Happy American Archives Month! It’s a new academic year here at the Albert Gore Research Center, and that means there’s a new crop of Graduate Assistants to introduce to you all. First, though, I have to go over other changes.
Front row, from left: Jason McGowan, Hannah Meller, Shelby Walker, Beth Ewald, Logan Mcvey.
This is Hannah Meller speaking. Sarah first introduced me to y’all when I started here as a graduate assistant back in 2019. While I graduated with my Masters in 2021, I returned to the Gore Center as a Project Archivist the next year to continue my work with the Johnny Hayes Political Memorabilia Collection. Later in 2022, Sarah Calise and Donna Baker accepted exciting positions in other institutions.
Donna has moved from Tennessee to the Northwestern State University of Louisiana, where she is now the University Archivist and Records Officer at the Cammie Henry Research Center. Sarah initially departed for a position in Vanderbilt University’s Cataloging & Metadata Department, but they have recently moved to the role of the Metadata Coordinator and Curator of Community Histories in Vanderbilt’s Special Collections. You can keep track of part of her continuing local history work at the Nashville Queer History website.
I want to extend my gratitude to the graduate assistants that were with us during the 2022-2023 academic year: Beth Ewald, Bethany Hollingsworth, Laura Headlee, Rachel Hooper, Emily Hougland, Olivia Iannotta, Logan Mcvey, Ryan Rowland, and Stephen Simmons. They adapted to the transitory period with grace, and Gore Center Director Louis Kyriakoudes and I couldn’t have kept the reference and processing functions of the archives running without their support.
I have now transitioned to the position of Associate Archivist, and we now have a new Archivist. Andrew McMahan has technically returned to the Gore Center, as he first came here as a graduate assistant back in 2017. After graduating with his Masters in 2018, he worked as an Archival Assistant at the Tennessee State Library and Archives until February 2020, and then as Records Manager of the Rutherford County Archives until June 2023.
I would also like to highlight Jason McGowan. He started working here as an Oral Historian in 2022. He has spearheaded the Middle Tennessee African American Oral History Project. It chronicles the lives and diverse experiences of Black Americans in Middle Tennessee during legal segregation through the implementation of integration. You can find out more about this project on his website.
Andrew and I were happy to welcome both familiar and new faces to the archives in this academic year’s group of graduate assistants from the Public History department.
One returning student is Bethany Ewald, who started here in Fall 2021. Since this summer, she has been working here as an intern. She is from Aiken, South Carolina and went to Anderson University for her undergraduate degree. She is interested in the nineteenth century, especially psychiatric and asylum history. In the archives, she enjoys processing work. If she could sing a duet with a historical figure, she would partner with Dorothea Dix to perform the song “Livin’ it Up on Top” from Hadestown.
Also returning is Logan Mcvey, who started as a graduate assistant in Spring 2023 after interning in the previous year. He is in his second semester in the Public History program and is pursuing archival management. Logan is originally from Warren County, Tennessee but moved to Murfreesboro before starting high school. He stuck around and earned a double major in History and Political Science at MTSU. He enjoys 20th-century political history and loves how archives allow for a unique perspective on political issues. He would sing “Farmer Refuted” with Alexander Hamilton. He notes that Hamilton reportedly was a good vocalist and wonders how the Founding Father would react to a musical about himself!
The first of our new graduate assistants is Abby Hikade, a third semester graduate student from Dyersburg, TN. As an undergraduate at MTSU, she had a major in History Education with a minor in Italian. She is passionate about education in the classroom and museum setting and is excited to learn more about education in the archives. She would play trumpet with Louis Armstrong and sing “What a Wonderful World.”
Chris Parker is from Nashville and also earned his undergraduate degree at MTSU, obtaining a B.S. in History with minors in Religious Studies and Jewish and Holocaust Studies. He is in his first year in the Public History M.A. and is interested in Tennessee political history. In the archives, he looks forward to working with university and political material. He picked “Movin’ Right Along” by Kermit & Fozzie and would sing it with Davy Crockett.
Morgan Stence is another MTSU graduate – she earned a B.S. in English with minors in History and Political Science. She has started her first semester as an M.A. student in the Public History Program with a concentration in archives. She loves archives and is interested in identity in archives as well as Irish history, classical and medieval history, and women and queer history. If she could sing a duet with any historical figure, she would sing “No Way” from Six the Musical with Catherine of Aragon. Amusingly, she pointed out to me that Catherine would likely go to a priest and ask for forgiveness afterwards.
Shelby Walker is our last first-year M.A. Public History student. She grew up in Trussville, Alabama – near Birmingham. She graduated with a B.A. History and a concentration in Public History from the University of North Alabama in Florence. She has diverse historical interests, including folklore, cults, secret societies, spies, and medieval history. She would sing a duet of Fallout Boy’s take on “We Didn’t Start the Fire” with Emperor Nero. I imagine they would do it while Rome was burning for maximum dramatic impact.
As for me and Andrew? I’d like to do a duet of “Everybody Wants to Rule the World” with Constance Markievicz. Andrew’s answer from 2017 holds true: he’d sing Molly Hatchet’s “Flirtin’ with Disaster” with Theodore Roosevelt.
The semester is in full gear and we already have interesting projects underway. Some of you may have seen our showcase of political memorabilia in the Tucker Theater Lobby for the Constitution Day panel discussion. You can follow us here and on our socials, where we hope to occasionally highlight the materials our graduate students are working with. In the meantime, feel free to come to us with your research requests.
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