About the Project

This project was developed because we believe that local history matters and that there are exciting possibilities for collaboration between the digital humanities and local historical archives. We are excited to present our work on William Seward Teator, a prominent Upper Red Hook apple farmer. The Experimental Humanities Initiative at Bard College has pioneered this digital history program wherein undergraduate students worked with Ryan Sablosky, Experimental Humanities Web Developer, and Heidi Knoblauch, Experimental Humanities Digital Projects Coordinator to create a large-scale digital project with a local historical society. This is that project. 

This January, four students—Nora Cady, Madi Garvin, Noah Segal-Gould, and Alexis Williams—were selectively chosen through a competitive application process to work with Historic Red Hook to create this digital project. As you will see, our project has multiple dimensions including nineteenth century collecting practices, advertising and marketing, produce distribution, and farming, and employs a number of digital technologies including network graphs, interactive maps, curated sound, and robust SQL databases. This project shows the many possibilities for collaboration between the faculty, staff, historical societies, and undergraduate students around digital humanities projects. 

Nora Cady is from Germantown, New York, a town not far from Bard College. She is a junior majoring in Sociology and concentrating in Experimental Humanities. Fascinated by media and urban development, Nora is a fine woman of the liberal arts. In her spare time, she enjoys listening to babies and strong female vocals.

Madi Garvin is a cool lady from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. As a junior at Bard College, she studies History and Experimental Humanities. Among her interests are editing, linguistics, and 20th century cultural history. She also really digs bagels and yogurt.

Noah Segal-Gould was born and raised in Southern Connecticut. Noah has a passion for learning and intends to major in Computer Science at Bard College. He graduated from the Sound School in New Haven, Connecticut in 2014 and started at Bard that same year. His interests include digital humanities, philosophy, linguistics, programming, and general pedantry.

Alexis Williams is in her third year at Bard avidly studying Studio Arts and concentrating in Experimental Humanities. Beyond her passions for painting, graphic design, animation and media studies, Alexis enjoys spending time outdoors. Growing up in a small town New Hampshire, Alexis learned from a young age to appreciate fresh air and Vermont maple syrup.

Faculty and Staff

Heidi Knoblauch is the Digital Projects Coordinator for the Experimental Humanities Initiative. She moonlights as a historian of science and medicine and specializes in 19th and 20th century clinical photography in America. She spends her days spearheading a campus-wide effort to collaborate with faculty, students, and community members on an array of new digital projects and teaching courses in the Historical Studies department.

Ryan Sablosky, a seasoned humanities-focused web developer, holds a B.S. in Mathematics and Physics from Pennsylvania State University and a M.A. in Rhetoric from Carnegie Mellon University. 

Thank you

First and foremost, we would like to thank Emily Majer for her generosity throughout the entire project. Not only did she spend hours in Historic Red Hook Archives with us but she guided us through the history of the Hudson Valley as we developed the project. We would also like to thank Claudine Klose for welcoming us into Historic Red Hook with open arms. We are very grateful for the help of Gregory Moynahan, who commented on the content of this website and provided secondary source material for context. 

This project could not have happened without the financial support of the Experimental Humanities Initiative, Center for Civic Engagement, and the Mellon Foundation. We are thankful for their faith in the project from the outset. A special thanks to Erin Cannan, Miriam Felton-Dansky, Collin Jennings, Gretta Tritch Roman, and the Experimental Humanities Steering Committee for their support. 

We would also like to thank Dave Brangaitis, Jeff Katz, Leslie Melvin, and Juliet Meyers for their support getting the website up and encouragement for the growth of this pilot program. Thank you to Betsy Cawley for giving us space in the library to work on the project. Thank you to Jake Grover for helping with the audio. 

Thank you to Liz Shea from the Delaware Natural History Museum, as well as Gary Rosenberg from the Academy of Natural Sciences for providing information on W. S. Teator's shell collection. 

Thank you to Tricia Reed, current owner of the Teator family house and farm, for allowing us to visit the property.