Frankfort Heritage Lecture Series - Beyond the Founders: The Filson Historical Society and the Growth of the History Professions in Kentucky

In his 2024 book Benefactors of Posterity, Daniel Gifford explored the motivations and activities of early history advocates and institution-builders who established the Filson Historical Society in Louisville in 1884. But as that generation passed on after the turn of the century, who would be the leaders to pick up the mantle of archiving, museum work, research, and publication in the state? The Filson found a new generation of leadership in president Rogers Clark Ballard Thruston and director of publications Otto Rothert, who solidified and began to professionalize the history professions in Kentucky, alongside contemporaries at the Kentucky Historical Society and the growing state university system. This presentation will trace those efforts, evaluate their success, and reflect on what they mean for Kentuckians today.
 
Dr. Patrick Lewis is the President & CEO of the Filson Historical Society. He came to the Filson in 2019 as served as the Director of Collections & Research and co-editor of Ohio Valley History journal. A Trigg County native, he graduated from Transylvania University and holds a Ph.D. in History from the University of Kentucky, where he taught for two years. Before coming to the Filson, he worked for the National Park Service and the Kentucky Historical Society. He has won grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the National Historical Publications and Records Commission, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, and the James Graham Brown Foundation. Lewis is author of For Slavery and Union: Benjamin Buckner and Kentucky Loyalties in the Civil War (University Press of Kentucky, 2015) and co-editor of Playing At War: Identity and Memory in Civil War Video Games (Louisiana State University Press, Fall 2024).