Local History Minor
Understand local history and gain an appreciation of the past... Enroll as a Local History Minor.
This minor in local history will give students the opportunity to learn the history of the area in which they live and to place it in a larger historical context. Once students have the basic background of Maine history and Aroostook County history, they will choose a course outside of the field of history and then they will complete the minor with a Service Learning course. The Service Learning course will allow the students to take the skills they have learned in their other courses and apply them to a project for a community partner. The completion of the Service Learning project will give them concrete evidence of their skills which they can then market to future employers. It will also make students aware of graduate programs in the fields of public history, museum studies, and historic preservation.
What is local history?
- History of the area in which you live
- History of everyday lives
- Understanding context of the local area's history and the history of everyday lives at the regional, national and world level
- Local history covers the "entire range of possibilities in a person's immediate environment."
- Allows for the history from the bottom up
- Provides a better understanding of past events as well as today's world and the connection between the former and the latter.
Skills provided:
- Ability to analyze the importance of your family and community history at the regional, national and world level
- Familiarization with local resources such as tax records, deeds, wills, census records, diaries, account books, photographs, material culture, etc.
- Familiarization with local libraries, town offices, courthouses, local historical societies and state archives.
- Creation of skills set you can use in the working world
- Ability to use interdisciplinary skills to analyze history
- Ability to take history from the abstract to the concrete by setting everyday events and people into their proper context
Provides background for:
- Law
- Government administration
- Museums
- Insurance
- Publishing
- Library science
- Archival science
- Genealogy
- Research and writing
- Historic preservation
For more information about the Local History Minor, contact Dr. Kimberly Sebold at 207.768.9721 or This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .
Course requirements
HTY 375 History of Maine
HTY 401 Oral History
HTY 400 Discovering and Interpreting Local History
HTY/ANT 471 Prehistory of Northeastern North America
Choose from one of the following:
ANT 377 Archaeology Field School
BUS 246 Intro to Web Page Design*
BUS 345 Database Management*
ENG 315 Professional Writing*
ENG 316 Advanced Professional Writing*
REC 382 Interpreting the Environment*
REC 429 Natural and Cultural Resource Protection*
SOC/EDU 374 Wabanaki Studies*
Another course with permission of minor's director
*Please see catalogue for appropriate prerequisites.
Required Capstone Course: HTY 402 Special Topics in Local History
Students Say
Students Sara Oliver and Craig Cormier talk about the experiences they had while participating in the Local History Minor. They helped to design and publish a book on the history of Presque Isle with Dr. Richard Graves, a local historian.
Sara: "The Dr. Graves' project was a great opportunity to put together all sorts of skills that I had learned in other classes, such as Maine History and Oral history, etc, but at the same time learn new skills like preservation and design. It gave me the chance to explore the community, meet new people, and see some sides of Presque Isle I never knew existed. The impact of the class was also far reaching to the community. People were delighted that someone was drawing out all of these neat memories from Presque Isle's history. My favorite parts of the class included interviewing Dr. Graves and working with my peers in the class to figure out all of the details of the project. In the end, we produced a magnificent book full of valuable local history, made an impact on the community, and grew in our own knowledge of our heritage.
"Most schools don't offer such a program. So often in our schools and universities we only learn of the bigger picture of American history, or world history and people forget that small towns and small people like this can have a huge impact on the rest of the world because it all starts somewhere, and this was my chance to examine that impact."
Craig: "This project was unique in that we weren't just reading textbooks and reciting back facts for an exam or research paper; we were using text books and other materials as resources and applying them to problems and questions that were affecting the outcome of our project on a weekly basis. We were actually able to see the possible real world applications of the skills and knowledge that we had been accumulating during our university careers.
"For me, the project directly affected my chosen career. The project showed me that there was a need for someone with my skills in the area and so I've opened my own graphic design business, my first full project just happened to be Dr. Graves' second book, and the experience and connections I made during the project has allowed me to get up and running, and I'm currently starting work on similar projects with the Frontier Heritage Society, Fort Fairfield's Historical Society."
