Members and Friends: We are all making history right now, as we live through the COVID-19 pandemic. It's an emergency of historic proportions, and has been compared to the Black Plague, or the 1918 Spanish Flu. Like those past crises, COVID-19 will be a major topic of study for future historians. Years from now, Schenectadians will look back and wonder, “how did the COVID-19 pandemic affect Schenectady County? How did our ancestors respond to the crisis?” "What was life like for people quarantined, for months?" You can help future researchers understand for themselves what life right now is like. You can help future historians understand the pandemic's immense impact on our community, and on ourselves, and on our way of life. You can help future historians understand how this international emergency changed your life, and changed our world, forever. Consider recording your unique perspective for inclusion in the SCHS archives. Diaries, scrapbooks, photo albums, letters, songs, poems, short stories, and other works of art are all important sources for future historians. Be creative: there are infinite ways you can express yourself, and document the impact of COVID-19 on you, your loved ones, and your neighbors. Help us, by: Contributing to a global collection: https://covid19.omeka.net/ Share your story using our form: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSeHgEsVMdH6NBHjFKx_QxVwa5_H4rZSKIQ71e_XkjhfWMeiXg/viewform Creating a personal diary, scrapbook, or photo album (analog/physically or digitally) Collecting the letters, emails, and notes that you’ve created or received to stay in touch or communicate with others during this difficult time of isolation The COVID-19 pandemic and its economic impact is an on-going, changing situation. It will take time to document how we are all affected. If you have questions about ways you can contribute to the SCHS archive collection, or about documenting your experiences, contact the SCHS librarian, Marietta Carr, at librarian@schenectadyhistorical.org Wishing you and your loved ones the very best. Be in touch and be safe.

While SCHS is closed during the COVID-19 pandemic, we invite you to view our online exhibitions: Handcrafted: The Folk and Their Art at https://indd.adobe.com/view/b06c2b57-3098-47ec-a417-e4b34378bcff Changing Downtown: The Rise, the Raze, and the Revitalization of Schenectady at https://indd.adobe.com/view/f6b96ae2-9988-469e-8b62-b6f32817a695 The Wizard of Schenectady: Charles Proteus Steinmetz at https://indd.adobe.com/view/e1090a87-2b04-43cf-8e0a-5639f662b737 and a map of the historic Mabee Farm at https://indd.adobe.com/view/b8a497d1-8ca2-4d13-b61c-cdd88d9ed8a1

THIS PROGRAM HAS BEEN POSTPONED FOR LATER IN 2021 Join us for our 2020 Annual Meeting, featuring a talk by Dr. Kori A. Graves, UAlbany Associate Professor of History. Dr. Graves will discuss women's suffrage in New York. When women throughout the U.S. won the right to vote in 1920, women in New York had been voting for three years. In 1917, New York State became the first state west of the Mississippi River to grant women the right to vote. Although many people heralded these victories as signs of the nation’s move toward greater equality for some citizens, the battle for women's suffrage in New York, and across the nation, had been contentious. The question of whether women wanted the rights and responsibilities that came with the vote was central in the woman suffrage struggle. As women on both sides of the debate articulated the reasons they either supported or opposed the question, they revealed other forms of oppression that limited women’s opportunities. In the Capital Region, women on the anti-suffrage side of the debate were often more successful than their pro-suffrage counterparts. Dr. Graves will discuss some of the reasons for this pattern. In many ways, the suffrage debate our region demonstrates how some women related the right to vote with many other rights, and why the anti-suffrage position remained popular even as support for suffrage increased in the U.S. About Dr. Kori A. Graves Dr. Kori A. Graves is an Associate Professor of History at the University at Albany, SUNY. A graduate of the Program in Gender and Women’s History at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Professor Graves teaches courses that explore gender and women’s history, the history of marriage and family, and histories of the body, beauty and identity politics in the U.S. Her book, A War Born Family:African American Adoption in the Wake of the Korean War tells the story of the first African Americans who adopted Korean children, and the ways their efforts revealed the contested nature of adoptive family formation across racial and national color lines. Her research and teaching interests explore the significance of political and popular representations of race, nation, and family - with a specific emphasis on the histories of motherhood and transracial adoption. Dr. Graves is also a dedicated teacher who has won awards for teaching excellence. The SCHS Annual Meeting will be held from 1:30pm-2pm, with the speaker starting at 2pm. Light refreshments will be served. Admission is $5 or FREE for SCHS members. Tickets are available at the door.

THIS EVENT HAS BEEN POSTPONED DUE TO THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC At the Historical Society, we love maps! You might even say we'd be lost without them. In this program, we'll explore our incredible collection of historic maps. We'll learn how they work and what surprising things we can learn from them. Kids will complete a scavenger hunt for prizes and finally, make a map of their own. This activity is free for kids and recommended for ages 5 to 14.