Public History Q&A: How to Share the Past with the Community
Many people do not notice the differences between “traditional” history and public history. This month we present a Q&A session with MJ Vega on how public projects get done and some of the challenges involved with bringing the past alive for a modern audience. Prior to starting graduate school at Washington State University, MJ created and now maintains a website dedicated to the public history of his high school football team. This is the brief story of how that project happened. Q: What got you interested in doing this kind of project? Why the history of this particular high school team? A: I was born and raised in Monroe, WA, so it’s something I already have some familiarity with. When I was growing up in the 2000s, I would always hear about the team, so I just assumed we had always been bad, because no one had said anything to the contrary. But when I started going to Monroe High, the program started to turn around. I still didn’t follow the team much, but in my sen