UConn History PhD ’15 Erin Bartram founded Contingent Magazine with this vision: to broaden who does history, how they do it, and where they do it. Bartram, who is a historian of the 19th century United States and currently works as the School Programs Coordinator at The Mark Twain House and Museum in Hartford, CT, is an example of how to do history outside of tenure-track positions. As a part of Contingent Magazine’s “Doing History” series, Erin Bartram reveals what energizes her about her work, from the variety of programming to K-12 curriculum design. Bartram describes that through her work in public history, she is able to use her research in gender and family histories of New England to tell richer stories about the past. In the article, Bartram affirms that:
“Not only was UConn really the best place for me, I was fortunate enough to have an adviser who was endlessly curious and didn’t mind me roaming far afield. In a department with Dick Brown, Bob Gross, Chris Clark, Nina Dayton, Nancy Shoemaker, and Altina Waller–plus some Early America stars in other departments at the university–I could have only taken 18th and 19th century courses if I’d really wanted to. But I took all kinds of courses, and got really into histories and theories of colonialism. Oddly it was that stuff that led me into the topic I ended up researching.”
For more on Erin Bartram’s work, please read “How Erin Bartram Does History,”