Erica Armstrong Dunbar is a historian, professor of history at Rutgers University, and main historical consultant and coexecutive producer for HBO’s The Gilded Age, whose work shines a light on racial injustice, slavery, and gender inequality.  She is the author of Never Caught: The Washingtons’ Relentless Pursuit of Their Runaway Slave, Ona Judge, which was a finalist for the 2017 National Book Award for Nonfiction and received the 2018 Frederick Douglass Book Award. A startling and eye-opening look into America’s First Family, Never Caught tells the story of Ona Judge, George and Martha Washington’s runaway slave who risked it all to escape the nation’s capital and reach freedom. Dunbar gives readers a glimpse into the life of a little-known, but powerful figure in American history and the ensuing manhunt led by George Washington, who used his political and personal contacts to recapture his property.

Dunbar’s most recent book,She Came to Slay: The Life and Times of Harriet Tubman, is a lively, informative, and illustrated tribute to one of the most exceptional women in American history whose fearlessness and activism still resonate today. Not only did Tubman help to liberate hundreds of slaves, she was the first woman to lead an armed expedition during the Civil War, worked as a spy for the Union Army, was a fierce suffragist, and was an advocate for the aged. She Came to Slay is an accessible and modern interpretation of Tubman’s life that reveals little known facts about one of our nation’s true heroes. Dunbar’s first book, A Fragile Freedom: African American Women and Emancipation in the Antebellum City, was published by Yale University Press in 2008.

An accomplished scholar, Dunbar was named the National Director of the Association of Black Women Historians (ABWH) in 2019, an organization dedicated to continuing the advancement for the study of black women’s history. In 2011, she also became the Inaugural Director of the Program in African American History at the Library Company of Philadelphia, a position she held until 2018. An in-demand speaker on the lecture circuit, Dunbar gives audiences an intimate look at the often-overlooked stories that make our country’s history so richly diverse.

Stacey Halfmoon is a citizen of the Caddo Nation and is also Choctaw and Delaware. She has over 25 years of experience in cultural preservation, tribal liaison work, consultation practices, cultural resource law and museum leadership. She holds a degree in Anthropology from the University of Oklahoma and a certificate in Cultural Heritage Tourism from George Washington University.

 Stacey currently serves as the Shawnee Tribe Executive Director of Cultural and Historic Preservation. She supports the Shawnee Tribe leadership and staff in all cultural programs and efforts including language, historic preservation, and the Shawnee Tribe Cultural Center.

 From 2007 to 2015, Ms. Halfmoon served as Director of Outreach/Museum Programs for the First Americans Museum (OKC) where she led a statewide tribal outreach effort and served as the exhibitions liaison with Ralph Appelbaum & Associates (NYC). From 2015-2019 she served as the inaugural Director of American Indian Relations for the Ohio History Connection in Columbus, Ohio where she initiated the Tribal Nations Conference and oversaw the development and adoption of the Ohio History Connection’s first American Indian Policy.

 In 2019 she returned to Oklahoma to support the Choctaw Nation and lead the way in preparing for the grand opening of the Choctaw Cultural Center; a stunning 100,000-sf facility with immersive exhibitions, a retail store, a café, and daily Choctaw programming. Ms. Halfmoon oversaw the hiring of all staff for the new cultural center as well as facilitating vital components including branding, marketing, facilities maintenance, and construction. The Choctaw Cultural Center opened its doors on July 23, 2021.

 Stacey is currently Chair of the American Alliance of Museums’ Indigenous Peoples Museum Network and a council member of the American Association for State and Local History. 

Karin Wulf is a historian of gender, family, and politics in 18th century British America, and Beatrice and Julio Mario Santo Domingo Director and Librarian, John Carter Brown Library and Professor of History, Brown University. From 2013-2021 she was the Executive Director of the Omohundro Institute of Early American History & Culture and Professor of History at William & Mary. The author of prize-winning scholarship, she has written for public and academic audiences about Vast Early America, the imperative of history and the humanities, scholarly communications, and why footnotes can save democracy (really). She is a co-founder of Women Also Know History, serves on a variety of boards including for the Jamestown Yorktown Foundation, Inc., and was a member of the Governor's commission for Virginia 250 while she lived and worked in the commonwealth. Her most recent book, Lineage:  Genealogy and the Politics of Connection in 18th Century America in forthcoming from Oxford University Press.

As Director and Co-Founder of Monument Lab, Paul Farber is among the nation's thought leaders on monuments, memory, and public space. Farber is author and co-editor of several books including A Wall of Our Own: An American History of the Berlin Wall, Monument Lab: Creative Speculations on Philadelphia, and the National Monument Audit. Farber also is the host and creator of The Statue, a podcast series from WHYY/NPR. He serves as Senior Research Scholar at the Center for Public Art & Space at the University of Pennsylvania and holds a PhD from the University of Michigan in American Culture.

