My name is Sarah Onufer. I am a junior majoring in Public History at Messiah University. I am a work-study for the History Department and am currently doing an internship in the Messiah University and Brethren in Christ archives on campus.
This semester I am enrolled in the Humanities Project course where I am working on a project with the Civic Club of Harrisburg. In the past, Messiah University students have worked with the Civic Club specifically in regard to their Women’s History Garden. The garden is set up to honor both modern and historical women from Pennsylvania who have made an impact on our state and sometimes our country.
This will be the fourth year in which we have worked with the Civic Club on this project. In our first year partnering with them students worked on the original development of the Women’s History Garden. They began with creating the original plaques, setting up an audio tour, creating a digital tour, and writing and researching biographies for historical women who were included in the garden. In the following years, we continued to research and write on historic women while updating the audio and digital tour and creating new posters for the plaques. Some of the women who students have written about in the past are: Pauline Levinsohn, Jane Chester, Mary Sachs, Mary C. Stackpole, Mira Lloyd Dock, and Gabriela C. Gilbert among many others.
I have the honor of continuing this partnership with the Civic Club and am in the process of researching and writing about three new historical women: Maude Coleman, Genevieve Blatt, and Hannah Callowhill Penn. The theme for this year is “Leading the Change: Women Shaping a Sustainable Future.” So, all of the women represent qualities of leadership in their communities and work for justice for those who need it.
Maude Coleman (1882-1953) was born in Virginia but lived in Pennsylvania for the majority of her life. She worked in the Welfare department and she was the first interracial consultant in Pennsylvania. She was also very involved in the Republican party in clubs within her community including being the President of the Harrisburg Women’s Republican Club. She was also president, vice-president, and secretary of a variety of other clubs that would spread awareness on Republican ideas and help her community.
I have only just begun researching Genevieve Blatt (1913-1996) and Hannah Callowhill Penn (1671-1726) so I currently do not have as much to share about them. Briefly though, Genevieve Blatt was the first woman appointed to Pennsylvania’s Commonwealth Court, and Hannah Callowhill Penn was the first first lady of Pennsylvania and served as the proprietor of Pennsylvania from 1712-1726.
I have been researching these women through a variety of sources, but primarily so far I have been using Newspapers.com to research both Maude Coleman and Genevieve Blatt. This source is great for primary source research on people who were in the public eye. For my research on Hannah Callowhill Penn, it will be a little harder since she lived so long ago and before the United States existed as we know it today, but I already have some ideas of how to find information on her.
The end product of this project will be creating a poster for each woman as well as writing scripts and recording audio about the women. The posters will be displayed in the Women’s History Garden at the Civic Club’s building in Harrisburg. The audio recordings will also be included alongside them as qr codes. The unveiling of this will be on March 29 as a special event at the Civic Club. I am excited to continue working on this project and I look forward to updating you on my completed project here in the future.
Sarah Onufer is a junior at Messiah University. She is majoring in Public History. She is also a work-study for the History Department and an intern at the Brethren in Christ and Messiah University archives.
Digital Harrisburg 