Outside Resources

Hear, Here shares the diverse stories and voices of downtown La Crosse. They seek out the stories of business people, tourists, and those that call downtown home. They also hear voices of people who experienced downtown long ago by including stories from the Oral History Program at the UW-La Crosse Murphy Library Special Collections.

In 1933, faced with a housing shortage, the federal government began a program explicitly designed to increase — and segregate — America's housing stock. Author Richard Rothstein says the housing programs begun under the New Deal were tantamount to a "state-sponsored system of segregation."

The National Women's History Museum discusses how African American Women have fought for Civil Rights. This online exhibit shares stories of African American Women who resisted slavery, spoke out against racism, and established women's clubs to improve conditions for African Americans. 

The Rendering Justice exhibition is an expansive examination of mass incarceration and an unflinching depiction of contemporary America. The artworks included feature varied responses to the displacement of bodies and revocation of autonomy entailed in incarceration. The works affirm how artists maintain a sense of identity, regain their agency, and grapple with coercive forces until—and after—they reenter society. Rendering Justice is created in partnership with the African American Museum in Philadelphia and Mural Arts Philadelphia, and is made possible with a grant from the Art for Justice Fund.

The National Museum of African American History and Culture is the only national museum devoted exclusively to the documentation of African American life, history, and culture. It was established by an Act of Congress in 2003, following decades of efforts to promote and highlight the contributions of African Americans. To date, the Museum has collected more than 40,000 artifacts and nearly 100,000 individuals have become members. The Museum opened to the public on September 24, 2016, as the 19th museum of the Smithsonian Institution.

This is the story of Mexican workers recruited in the early 1900s to work the railroads in Galesburg, Illinois. Mexico was torn by a bloody civil war and many American men had gone off to fight in World War I. The railroad companies looked south, offering displaced Mexicans a job and a place to raise a family … a home in the form of a boxcar.

American Indian images are everywhere, from the Land O’Lakes butter maiden to the Cleveland Indians’ mascot, and from classic Westerns and cartoons to episodes of Seinfeld and South Park. American Indian names are everywhere too, from state, city, and street names to the Tomahawk missile. And familiar historical events such as Pocahontas’s life, the Trail of Tears, and the Battle of Little Bighorn remain popular reference points in everyday conversation.

Why does Minnesota suffer through some of the worst racial disparities in the nation? One answer is the spread of racist, restrictive real estate covenants in the early 20th century. Jim Crow of the North charts the progression of racist policies and practices from the advent of restrictive covenants after the turn of the last century to their final elimination in the late 1960s.

Race Project KC is an annual immersive social justice initiative for students in grades 9 through 12 in the Kansas City metro area. Established by Johnson County Library and evoked by the book Some of My Best Friends are Black: The Strange Story of Integration in America by author Tanner Colby, the program’s goal is to help participating students build connections by better understanding each other and our shared history through the lens of race.

This virtual exhibit and its teachers’ resource guide are the result of an almost five-year journey from 2017 to 2022 undertaken by a learning community of five museums and one cultural organization. Together, they crossed the northern and western United States to convene at each location and learn from thought leaders, scholars, and each other, dig into archives, and listen to community members share their experiences. Unvarnished was conceived, developed, and directed by Naper Settlement, an outdoor history museum in the Chicago metropolitan area administered by the Naperville Heritage Society. As part of an extensive community engagement process, the museum expanded its mission from a nineteenth-century settlement story to an inclusive history leading up to today’s Naperville.