This is the aftermath of an ICE kidnapping a few blocks from my home in St. Paul—an hour ago. A quiet street full of broken glass and at least three wrecked cars. The target of the kidnapping was taken away by ambulance. He was on a stretcher and covered by a sheet, though a cop said he was alive.

they're executing moms and nurses in the street. they're using preschoolers as bait. they're stealing people's dads and grandmas and children. they're tear gassing babies. they're staking out schools. there is no remedy but abolition. any proposal that doesn't start there is an act of violence.

Fairly sure it’s unintentional, but the end date on this mug being sold by the Smithsonian does make it sound a little like they’re saying America dies in 2026…

You know you’ve made it as a municipal archivist when your Xmas gifts from dad are: a collage of materials from a demolition contractor who demo’d most lost city landmarks, Indiana world war memorial plaza ephemera, and an ashtray from the Lincoln Hotel

It’s hard building a municipal archive from scratch. Despite all the obstacles, we accomplished a lot this year. -108 reference questions answered -40 tours for ~150 people -8 lectures/panels for ~600 people -340 volunteer hours -doubled our vault and storage space -est online presence

Mental health break ✌️

Mapping Inequality, the digital humanities platform for exploring redlining maps & data, launched in 2016. Never in my wildest dreams did I think they would ask me to write an essay on Indianapolis! It is an absolute honor to be included in this project: dsl.richmond.edu/panorama/red...

Beautiful weekend away 🧡

Today is World Day of Remembrance — a global event to remember those killed or seriously injured on our streets. Read more about this day, and our call to action for the City of Indianapolis, at the link below. #WDoR2025 #SafeStreetsIndy #Indianapolis #HoosierSky #VisionZero

Anyway a great way to radicalize people is for them to realize that you just abandoned their chance at being able to access and afford health care because you didn’t like waiting in line at the airport.

🍁 “I’ve got an idea. Let’s go outside.” 🍁

Thank you @mirrorindy.org for featuring Deedee our reference archivist and her amazing work to identify historic glass negatives held at the Irvington Historical Society: mirrorindy.org/historic-pho... You have until Nov 30 to see the exhibit!

Thanks IndyStar for celebrating Archives Month with local public, nonprofit, university, and governmental archives ❤️ www.indystar.com/story/opinio...

Remember, according to the Republican Justices, it's okay to gerrymander for party advantage, not racial advantage. It's an unknowable distinction, but one that allows the Republicans to okay racist gerrymandering under the guise of political gerrymandering.

The civic shame of it all

Exhibit Columbus installations + Alexander Girard exhibit today with Dad 💯

A fabulous week in Fort Wayne at the statewide historic preservation conference.

📣 Excited to share that What a Building Does: The Hoosier Modernisms of Evans Woollen is available for pre-order! Phillip Cox & Niall Cronin brilliantly tell the story of Woollen and his firm's journey from Midcentury Modernism to Brutalism to Postmodernism. Pre-order: iupress.org/978025307410...

RIP the Albert Kahn-designed Crane Bay, what a sad loss These photos are from July 2019. I just had this sick feeling the last crane bay wouldn’t survive The tangible context of: Industrial history Labor history West side neighborhood history Gone. #thisplacemattered

I just rolled up to what I assumed was a public unveiling of a sculpture at Elanco but when I rolled up I was immediately turned away by this gentleman Who said I couldn't come back there Then he asked the guy walking up if he was there for the art unveiling and let him thru 😉

Another excellent Behind Closed Doors mausoleum tour at Crown Hill Cemetery. #thisplacematters

The Henry Street Bridge Project's Greenlawn Cemetery excavation is well over 1,500 grave shafts now on our little 1.5 acre strip. Don't forget to follow along on our project website where we provide updates for the public: wridinfrastructure.com/archaeology/...

🪦 Happy archaeology month 🪦 The City-County Archives was thrilled to table at the Indiana State Museum’s Archaeology Family Discovery Day yesterday. We shared historic maps and deed research with guests. Some guests made their own marker/monuments. Thank you to all who stopped by!

Yesterday marked our final Archives teaching day for our Indyology internship. The students learned about memorialization from Leon Bates & Ahmaud Carroll-Tubbs, looking at national examples, then designed their own memorials for our cemetery. They then sculpted monuments to place in their designs.

The City-County Archives went on a great field trip yesterday, visiting Ball State’s architectural archivist Cody Sprunger. We learned about DIY humidification chambers to make our architectural drawing collection work more efficient. And of course we had to end the trip with some Pizza King!