Dr. Richard Benjamin is Visiting Professor of Slavery and Public Engagement in the School of Histories, Languages and Cultures at the University of Liverpool. He is on secondment from his role as Head of the International Slavery Museum at National Museums Liverpool and Co-Director of the Centre for the Study of International Slavery. 

Richard gained his first degree in Community and Race Relations at Edge Hill College and completed an MA and Ph.D. in Archaeology at the University of Liverpool. In 2002 he was a Visiting Research Scholar at the W.E.B. DuBois Institute of African and African American Research, Harvard University.      

He is a Trustee of the Anthony Walker Foundation, a member of Everton Football Club External Equality Advisory Group, and a Board member of the European Museum Forum and MONITOR: Global Intelligence on Racism magazine. He is Co-editor of the Routledge Book Series on Restorative Justice in Heritage Studies & Archaeology.

His current research on Black museology focuses on diverse museum practices, Black cultural spaces, and the associated artistic, cultural, and social movements. He hosts the Kinways Black Museology podcast.

Hannibal B. Johnson, a Harvard Law School graduate, is an author, attorney, and consultant specializing in diversity, equity, and inclusion issues, human relations, leadership, and non-profit leadership and management. He has taught at The University of Tulsa College of Law, Oklahoma State University, and The University of Oklahoma. Johnson serves on the federal 400 Years of African-American History Commission. He chaired the Education Committee for the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre Centennial Commission and served as local curator of its world-class history center, Greenwood Rising. His books, including Black Wall Street 100: An American City Grapples With Its Historical Racial Trauma, chronicle the African American experience in Oklahoma and its indelible impact on American history. Johnson’s play, Big Mama Speaks—A Tulsa Race Riot Survivor’s Story, was selected for the 2011 National Black Theatre Festival and has been staged in Caux, Switzerland. He has received numerous honors and awards for his work and community service, including a lifetime achievement award from the Oklahoma Center for the Book and induction into the Tulsa Hall of Fame and the Oklahoma Hall of Fame.

Anna Laymon is a nationally recognized leader in cultural institutions known for her dynamic, innovative, and collaborative approach to building organizations, managing teams, and sharing America's stories. Anna is the Executive Director of the Women's Suffrage National Monument Foundation, the organization designated by Congress to build a monument in Washington, D.C. that shares the history of the early movement for women’s equality. Prior to joining the Women’s Suffrage National Monument Foundation, Anna served as Vice President of Programs and Planning for the America250 Foundation, Executive Director of the Women’s Suffrage Centennial Commission, and the Director of Partnerships and Public Programs for the National Woman’s Party.

M. J. Rymsza-Pawlowska is the author of History Comes Alive: Public History and Popular Culture in the 1970s and is currently working on a new book, tentatively entitled Going to Washington, about four different kinds of “visitors” to Washington, D.C.: appointees, tourists, activists, and militia. M.J.’s public facing work includes serving on the editorial board of Washington History Magazine, as well as advisory boards for the DC History Center, the Humanities Truck, and the Board of Directors of Humanities DC.

Frank Barrows is the SeniorAdvisor for Commemorations and Anniversaries for the National Park Service.

Frank started his career with the NPS after the exploration of his culturalidentity as a Cape Verdean American led to a position at New Bedford WhalingNational Historical Park. His role with the NPS allowed him to deepen hisunderstanding of the role of Cape Verdeans in the whaling industry and the roleof African Americans in the New Bedford community. Sharing those stories withothers, especially youth, sparked his passion for the NPS and the beginning ofhis 22-plus year career with the agency.

 After spending almost 15 yearsin New Bedford as a park ranger and chief of interpretation, Frank served foralmost 5 years as superintendent of Fort Stanwix National Monument in Rome, NewYork and 3 years as the project lead responsible for standing up thenewly-established Harriet Tubman National Historical Park in Auburn, New York.Frank joined the Interior Region 1 team in Philadelphia as the Program Managerfor Visitor Experience and Community Engagement in 2018, supporting over 100parks and programs from Virginia to Maine. He started in his new role in Julyof 2022.

Kristin Ann Hass is a Professor in the Department of American Culture. She lectures, teaches, and writes about public memory, memorialization, and race.

 Her most recent book --Blunt Instruments: Recognizing Racist Infrastructure in Memorials, Museums and Patriotic Practices -- helps readers to identify, classify and name elements of our everyday landscapes and cultural practices that are designed to seem benign or natural but which, in fact, work to maintain powerful structures of inequity. Her other books also take up our shared commemorative landscapes: Sacrificing Soldiers on the National Mall is a study of militarism, race, and war memorials, and Carried to the Wall: American Memory and the Vietnam Veterans Memorialis an exploration of public memorial practices and the legacies of the Vietnam War. 

