Museum noted for Underground Railroad work
The Association of Midwest Museums (AMM) will present an award to The Birmingham Museum for its leadership in grant-funded multi-community public history project to study Oakland County's Underground Railroad.
This year, the AMM has selected the Birmingham Museum to receive a special “Collaborators Award” to recognize the project and its impact, calling it ‘inspiring’ and ‘extraordinary.'
The unique project has generated an enormous amount of information about previously unknown formerly enslaved people who fled the south in the years before the Civil War and were sheltered in communities throughout Oakland County by everyday people who helped them reach safety in Canada. It was discovered through the project that there were individuals that lived in Birmingham and are buried in Greenwood Cemetery that were part of the Underground Railroad.
The initial project began in 2023, with coordination and professional direction by the Birmingham Museum. It included the Farmington Historical Society, Oakland County Pioneer and Historical Society, Royal Oak Historical Society and Southfield Historical Society. Over the past year, the Birmingham Museum has created a database of primary sources identified by the project, designed a traveling exhibit and provided numerous presentations to the public related to this newly discovered local history.
The museum has also helped the partnering organizations use trained volunteers and their own collections to uncover their stories and explore how they fit into the bigger narrative of the anti-slavery movement in Oakland County. This has raised public interest and awareness through school programs, public proclamations, special events, and other support, and has resulted in two more historic site designations with the National Park Service’s Underground Railroad Network to Freedom in Southfield and Royal Oak. This public engagement and momentum has resulted in an expansion of the project into a second year, with additional funding, more partners, and the addition of historical organizations in Commerce, Oxford, Rochester, Troy and West Bloomfield.
The second phase of the project will enlarge the database of research and will create teacher and student resources, including planned Network to Freedom nominations for at least two additional sites. This type of collective effort is highly unusual in the museum field. It demonstrates a highly effective approach to cross-museum collaboration that incorporates creative use of resources and grassroots involvement to do original research that benefits a wide public audience.
The award will be presented to museum director Leslie Pielack and museum specialist Donna Casaceli at the AMM's annual conference in Columbus, Ohio, on August 1. An additional virtual celebration will take place this fall that will be open to the Underground Railroad project partner organizations. The project will be continuing into 2025 and beyond, and plans are underway in partnering communities to utilize the research from the project in special celebrations and events in 2026, for America’s 250th anniversary.
The AMM represents the eight-state region of the Midwest, including Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Ohio and Wisconsin. Its mission is to strengthen museums in the Midwest by providing nationally relevant, regionally specific programs, products, and networking opportunities, and it encourages and Its mission is to strengthen museums in the Midwest by providing nationally relevant, regionally specific programs, products, and networking opportunities, and it encourages and recognizes professional standards and excellence in the museum field.
