Fort Ticonderoga has collaborated with post-secondary educators across the country to identify programmatic needs that support undergraduate and graduate-level students. Fort Ticonderoga’s Micro Courses combine a visual and material analysis of 18th-century documents and material culture for use in coursework on early American and Atlantic history. These Micro Courses are available for free thanks to a Humanities New York CARES grant with support from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the federal CARES Act.
Want an unforgettable classroom experience? Fort Ticonderoga’s Curator Dr. Matthew Keagle can supplement your Micro Course with a live virtual seminar. Live virtual seminar programs are priced per program, per class. ZOOM and Google Meet platforms are currently available. Enquire today by emailing Fort Ticonderoga’s Group Sales Manager, Ryann Wiktorko.
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Service and Citizenship: The Militia from Colonies to Nation
This course asks students to consider the interrelated obligations and expectations of citizens through the example of the militia. Using examples and artifacts from Fort Ticonderoga’s collection, the course will explore the evolution of the militia through the founding era. By exploring this unique system, which was central to American military and political ideals, it will pose questions about who should defend the nation and what citizens owe to the state. Through a short quiz and discussion prompts, students come face to face with issues of who bears a responsibility, who benefits, and how these topics have evolved over time.
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Setting the World on Fire: Firearms in the Atlantic World
Although crude by today’s standards, this course explores the reality of firearms that shaped the 18th century. Beyond fighting wars, revolutions, and rebellions, the systems developed to manufacture and finance arms production represents an underappreciated industrial revolution. This course will examine the reality of firearms in the 18th century Atlantic World, using Fort Ticonderoga’s extensive collection to reveal how new organizations of labor produced literally millions of weapons that were responsible for subjugation and death, as well as liberation and independence, across the world, the repercussions of which we still live with to this day.
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Sources and Methods for Holistic History
This course encourages students to think critically about the range of historical sources available to them when researching and writing history. Using an example from Fort Ticonderoga’s Revolutionary War archives, it explores a range of official and private documents, as well as material culture, that contributes to more fully understanding the experience of the Revolutionary War. Digital resources allow students to explore these sources themselves and questions can prompt a discussion of the variety of courses and their utility for telling different stories about the past.
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Meet Your Instructor
Dr. Matthew Keagle is the Curator of the Fort Ticonderoga Museum. He has been involved in curation, exhibitions, research, historical interpretation, teaching, and program development for historic sites and museums across the East coast. He holds a Bachelor’s degree from Cornell University, a Master’s in American Material Culture from the Winterthur Museum, and a PH.D. from the Bard Graduate Center in New York City. At Fort Ticonderoga, he conducts extensive historical research and development of exhibitions and delivering programs to advance our understanding of the 18th-century military experience. He has researched and lectured at archives and collections across the US, Canada, and Europe, with a particular research focus on the military dress in the 18th century.
