By Ronald Limbaugh, Ph.D.
Emeritus Professor of History, University of the Pacific
For years academic historians at many
prestigious universities studiously avoided what was once pejoratively
labeled “local history.” Regional or area studies seemed too provincial, too
narrowly focused, too filled with petty details of unimportant events, to
merit the attention of the “big wheels” of history. Much of this disdain
arose out of the decline of Turnerian thinking, starting in the late 1930s
and reaching a crescendo during the “consensus school” of historiography in
the postwar era.
Frederick Jackson Turner,
a late-19th century historian whose study of cheap lands and their influence
on the process of American westward expansion was based on regional and
local historical research, had profoundly influenced the study and writing
of American history for the next half-century. As Turner’s influence waned,
so did the emphasis on American studies at the local level, at least for
many institutions of higher learning.
By the mid-20th century,
the “big wheels” of academic history were those that looked for great
synthesizing events, the profound forces of change that explain fundamental
ideas about people and cultures over time. Men like Arnold Toynbee and
Oswald Spengler, both of whom were noted for sweeping generalizations about
the rise and decline of empires and the organic development of civilization,
influenced the history academy and left a profound impact on how it was
written.
During that period, local
history was largely abandoned by professionals and left to untutored
amateurs who often were unable to handle the responsibility of synthesizing
local history. They made little effort to view local events from broad
perspectives or draw important conclusions from narrowly focused data. Most
local history was written as local chronology, disconnected from the broader
stream of people, places and events, without impact beyond a specific
region. Many local historians resembled a very legalistic-minded U.S.
senator, who, as a witty academic once said, “can see the knot hole in a
barn door but can’t see the door.” Crane Brinton, a respected professional,
summed up the case against local history in these words: “In the past we
have absorbed too many facts and have thought about them too little.”
In recent decades,
however, local history has gained new respect and recognition. The impact of
the 1960s — that disturbing era of social foment and political upheaval —
turned the historian’s world upside down. Instead of exclusively looking at
the world from the top down from ivory towers, more and more academics began
to turn the telescope around, to view history “from the bottom up.” Looking
at change over time from down near the grass roots, where “real people”
live, gave a new dimension to history. Even though the social turbulence of
the 1960s threatened to undermine the very foundations of society, in the
arena where history was debated and written there were some significant and
constructive side effects. As people and organizations began to renew the
search for meaningful lives, and as communities began to redefine their
roles in society, local history became a valuable tool, an instrument for
social and intellectual progress. For at its very core, the social unrest of
that decade was a reaction against an alienated, impersonal, dehumanized,
technological, bureaucratic society. Local history thus became part of a
focused effort to redefine the role of individuals and minorities in
American life.
Does this mean that local
history is now simply a tool for the special interests — the minorities, the
poor, the Third World, the environmentalists, the young radicals who attack
conventional values and old traditions? Certainly history has sometimes been
used for political purposes, to reinforce preconceived notions instead of
trying to “tell it like it is,” or was. But manipulating history — whether
deliberately or just unconsciously — is nothing new. Back in the 18th
century, Voltaire scoffed at history and thought it was nothing “but a pack
of tricks we play on the dead.” A century later he could have cited Leland
Stanford’s example. Stanford commissioned a painting to commemorate the
completion of the transcontinental railroad, but told the artist to leave
out the liquor bottles and ladies of ill repute so as not to mar the dignity
of the occasion. Unfortunately for the great railroad magnate, photographers
were present to tell the real story, and those photos have been vital in
protecting the past from the mythmakers.
Preserving the raw
material of history is one of the most important roles of local historical
societies and libraries, for without documentation, history can truly
become, as iconoclast John Dos Passos once said, “a mass invention, the
daydream of a race.” There is nothing wrong with daydreams, so long as the
dreamer does not lose track of reality. That is why historians must have
access to newspapers, court records, family papers, estate appraisals,
school records and all the other documents which provide clues to the real
past, not just the figments of someone’s imagination. Without those clues,
historians would remain as uncertain as the eastern tourist who reportedly
arrived in the Mother Lode one day and gazed for a moment at the two huge
tailings wheels still standing, part of the tramline that carried mine waste
away from the Kennedy Mine in Jackson. Turning to a friend he, remarked,
“You know that must have been quite a wagon when they had all four of them.”
Assuming we have adequate
raw materials for good research and writing, focusing on local communities
has been crucial for reinterpreting the past and correcting popular
misconceptions. For example, a few decades ago, conventional views about the
process of approving the American Constitution were drastically revised
after historians carefully analyzed county records of the original 13
states. Regional research has also corrected distorted views about the role
of minorities on the American frontier. We know now, for example, that at
least a quarter of western cowboys were Mexican or Negro — despite those old
nostalgic lily-white B-westerns you can still catch on late night
television.
Local history, written
about specific places and people, is also important because it brings us
down to earth, away from the abstract, and reveals the lives of ordinary
folk who were the real shapers of history in a democratic society. There is
a story — perhaps apocryphal — about Abe Lincoln that illustrates the point.
One day an aide, remarking on a famous intellectual of the day, said: “It
may be doubted whether any man of our generation has plunged more deeply
into the sacred fountain of learning.” To which the president replied: “Yes,
or come up drier.” For too long, national history was geared to a “great
man” approach that neglected the lives of the vast bulk of denizens who make
up society and mold its destiny. In the postmodern world where complexity is
the norm and stress the common denominator regardless of country, wealth or
status, understanding history means recognizing the impact of everyday lives
on the “global village.”
Finally, local history is
important because it helps build community pride and respect. In an age
characterized by the disintegration of family and community, local history
can give us a common focus, a sense of direction to our lives and
communities. Some time ago in one of my classes, I asked a young Armenian
girl, who had never talked about the family’s past with her parents, to
write a term paper on Armenian history using her own family as an example.
The project was a great revelation to her, one that not only elevated her
self-respect but brought the family closer together. It also turned out to
be a darned good paper — imaginative, creative, readable and indeed
profound, for it used one Fresno example as a case study for analyzing the
entire Armenian-American experience. This was local history at its best.
In an introductory essay
in the Harvard Guide to American History, an old but still useful reference
tool, the editors challenged young historians to: "Bring all your
knowledge of life to bear on everything that you write. Never let yourself
bog down in pedantry and detail. Bring history, the most humane and noble
form of letters, back to the proud position she once held; knowing that your
words, if they be read and remembered, will enter into the stream of life,
and perhaps move men to thought and action centuries hence, as do those of
Thucydides after more than 2,000 years."
To me the message is
clear. Regardless of whether the subject is the Peloponnesian Wars or the
Fresno Armenians, no matter if you are a trained professional or a gifted
amateur, if you write history, make it meaningful by telling us not only
what happened but why. Flesh out bare skeletons with real people living real
lives. Record not just events but explain their context and significance.
Give the story perspective, depth as well as breadth. Finally, tell the
story in simple, direct, literate prose. Thucydides did all this, and his
words are still very readable today. His model is well worth remembering,
for after all, Thucydides was writing about a regional event in a specific
time and place. You might say he was writing local history.
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