“RUNY’s proposed work—research, publication, and public engagement—will preserve and illuminate a region of profound historical significance, while also offering a model for how serious humanities work can serve the public beyond academic settings. The project will benefit Upstate institutions directly and will also enrich broader national conversations about culture, community, and the meaning of American life.”
“As a professor at Syracuse University, I value efforts that bring serious humanities work into contact with the wider public—especially work that is attentive to place, memory, and the formation of communities over time….RUNY’s work to research and write about the history and personalities of this region will help preserve Upstate New York’s distinctive inheritance and make it accessible to readers, students, and local institutions. It will also serve as a model for how other regions of rural America might recover their own histories and traditions and contribute them to the broader national conversation.”
“RUNY’s mission—to recover and promote the overlooked cultural, religious, intellectual, and historical heritage of Upstate New York—is both timely and vitally important. In an era when national conversations often ignore rural America, regional folkways, local history, and traditions, RUNY provides a necessary corrective: bringing scholarly and narrative attention to a region rich in historical and cultural significance.”
“I am a writer, editor, and citizen of my hometown of Batavia, New York, a small city in the western part of the state. I have spent much of my life exploring and writing about the tremendously rich history and culture of our region….RUNY has tremendous promise as a vehicle through which we can recover, discover, and celebrate the stories, the people, and the history of Upstate New York. ….RUNY's labors of love--through research, publication, promotion, and vigorous engagement-- will bolster public awareness of our rich cultural inheritance, and this in turn will strengthen civic confidence and pride. I see much good coming from this undertaking. Our country is only as strong, and as good, as its regions; a healthy national life absolutely requires healthy local lives.
“In my work as an investment advisor and as a community leader in the Canandaigua area, I have seen how much a community's strength depends on shared memory and local institutions….RUNY's work-research, publication, and public engagement-will reinforce precisely the kind of civic and cultural foundations that make local life possible. The project will also benefit schools, libraries, community organizations, and readers beyond the region who want a clearer understanding of rural and small-town America.”
“My work has long focused on civil society—those voluntary institutions and habits of association that sustain communities over time. RUNY is the sort of endeavor that can renew civil society from the ground up: by telling the truth about a place, honoring the institutions that formed it, and restoring confidence that the inheritance of small towns and rural regions is worthy of serious attention. That work has implications beyond Upstate New York. It offers a model for how other regions of rural America might recover their own histories and traditions and contribute them to the broader national conversation.”