Thanks to everyone who attended our Greenlawn Cemetery excavation + Henry Street Bridge project public information meeting. I am excited to see where the research takes us in the next few years. In case you missed the meeting, the presentation slides are here: wridinfrastructure.com/june-2024-up...

Last week we hit a new benchmark on the Henry Street Bridge Project excavation - reaching over 1,000 graveshafts identified. Not even 50% through our excavation. On our tiny, 1.5 acre parcel of a larger 25 acre cemetery.

He was humiliated last weekend. This weekend he bombed someone. My guess is there is a relationship between those two events.

New from me in Mas Context: In February NPS removed Transgender and Queer from the Stonewall National Monument website. NPS also removed LGBTQ America: A Theme Study of Lesbian Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Queer History—the 1st federal account of the LGBTQ community.

I’m shattered. Our traffic calming project survived 2 months before a motorist wrecked through it. Listen to neighborhoods when they tell you we need more traffic calming measures. Pedestrians and cyclists are not safe. 💔

Special thanks to my reference archivist who surprised me & assembled this model before a tour. This is a rejected proposed plan for the GM stamping plant. It’s a great artifact and teaching tool that captures a moment in time of the downtown and west side’s built environment. #whatanarchivistdoes

Brilliant and dedicated historians, librarians, archivists, and curators - gone. 💔

civic shame.

A tiny but wild snapshot of the current chaos

I'm excited to share that Jeannie Regan-Dinius and myself are starting a dialogue at the Alliance for Historic Landscape Preservation conference. Our presentation, "The Monumental Effort to Excavate and Memorialize Greenlawn Cemetery," discusses the physical, archaeological, & contextual challenges.

🥳 Happy Historic Preservation Month! What do a union steelworker, a clairvoyant palmist, and the inventor of Bar Keepers Friend all have in common? These individuals all made history in the Fountain-Fletcher District: the area including the Fletcher Place, North Square, and Fountain Square n’hoods.

A new post about the history behind a mystery photo at an ice cream establishment in Broad Ripple. www.class900indy.com/post/gus-bar...

3 neighborhoods came together to do a tactical urbanism project on a problematic piece of infrastructure impacting each of us. And I spoke with WFYI about it: www.wfyi.org/news/article... Oh, and I thoroughly enjoyed waving the safety flag at motorists.

2 years today without our Paul 💔 We love you and we miss you very, very much Every volume, every talk, every paper, every collection… everything is to honor your work and the work you left us. Miles to go ❤️

A story of 3 neighborhoods - Fletcher Place, Fountain Square, and North Square - coming together to work on a shared infrastructure problem: speeding motorists on Calvary/McCarty Street getting on or off the highway. Can’t wait to see what we do next. ❤️

Thanks for all the kind words at my Society of Indiana Archivists conference plenary talk yesterday. It means a lot. 💞 I'll be at Indy Design Week 4/25 to talk about municipal logos and the Alliance for Historic Landscape Preservation 5/17 to talk about Greenlawn Cemetery & monument-making.

celebrity sighting in this clip!!! wishtv.com/news/local-n...

This, all day, every day: “Where you live has a massive impact on not only your quality of life, but how long you live ... And so you got to invest in your own home. And the community is part of your home.” mirrorindy.org/fountain-squ...

It’s economic strip-mining. The housing stock further deteriorates, along with the social fabric, as these companies have no personal investment in the communities they operate it. The only thing that matters is the balance sheet. www.post-gazette.com/opinion/edit...

MAGA went to defund the humanities, but discovered that they were already defunded years ago.

We found 85 grave shafts last week. That’s on our small, 1.5 acre parcel, in the larger footprint that is the city’s first public cemetery. Follow our excavation updates here: wridinfrastructure.com/archaeology/...

Happy 317 Day! (317 is the area code for Indianapolis for you non-Indy folks) I spent it moving the contents of 24 flat files in DMD’s long range planning area - & maintaining the current order as I had already inventoried these drawers. Can’t wait to make this collection more accessible 😍

Looks like Trump forced out the Chair of NEH. For predictably outrageous reasons. Yes, it’s time to worry.

Indiana is facing a severe housing crisis, characterized by escalating rents, increased foreclosure rates, & substandard housing conditions. The FHCCI is actively working to combat these issues by facilitating open housing for all and advocating for tenant protections. www.wishtv.com/community/co...

Really glad Democrats saved the fucking filibuster so they could NOT USE IT. Fucking cowards