Truth Or Consequence: History In the Digital Age

Truth Or Consequence: History In the Digital Age

- Suzanne Clary

I remember the first time someone introduced me publicly as a historian. I had never self-identified as one. I have an undergraduate degree in Art History and, as many regular readers already know (yay all of you!), restoring the bricks and more importantly the narrative of John Jay’s home in Rye, New York has been my passion for nearly a decade. When my children were each filling in the Common App for college, the field for “Father’s Occupation” was a snap but “Mother’s Occupation” was a stumper. None of the 45 generic drop-down categories quite captured “full-time volunteer preservationist, nonprofit historic site director, researcher and writer.” In the end, they assured me it was not a reflection of my deficit of pie-baking skills or nest-building capacity that made them immediately reject “Homemaker;” nor the fact that our dining room table is completely unusable, laden as it is with antique maps, diaries and indentures. True to their upbringing to challenge limitations or perhaps just expand definitions, my son and daughter affirmatively checked the box “Other.”

But back to my apotheosis. It took place at a stately, black tie dinner in 2011 hosted by the New-York Historical Society (NYHS) at which a real historian, Ron Chernow, was being honored. During the cocktail hour, we all inhaled rarified tidbits of 18th and 19th century-centric conversation more rapidly than mini-crab cakes. Hundreds of people were packed into a votive-lit, marble hall that glittered with intellectual capital. We were there to show our support of the organization’s mission to be “a national forum for the discussion of issues surrounding the making and meaning of history.”