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In this special episode, Miranda Ruzinsky and Katie Truax – UH graduate students in public history – highlight the tradition of community support in Third Ward demonstrated through the institutions and public spaces associated with the funeral process. The role of black-owned businesses, churches and religious leaders, and public remembrance like murals are central to the neighborhood’s resilience in difficult times of death and grief.

This episode was researched, recorded, and produced by Miranda Ruzinsky and Katie Truax for the Center for Public History at the University of Houston.

To learn more:

Beverly, Trevia Wooster. “At Rest: A Historical Directory of Harris County, Texas Cemeteries (1822-2001).” Reference Material, n.d. Genealogy Collection. Houston History Research Center.

Bruines, Myron. “Walter Allen Ford.” Funeral Program. McCoy & Harrison Funeral Home: 4918 Martin Luther King Boulevard, Houston (Tex.), 77021; Jones Memorial United Methodist Church: 2504 Almeda Genoa Road, Houston (Tex.), 77047; Houston Memorial Gardens: 2426 Cullen Boulevard, Pearland (Tex.), 77581, April 14, 2016. African American Funeral Programs. Houston Public Library Digital Archives.

Houston Mural Map. https://houstonmuralmap.com/.

Najarro, Ileana. “Black Funeral Homes in Danger in Some U.S., Houston Communities.” Houston Chronicle, January 23, 2019.

“Our History - McCoy & Harrison Funeral Home,” June 11, 2018.

Wilson, Ezell. “Third Ward, Steeped in Tradition of Self-Reliance and Achievement.” Houston History, April 18, 2011.

All check out the amazing collections at the African American History Research Center at the Gregory Campus.

Oral Histories conducted by Miranda Ruzinsky:

Dickson, Pastor Donald, Interview, March 9, 2024.

McCoy Abernathy, Helen. Interview, February 24, 2024.

Music courtesy of:

Freesound.org

"remix of 45145__hammerklavier__GOSPEL_INTRO_TRADITIONAL_even_BRIGHTER_reverbed.wav" by Timbre. CC BY-NC 4.0.

"Street Gospel Hip Hip Piano - 75bpm - Bbmaj" by nnaudio. CC BY 4.0.

Freemusicarchive.org

"Little Wooden Church" by The Trumpeteers. PDM 1.0.

"Free Spacy Organ (F 003)" by Lobo Loco. CC BY-SA 4.0.

https://sarah-bereza.com/hymn-accompaniments/

The Center for Public History at the University of Houston. https://uh.edu/class/cph

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All over the United States, communities and individuals banded together to support the country during the Second World War. Houston’s Third Ward was no different in this respect. In this special episode, UH graduate students Austin Lee and James Burke weave together accounts originally documented in the African American newspaper, The Houston Informer. From the men and women in the armed forces to the merchant marine sailing supply ships and the volunteers on the home front, Third Ward residents supported their country even amid segregation and racism. After the war, many of these same volunteers returned to their community and gave back in the form of long careers serving their neighbors.

This episode was written and recorded by Austin Lee and James Burke for the Center for Public History at the University of Houston.

An archive of the Houston Informer can be found at the African American History Research Center at the Gregory School, a part of the Houston Public Library system.

Music courtesy of:
OpenMusicArchive.org
Don’t Go ‘Way Nobody performed by George Lewis & His New Orleans Stompers and written by Buddy Bolden. PDM.
In The Dark-Flashes performed by Jess Stacy and written by Bix Beiderbeck. PDM.

freemusicarchive.org/
“Taboret,” “Rate Sheet,” “Lacquer Groove,” “The Coil Winds,” and “Ray Gun – FasterFasterBrighter” by Blue Dot Sessions. CC BY-NC 4.0.

https://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/
Anchor's Away. Performed by Navy Band.

Sound Effects by:
Freesound.org
S17-10 Depth charge with water sounds.wav by craigsmith. CC0 1.0.
old typewriter sounds by Grauda 1982. CC0 1.0.
06 Warsaw Długa street in february 2012 about 3 PM.wav by MaciekKubera. CC0 1.0.
Waves by Bittermelonheart. CC0 1.0.

Day of Infamy Speech courtesy of the National Archives:
President Franklin Roosevelt’s “Day of Infamy” Speech. John G. Bradley. PDM.

The Center for Public History at the University of Houston. https://uh.edu/class/cph

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In 1977, thousands of women gathered in Houston, Texas, for the first and only federally funded National Women’s Conference (NWC) in U.S. History. Their purpose was to set and deliver an agenda to the president that would ensure that women’s rights would be a central focus in the wider human rights debate.

The Sharing Stories from 1977 Project, led by Dr. Leandra Zarnow (Associate Professor of History, University of Houston) and Dr. Nancy Beck Young (Moores Professor of History & Director of CPH, University of Houston), seeks to preserve and amplify this important political moment through a massive, crowdsourced digital archive. In Part I of their conversation, Drs. Zarnow and Beck Young introduce their practice of “big biography” - capturing the lives and demographics of over 2,000 delegates, 30,000 conference observers, and 150,000 regional participants. They emphasize that the success of this monumental project is only possible through the collective efforts of educators, students, researchers, archivists, and NWC participants from across the country.

In Part II of this episode, Drs. Zarnow and Beck Young are joined by three such collaborators - Dr. Judy Tzu-Chun Wu (Professor of History and Asian American Studies, University of California, Irvine), Dr. Stacie Taranto (Associate Professor of History, Ramapo College), and Dr. Emily Westkaemper (Associate Professor of History, James Madison University). They discuss how Sharing Stories has promoted strong intergenerational exchange, especially as students realize that many of the issues of the 1970s are still the issues of today.

Check out this amazing project: https://sharingstories1977.uh.edu/discover

The Center for Public History at the University of Houston. https://uh.edu/class/cph

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The power of an archive to elevate an underrepresented community cannot be overstated. Since the early 1990s, Recovering the US Hispanic Literary Heritage Program ("Recovery") under Arte Público Press at the University of Houston has focused on collecting and making accessible the written legacy of Hispanic and Latino peoples from colonial times to the late 20th century. In 2017, this effort to expand the historical record of the US took new form with the establishment of the US Latino Digital Humanities Center (USLDH), the first of its kind in the country.

In Part I of this episode recorded in Fall 2023, Dr. Gabriela Baeza Ventura (Deputy Director for Arte Público; "Recovery" Director; USLDH Co-Director; Associate Professor of Hispanic Studies), Dr. Carolina Villarroel ("Recovery" Brown Foundation Director of Research and Co-Director of USLDH), and Dr. Lorena Gauthereau ("Recovery" Digital Programs Manager) discuss the deep community connections and trust fostered by their approach to the digital archive. Their insistence on sharing authority and inquiry with the people donating material breaks down academic barriers, while the respect they give to each item digitized - including adding bilingual metadata - increases accessibility and representation.

In Part II of this episode recorded in Fall 2024, we get to hear about the efficacy of this practice through the experience of three student interns (Monica Jiminez, Natalia Siboldi, and Yadira Hermosillo), who helped process one family’s archive - the Morales Funeral collection. An introduction to their work is provided by Mikaela Selley, CPH alum and "Recovery" Program Manager.

For more on the amazing work of "Recovery" and USLDH, check out the embedded links above.

See also the written publications of these scholars, including:
Baeza Ventura, Gabriela, María Eugenia Cotera, Linda García Merchant, Lorena Gauthereau, and Carolina Villarroel. "A U.S. Latinx Digital Humanities Manifesto" in Debates in the Digital Humanities 2023. Edited by Matthew K. Gold and Lauren F. Klein, 2023.

Baeza Ventura, Gabriela, Nicolás Kanellos and Carolina Villarroel. “Twenty-Five Years of Recovering Our Written Legacy” in Writing/Righting History: Twenty-Five Years of Recovering the US Hispanic Literary Heritage. Edited by Antonia Castañeda and Clara Lomas. Houston, Arte Público Press, 2020, 5-18.

Transition music: "Por Medio De La Lectura" by Los Amparito. CC BY-NC-SA 2.5 MX.

The Center for Public History at the University of Houston. https://uh.edu/class/cph

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A historian and two engineers walk into a conference….

Rather than the start to a joke, this is a core component of the project, "Algorithms and Power Systems Architecture: Using Historical Analysis to Envision a Sustainable Future.” Led by Dr. Julie Cohn, a research historian (Center for Public History, University of Houston), and two electrical engineers, Dr. Daniel Molzahn (Assistant Professor in the School of Electorical and Computer Engineering, Georgia Tech) and Dr. Sairaj Dhople (Oscar A. Schott Professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Minnesota), this interdisciplinary team is united by a shared vision that building the power grid of the future depends on a thorough understanding of the past and the people and ideas behind the technology. In their conversation recorded in January 2024, Drs. Cohn, Molzahn, and Dhople discuss one portion of the project: collecting oral histories from academic and industry leaders in electrical and power systems engineering. From the inclusiveness of their methodology to the enthusiastic response of the engineering community, it is evident how productive these kinds of partnerships between the humanities and STEM can be.