James Pepper Henry is the Executive Director and CEO of FirstAmericans Museum (FAM), a new cultural institution located in OklahomaCity.  Its mission is to educate the broader public about the uniquecultures, diversity, history, and contributions of the 39 federally recognizedtribes that were removed to Indian Territory, now the state of Oklahoma. The museum opened to the public in September 2021. Jim is a member of the KawNation and is of Muscogee Creek heritage.  He currently serves asVice-Chairman of the Kaw Nation, one of the thirty-nine federally recognizedNative Nations in Oklahoma.

Izetta Autumn Mobley, Ph.D. is a native Washingtonian and graduate of Brown University. She received her doctorate in American Studies at the University of Maryland, College Park. As a cultural historian, Dr. Mobley’s research focuses on gender, race, disability, medicine, public history, material and visual culture, and digital humanities. Her research explores how race, slavery, and disability are enmeshed in the Atlantic world.

Dr. Mobley has extensive experience within the cultural sector, having worked with TEDx, Shakespeare Theatre, Woolly Mammoth Theatre, Institute for Museum and Library Services, the National Endowment for the Arts, Humanities D.C., the Office of Historic Alexandria, the Smithsonian National Museum of African Art, and the DC History Conference – for which she served as co-chair and project manager. 

She has received the Walter B. Hill Fellowship at the Banneker- Douglass Museum, the Woods Research Fellowship at the Historic Medical Library at the College of Physicians of Philadelphia, and was a 2018 National Museum of African American History and Culture Interpretive Fellow. In 2020, Dr. Mobley was an American Council of Learned Scholars Emerging Voices Fellow at The University of Texas at Austin where she taught courses on visual culture, race, cities, and disability. She previously served as a lecturer for the Brown University Watson Institute and as faculty for the Brown University in Washington program.Mobley is a Certified Interpretive Guide, licensed D.C. tour guide, and founder of Site Unseen, focused on exploring submerged, neglected, or under-examined history and culture. 

As a cultural worker, facilitator, and educator, Izetta has more than 25 years   experience specializing in youth development, community capacity building, and equity education. She has taught classes on race, disability, and American history. She is a member of the Association of State and Local History’s History Relevance Working Group and the Association of African American Museums conference planning committee. 

In addition to her work in the cultural sector, Dr. Mobley founded the Office of Diversity & Inclusion at College Summit (now PeerForward), a national education nonprofit and served as its first Senior Diversity Officer. Dr. Mobley has served on several boards, including the National Network for Youth and the now defunct youth journalism organization, Children’s Express. In 2000, she helped to organize and conceive the first National Youth Summit, co-sponsored by the 

National Youth Leadership Council and Points of Light Foundation. Dr. Mobley has appeared on National Public Radio’s All Things Considered and Good Morning America. Her writing has appeared in Covey, Off Our Backs. She is the co-author of “Work in the Intersections: A Black Feminist Disability Framework.”  

Dr. Mobley is the Director of Interpretation, Collections, and Education at the Reginald F. Lewis Museum of Maryland African American History and Culture.

Jimmy Sweet (Lakota/Dakota) is an Assistant Professor in American Studies at Rutgers University. Sweet received his Ph.D. in history from the University of Minnesota and served as a managing editor of NAIS: The Journal of the Native American and Indigenous Studies Association from 2012 to 2017. Before joining the faculty at Rutgers he was the Henry Roe Cloud Postdoctoral Fellow at Yale University. His book project excavates the legal and racial complexities in the experiences of Native Americans of mixed-ancestry as they navigated both the Indigenous world and the American state.

Judy Tzu-Chun Wu is a professor of History and Asian American Studies at the University of California, Irvine. She also serves as faculty director of the Humanities Center and Associate Dean in the School of Humanities of Research, Faculty Development, and Public Engagement. She is the inaugural director of the Center for Liberation, Anti-Racism, and Belonging (C-LAB). 

She received her Ph.D. in U.S. History from Stanford University and previously taught at Ohio State University. She authored Dr. Mom Chung of the Fair-Haired Bastards: the Life of a Wartime Celebrity (University of California Press, 2005) and Radicals on the Road: Internationalism, Orientalism, and Feminism during the Vietnam Era (Cornell University Press,2013). Her book, Fierce and Fearless: Patsy Takemoto Mink, First Woman of Color in Congress (New York University Press, 2022), is a collaboration with political scientist Gwendolyn Mink. 

Jorge Zamanillo is the founding director of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Latino. The new museum was established by Congress in December 2020. In legislation establishing the museum within the Smithsonian, Congress stated the purposes of the museum are “to illuminate the story of the United States for the benefit of all by featuring Latino contributions to the art, history and culture of the nation since its early history.”

