices as possible in a public history exhibit. 

Inside cover of the brochure featuring mineworkers posing for a picture outside of one of the area's many shafthouses and the funeral for Finnish immigrant people who died at Italian Hall. This image is from the interior of a Finnish Apostolic Lutheran Church on Pine Street in Calumet, Michigan. 

Two of the four exhibit content areas.

The two other exhibit themes contained in the brochure. 

The brochure is intended to give an encapsulation of the exhibit's main themes and direct the reader to the exhibit's on-line content. The four content areas, or themes, of the exhibit are displayed as titles on each of the brochure's inner folds and then the sub-headings for the exhibit are contained in the top right corner above the each heading. The four thematic areas I chose to tell the story of the "Tumult and Tragedy" of the 1913-14 Michigan Copper Strike were "Context," "Community," "Conflict," and "Consequence."

As you will note, there are QR Codes (Quick Read Codes--available as apps on most mobile devices) on each of the public material handouts. QR Codes are the funny looking, square bar code-like blocks that are seen everywhere nowadays. Though they look and sound a little mysterious, QR Codes are simply a way to direct mobile device users to on-line content. QR Codes have been used in marketing for a while now, but they also provide public historians and exhibits a valuable way to link people at physical exhibit sites to cyber, or on-line, content such as web pages and streaming video or audio content.

The QR Codes on "Tumult and Tragedy's'" public materials direct readers to the web site hosted by Michigan Tech, while QR Codes were also used on the exhibit panels as well as a way to direct viewers to various content and web sites on the internet including web pages and content from the Copper Country Historical Collections, Keweenaw National Historical Park, and Finlandia University.

Italian Hall Archaeology Part II

This Saturday and Sunday students from Michigan Tech's Industrial Archaeology program began doing physical archaeology at the Italian Hall Memorial site. The purpose of the archaeological work was to do sampling, in the form of shovel test pits, of what is under the site of the Italian Hall. With this information, the National Park Service's Keweenaw National Historical Park will create a landscape design for future interpretation and education efforts at the site.

Dr. Tim Scarlett, who was leading the dig, was surprised and confident that the archaeological work at the site yielded enough information to give Keweenaw National Historical Park some solid information on which to plan for the landscaping work at the site.

I (Gary) was able to participate in the dig on both Saturday and Sunday. Saturday was a beautiful fall day in the Keweenaw and the group that I was working in found what is likely the foundation of the Italian Hall. I'll post photographs of this foundation, which we found at about 40 cm underground, and other interesting finds from this weekend. I have to write that excavating and finding what is likely a part of the Italian Hall's 1908 building foundation was a unique and moving experience. What we uncovered was buried for over 100 years and the simple smooth faced stones buried in the ground are physical connections to the tragic building that reminded us all of the significance of the work we were doing.

I got chills when I first saw the rough face of the stone foundation as I saw it emerging from the dirt and rubble that had buried it for over 100 years. It was truly a great experience and I feel honored to have been a part of the students, volunteers, and project staff who were working at the site. My thanks to Dr. Tim Scarlett and Keweenaw National Historical Park for including me in this work.

Now, the photos from Saturday:

Saturday's digging was under warm, sunny skies. This group of Tech Industrial Archaeology Program students digs into the lot adjacent to Italian Hall as the Memorial Arch watches over the work.

In the upper right hand corner of this test pit is what is believed to be a small section of stone foundation from the Italian Hall. Our team of workers unearthed this through rubble seen sticking out into the shovel test pit. It was amazing to be able to dig this up; it was an experience I will always remember.

Sunday's work at the site brought much less favorable weather, but interesting finds none-the-less. Conditions got so cold and rainy that at times we had to tent the shovel test pit holes to keep water out and workers dry. Images from the soggy Sunday:

Michigan Tech Industrial Archaeology program student Roger Gerke beginning a shovel test pit in the rear quarter of the Italian Hall Memorial site. There were three shovel test pits dug in the Italian Hall Memorial site, of these only two were inside the historical building. The shovel test pits, once bottomed out, are then filled in and sod is replaced to leave as little impact at the site as possible. 

Difficult to believe, but there is a person under this makeshift tent and down about 80 cms below the ground. This shovel test pit, located in a lot adjacent to the Italian Hall Memorial site yielded very interesting finds and bottomed out at about 100 centimeters. The person excavating the shovel test pit only stopped because a wooden floor was hit at 100 centimeters.

As dirt is screened from digging in the shovel test pits, small pieces of physical history emerge. This tiny artifact is a piece of porcelain from the lot adjacent to the Italian Hall Memorial site. Through historic photographs and maps, it was determined that this lot housed a saloon and residences and this piece of porcelain probably came from one of those historic residences. 

Iron artifact from a shovel test pit inside the Italian Hall--or rather from inside where the Italian Hall once stood. It is thought that this artifact is perhaps a piece of hardware, perhaps a coat hook. The Italian Hall's interior had many coat hooks and the depth of this coat hook in the ground, indicated that it was a historic artifact, likely from Italian Hall. The next step for this artifact is a good cleaning in the Tech's Industrial Archaeology lab to remove the rust and dirt from around the artifact.

Difficult to tell from this image, but this shovel test pit goes down about 100 centimeters. The various layers or levels of soil can be seen in the walls of the shovel test pit. The bottom of this shovel test pit proved very interesting as a number of glass bottles and glass bottle fragments sat on top of a wood floor.

More Italian Hall Archaeology News Stories

From the Houghton Bureau of NBC's Marquette affiliate: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0lGrc6VUs4c

From ABC 5 & 10: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z7lXKXnM1Cs