Check out the project: https://sites.google.com/view/power-systems-history/home

Learn more about the project leads:
Dr. Julie Cohn - The Grid: Biography of an American Technology (MIT Press, 2017)
Dr. Daniel Molzahn - https://molzahn.github.io
Dr. Sairaj Dhople - https://cse.umn.edu/ece/sairaj-dhople

The Center for Public History at the University of Houston. https://uh.edu/class/cph

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Latino cARTographies is an interactive digital archive and exhibition reimagining Houston through an inclusive vision of Latino art, artists, and community. This project was developed out of the University of Houston’s Center for Mexican American and Latino/a Studies (CMALS) as the brain child of Dr. Pamela Anne Quiroz (Distinguished Professor of Sociology, University of Houston). After hosting the 2019 Latino Art Now! - a national visual arts conference - Quiroz joined with Juana Guzman (former vice president of the National Museum of Mexican Art, Chicago) to preserve this experience, art, and culture for a wide public audience. Using TouchCity™ technology developed by Gibson International, Quiroz, Guzman, and a research team of faculty and students gathered hundreds of hours of data and 2,000 images related to 250 Latino artists, 80 landmarks, 17 arts organizations, and other important sites within Houston’s Latino communities. As mobile digital boards, public audiences can now experience Latino cARTographies throughout the city of Houston, at Bush Intercontinental and Hobby Airports, The Heritage Society, Multicultural Education and Counseling through the Arts (MECA), the Mexican Consulate, and Art Museum, TX.

In Spring 2023, the team took the digital board to a new level with an immersive, cinematic event. A selection of artists and organizations were integrated with music and animations and then projected on walls 20-feet tall for a 270-degree wraparound experience. A few days later, Quiroz and Guzman sat down to talk with Dr. Debbie Harwell in the CMALS office, reflecting on the three-year project, audience reception, and plans for the future.

To learn more about Latino cARTographies, see their official page through the Center for Mexican American and Latino/a Studies: https://www.uh.edu/class/cmals/latino-cartographies/index

On the TouchCity™ platform, see Gibson International's webpage: https://www.gibsoninternational.design/portfolio/latino-cartographies/

The Center for Public History at the University of Houston. https://uh.edu/class/cph

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In an increasingly digitized world, public historians have new opportunities to reach wider audiences than ever before. However, translating our work online for and with public audiences requires more than simply uploading essays and images.

In this conversation among the directors of SYRIOS (recorded Fall 2023), we learn how a digital exhibit devoted to ancient coins from Syria experiments with new technologies and techniques from data science and digital media. Specifically, SYRIOS draws upon user experience (UX) research to enlist public audiences in the full process of creating an online exhibit. Drs. Kristina Neumann (Associate Professor of History), Peggy Lindner (Assistant Professor of Information and Logistics Technology), and Liz Rodwell (Assistant Professor of Digital Media) discuss how the success of a digital project hinges upon UX, from imagining users through personas, enlisting testers for new concepts, and intentionally making space for even the most surprising feedback from public audiences of all ages.

Check out the prototype digital exhibit for SYRIOS: https://syrios.uh.edu/

The Center for Public History at the University of Houston. https://uh.edu/class/cph

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Over the course of the 20th century, Houston evolved into a global city as immigrants from across the world came to call the city home. In this special supplement, undergraduate students from the University of Houston explore Houston’s undertold immigrant stories. Together, they reveal a range of experiences that uncover often overlooked textures of the city.

In this episode, students recount the lives of Jewish-Latin Americans who settled in 1960s and 1970s Houston. These immigrants belong to two ethnic groups, and while building a life in their new homes, they created a new community of their own.

How did a meeting between the dictator Fidel Castro and a Houston congressman, Mickey Leland, help a young, Jewish prisoner in a labor camp become a successful doctor in Miami? Listen now for the story of Salomon Imiak.

This episode was written and recorded by Devin Herrera, Nicole Hopkins, Christian Dodd, and Charis Wu as part of HIST 3317: Making of Ethnic America (Spring 2023).

The oral history with Salomon Imiak was recorded by Dr. Mark Goldberg (Associate Professor of History, University of Houston).

Music courtesy of:
freesound.org
por el camino by Connie Mendez. Attribution NonCommercial 4.0.

https://freemusicarchive.org/home
The Devil's Dance by Cuban Cowboys. CC BY-NC-ND 3.0.
Come Again by Holizna. CC0 1.0.
le manège pour les Antilles by Jean Toba. CC BY-SA 4.0.
Funk and Flash by Blue Dot Sessions. CC BY-NC 4.0.
Sadness by Gurdonark. CC BY 3.0.
Thoughts by Gurdonark. CC BY-SA 4.0.
Stereo Funk by M33 Project. CC BY-NC 4.0.

The Center for Public History at the University of Houston. https://uh.edu/class/cph