Editor’s note: this reflection is the second in a series of posts of the Center for Public Humanities at Messiah University that highlights the voices of activists, educators, and community leaders in the Harrisburg area who are advancing civil rights and preserving history. The series, titled “The Lenwood Sloan Impact,” is named in honor of the late visionary, Lenwood Sloan, whose partnership with Digital Harrisburg and the Center for Public Humanities over the years deepened our work and profoundly impacted us. In this second reflection, public history alum, Kelan Amme, reflects on his collaborative work with Lenwood. For the first essay in the series, see “Catalytic Agents: The Lenwood Sloan Impact.“
“Equity, parity, and justice” were the words spoken by Mr. Lenwood Sloan during one of our many filming sessions around the Pennsylvania Capitol Complex. These three words, elegantly phrased through the persona of Martin Delany, an abolitionist and orator depicted by Lenwood, stuck with me as my inspiration as an eager undergraduate student working on his first public history project. What did they mean in this context? How could one man representing the lived history of a community erased from the ground on which it stood define the words of a movement? How can I work to represent this message?
I was fortunate enough to meet Lenwood halfway through my undergraduate education, right when our work at the Center for Public Humanities began ramping up. At first, I figured Mr. Sloan and his group of Pennsylvania Past Players needed recordings filmed and edited for their programming through the Dauphin County Library System. I would record them in character, send it to their organization, and that would be it. What turned from a trial by fire experience, meeting with and learning what it was like to direct professionals who had been in the game longer than you, transitioned into one of the most meaningful partnerships I could have ever had the opportunity to form. Lenwood was the catalyst for change in what it meant to be a public historian. He was inspiring, offering tough criticism and high expectations. All the while carrying a lesson with every sentence, which we were fortunate enough to record many of. He was also patient and accepting, working with every situation with the understanding that there would be a shared outcome we could all agree upon.
He was considerate and elevated the value of history in his community. He was gracious and entrusted me to help share a more expansive story about his work with the Past Players. We shared conversations about what it meant to develop these stories, how the past is represented, and what it would mean to honor the legacy of Harrisburg’s Old Eighth Ward through sculpture, performance, and literature. This small area of Harrisburg, spearheaded by Lenwood and his partners, allowed me to find my place as a student. It inspired me to find a specific interest within the realm of public history. How do we remember the past, and what stories are being represented through museums, monuments, or memorials? How do we represent the past through the small things forgotten in libraries and archives? And how do we establish a sense of equity, parity, and justice over the ways in which difficult pasts can be turned into illuminating stories today?
I would like to thank Lenwood Sloan for his impact on my personal and professional life. For showing me what it means to respect the past through patience and understanding. Through collaboration and bringing the best to the table, together. Without your vision and acceptance, I would not be the man I am today. Thank you for impacting and entrusting your mission to those around you, who come from all different backgrounds, to ultimately create an understanding of compassion and humility in transformative historical work.
“What I want people to take away from our experience is the desire to know more… the takeaway is: this is not my story, this is your story” – Mr. Lenwood Sloan.
Kelan Amme is the Local History Librarian at South Brunswick Public Library in central New Jersey. He graduated from Messiah University in 2024 with a BA in History, with a concentration in Public History and a Minor in Digital Public Humanities. He will have graduated from Rutgers University in May 2026 with a Master of Information, concentrating in Archives and Preservation. His LinkedIn can be found here: www.linkedin.com/in/kelan-amme-8bab121b6
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