Footprints of Polonia and Public History

Recent years have witnessed the growing popularity of academic interest in public history. Conceptualized in the 1970s as either a professional career path for history postgraduates, an alternative to an academic career, or as a grassroots social activism focused on the past of peoples marginalized by academic historiography, it has found ways to expand its scope of interest, tools to reach and engage the public, and eventually, a route to return to mainstream academia as both a topic of theoretical reflection and a field of practice for professional historians.This short review of the recently published Footprints of Polonia: Polish Historical Sites Across North America claims this book belongs to the field of public history and to a subfield that can be called ethnic public history. The argument is based on Barbara Franco's definition of public history as history for the public, by the public, with the public, and about the public.1 It claims that Footprints fulfills each component of this definition.Apparently the authors had a clearly defined audience in mind while selecting the objects to be included and the way of their presentation. The primary audience is Polish Americans interested in the material traces of their own ancestors or their ethnic predecessors in America. Most likely, Polish tourists or visitors interested in the things Polish or ethnic in America will also find the book interesting and inspiring.For many of the former, the book will have not only documentary but also sentimental meaning and value. Though, on the other hand, one can expect (and it can already be observed on the Internet) a certain dissatisfaction if the objects dear to them were omitted or insufficiently covered, but this is also a feature of public history whose practitioners have to take into consideration practical assets and limitations, including, in this case, how to keep the interest of “an average reader” (not only persons attached to particular places) and to have the book published in a comprehensive, manageable form—both in terms of financial costs, but also the “readability” by the intended public. Who would buy or read a ten-volume set of meticulous descriptions of every instance of the Polish presence in American public spaces?The very form of the book—with text not exceeding half a page, numerous photographs depicting objects of potential interest to an average visitor in present-day or historic Polish communities in North America (Central America included), a relatively large page size, and glossy paper—is aimed at attracting a general readership rather than researchers specializing in Polish American history and heritage. This is not to say that the factual accuracy or quality of arguments fall short of academic standards. The content is accurate but not excessively detailed and complicated.The book was written, edited, and published by Polish Americans. It was the initiative of the Polish American Historical Association—a professional association of historians—though it was definitely not only historians that contributed to the whole endeavor, with Ewa Barczyk, the chief editor, being a trained librarian and Polish American whose parents were engaged in Polish schools in the Chicago area. One can assume that the initiators, coordinators, editors, and authors were personally attached to the object they were working with. Their dedication is visible on the pages of the book. They try to present material Polish American heritage at its best in order to enable other Polish Americans to share their knowledge and pride in it.Ewa Barczyk managed to engage a large number of people who contributed in various ways to the book, identifying the objects to be included, scattered all over the United States and other countries—not only in large and well-known centers of Polonia but also on the peripheries of Polish American life as it is known from research monographs and published memoirs. The list of contributors consists of over 200 names, mostly Polish American, and definitely not all historians. Special praise is deserved for the photographers who both documented the “footprints” and made the book much more attractive. Gathering and arranging all the data must have required volumes of correspondence, reminders, and clarifications (take just copyright issues!). If we take into account that the core of this work was done during the COVID-19 pandemic, one can only admire how the project kept going while so many others were postponed or discontinued.The core content of the book consists of the documentation of material traces of the historical presence of the people of Polish descent in America. Most of the objects were created at the initiative and for the money of those people, and sometimes with their own hands. For the most part, the people who stood behind those efforts were not part of the social elite, but just ordinary immigrants, with peasant backgrounds in Poland that changed into working-class affiliation in the United States. They were marginalized both at the time they were active and subsequently in the collective American memory and historiography. The book is yet another attempt (after such endeavors as the Polish American Encyclopedia2) to bring their heritage to the awareness and attention of future generations of Polonia and the American mainstream.Like many other valuable public history projects, Footprints is thus aimed at a clearly defined public, as much participatory as possible, and open-ended, providing space for future developments and improvements. Hopefully, an electronic version of Footprints can be made available that would allow for further public engagement, for instance, in developing new entries and documenting changes in the existing Footprints, including traces of the past that do not exist anymore.The ideas are always many and varied but the achievement of Ewa Barczyk and the team is that they managed to have them materialized. And this is what they deserve to be praised for.