Hello from the 3rd floor of Old Main!
As I write, we finally have snow in the forecast, which seems appropriate given the fact that so many holiday events at Augustana College are this week!
Among those many events is one that the Department of History is co-sponsoring with the Augustana Historical Society … and which would not be possible without the incredible support from the faculty and staff at the Thomas Tredway Library: A Pop-Up Exhibition about the History of Fashion and Clothing at Augustana College!
There are a couple of times when students will be sharing what they learned:
Other classes are wrapping up with projects, big and small, too. Thanks to a European history course taught by Dr. Ellis, I just walked by a rather exciting reenactment of debates surrounding the French Revolution today, for instance. Our History Club will also be hosting its annual holiday party, complete with weird Victorian Christmas cards, before we head into the winter break.
Our history department intern, Ryan Bacorn, created faculty profiles to adorn our hallway bulletin board. He suggested that I share some entertaining tidbits from them here, but you’ll have to stop by our bulletin board the next time you’re in Old Main to read the rest.
Dr. Lendol Calder: Chopping cotton on my uncles' farms. ("Chopping" here means digging up weeds with a hoe.) Age 8-11. I learned that no matter how long the row, or hot the sun, or grueling the task, you can do the impossible if you take things one step at a time. And keep going.
Dr. David Ellis: Dw i'n dysgu Cymraeg. (I'm learning Welsh.)
Dr. Jane Simonsen: I own hand puppets of Quad Cities founder George Davenport and his maybe-wife, Margaret. See me to book re-enactments of lesser-known moments in QC history.
Dr. Elizabeth Lawrence: Teaching new courses, new material, or even new students affords me opportunities to continue my own learning and follow my curiosity. At Augustana, I have enjoyed significant freedom to teach courses of my own design. I have taught a course in China and I am offering a course that will travel to Hawai'i in January 2027. These are rare and wonderful opportunities - for students, I hope, but also for myself. I have also greatly valued teaching in the Augustana Prison Education Program.
Dr. Brian Leech: I was a jazz drummer in my teens and twenties. I recently put up my drum-set again and I’m trying to improve my double bass drum technique so that I can play along to complicated metal.
After finals week concludes we’ll all enjoy a brief respite, then January-term courses begin, which include a course on movies about wars, a course about the modern Olympic games, and yet another course about depictions of Native Americans. I’ll be in touch after that time with another update.
Cheers,
Brian Leech
Chair of the Department of History
Three student-athletes remain on top in their sport and studies — Charlotte Frere ’26, Charlotte Newport ’25 and Ocean Akau ’25. All three are repeat Academic All-American honorees, a feat achieved by only a few Vikings through the years.
Dr. Lendol Calder is no stranger to awards and honors, being named Illinois Professor of the Year in 2010. And now he's a finalist for Baylor University's Robert Foster Cherry Award for Great Teaching, the top teaching prize in the nation.
Students in an Augustana Prison Education Program history class curated a new exhibition in the Thomas Tredway Library. “Dynamic Traditions,” which was staged by Augustana’s Center for Visual Culture, will be on display on the library’s second floor until May 23.
The students in Augustana's Public History course have spent the semester learning about the history of clothing and then applying what they've learned to alumni interviews and archival research. They're excited to share their findings at two separate showings of a pop-up museum:
The students in Augustana's Public History course have spent the semester learning about the history of clothing and then applying what they've learned to alumni interviews and archival research. They're excited to share their findings at two separate showings of a pop-up museum:
