Themes
Pursue Historic Designation or Expand Existing Designations to Include Protest Event
Designation of a historic site through listing in the National Register of Historic Places and/or as a National Historic Landmark not only establishes through a rigorous review process that a site is significant, but it can also bring with it benefits and protections. A core part of the designation would bracket (by beginning and ending dates) a site’s period of significance, which is the timespan covering notable developments or events associated with a site. For sites that are currently designated, a period of significance that does not encompass the historic events or action can be expanded to do so.
Ensure Mission and Vision Statements Accommodate Interpretation of Protest Event
The goal of a mission statement is to summarize why an enterprise, organization, etc., exists, along with its values and purpose. A vision statement is aspirational and about where the organization is going. Both are essential to communicating decision-making. In the case of cultural landscapes this decision-making includes stewardship and management decisions, which factors in issues such as historic significance, spatial and material integrity, and strategies for interpretation.
Introduce and/or Supplement On-site Interpretation
Interpretation is the critical tool for helping people understand, forge a connection with, and care about a landscape’s inherent natural and cultural assets. On-site interpretive markers could include text about the protests, short biographies of the participants, maps, and other material that would contextualize the events and complement guided tours and online information.
Introduce and/or Supplement Online Interpretation
Interpretation is the critical tool for helping people understand, forge a connection with, and care about a landscape’s inherent natural and cultural assets. Online interpretation includes written descriptions of people and events, video tours of sites, oral histories, connection to other resources, and more. In addition, on-site interpretive markers with QR codes would allow visitors easy access to online information via handheld devices.
Establish or Enhance the Visibility and Value for “Witness” Landscape Features
Stewardship of places of memory that provide direct connections to people and events includes landscape features (for example, the “Survivor Tree” at the World Trade Center Memorial), as well as buildings. In the United States, the concept of “witness trees,” often interpreted at Revolutionary and Civil War battle sites, is common and offers a sense of immediacy and living, tangible personal connections with a historic event. Stewardship and management, along with on-site and online interpretation, documentation, and even propagation of historically significant genetic biotic resources such as witness trees, as well as other living and non-living landscape features, are essential components of the storytelling.