Previously, Zamanillo was the executive director and CEO of HistoryMiami Museum. He began working at the museum in Miami in 2000 as the curator of object collections and, over time, organized several key exhibitions and programs, including renovating the museum’s permanent exhibition. Before he was promoted to executive director and CEO, he served in several leadership positions at HistoryMiami— including deputy director, vice president of expansion projects and senior curator.

As executive director and CEO of HistoryMiami, Zamanillo managed the daily operations of a museum with a $6.2 million budget. He also led a $45 million expansion project (2015–2016) that added and renovated a new museum building, more than doubling the size of the museum, and created four additional exhibition galleries.

Zamanillo helped transform HistoryMiami into an indispensable and vibrant community-based museum through exhibitions and programs that reflect the diverse communities of South Florida. Under his direction, the museum expanded the South Florida Folklife Center, dedicated to documenting, presenting and supporting the region’s traditional arts and culture, and it added a dedicated permanent folklife gallery.
Before joining HistoryMiami Museum, Zamanillo was an archaeologist at the non-profit cultural resource management firm Archaeological and Historical Conservancy Inc. in Miami. He currently serves as the vice chair and board member of the American Alliance of Museums.

Born in New York City, Zamanillo grew up in Miami and earned a bachelor’s degree in anthropology at Florida State University in Tallahassee and his master’s in museum studies at the University of Leicester in Leicester, England.

Caroline Klibanoff is the director of Made By Us, a nationwide collaboration of history organizations, museums and historic sites informing and igniting Gen Z civic participation for the nation’s 250^th anniversary in 2026. Previously, she project managed exhibitions for MIT Museum’s new campus, and has worked in digital strategy for Big Tent Nation and the Bridge Alliance, developing the Civvys Awards and rolling out the inaugural National Week of Conversation. She began her career in strategic communications at the Pew Research Center and the Frameworks Institute, and has worked for cultural organizations including Longfellow House – George Washington’s Headquarters National Historic Site; Northern Light Productions; the Cambridge Historical Society; and Northeastern University’s Digital Scholarship Group. She holds a B.A. in American Studies and Film and Media Studies from Georgetown University, and an M.A. in Public History and Digital Humanities from Northeastern University.

Sara Cureton joined the staff of the New Jersey Historical Commission (NJHC) in 2004 and now serves as its executive director. She oversees funding programs totaling $5.5 million that support history organizations and activities across New Jersey. The NJHC also offers a variety of programs in New Jersey history, including an annual conference, professional development training, and an online journal, New Jersey Studies: An Interdisciplinary Journal.

Ms. Cureton’s career began with positions at several historic sites in the Garden State, working primarily on interpretation and historic preservation projects. As director of Absecon Lighthouse in Atlantic City she developed interpretive programming and oversaw a $3.4 million restoration of New Jersey’s tallest historic beacon. Active in professional organizations, she has served on the boards of the Mid-Atlantic Association of Museums, the New Jersey Association of Museums, and South Jersey Cultural Alliance. Ms. Cureton earned a B.A. in Folklore and Mythology from Harvard University, and an M.A. in Medieval Studies from the University of York in the U.K. She was recognized by the New Jersey Historical Commission with an Award of Recognition in 2003, received the John Cotton Dana Award for her contributions to New Jersey museums from the New Jersey Association of Museums in 2002, and was honored with the Lillian Levy Standing Ovation Award in 2014 by the South Jersey Cultural Alliance.

Activities surrounding New Jersey’s 350^th anniversary in 2014 provided Ms. Cureton with ample opportunity to launch new programming initiatives at the Commission, including an updated series of teaching resources in New Jersey history and a video series titled It Happened Here: New Jersey, for which she serves as an executive producer. The series was recognized with Emmy® nominations in both the New York and Mid-Atlantic regions. Ms. Cureton also served as executive producer for the Emmy®-award winning series NJ Women Vote in 2020.

Ms. Cureton is actively engaged in preparations for the Semiquincentennial in 2026, both as executive director of the New Jersey Historical Commission, and as chair of the Semiquincentennial Coordinating Committee of the American Association for State and Local History. A native of Seattle, Washington, she is now an enthusiastic resident of South Jersey. 

Laura Huerta Migus was appointed Deputy Director, Office of Museum Services, in July 2021. She comes to IMLS following her tenure as Executive Director of the Association of Children's Museums (ACM) in Arlington, Virginia, the world's largest professional society promoting and advocating on behalf of children's museums and children’s museum professionals. In 2018, Laura was named as an Ascend Fellow of the Aspen Institute, and in 2016, she was recognized as a Champion of Change for Summer Opportunity by the White House. She is a noted speaker and author on topics of equity and audience-focused museum practice for institutions including the Board of Science Education of the National Academies of Sciences, the U.S. Play Coalition, and various university texts.

Jennifer is director of the Utah Division of State History, Utah's public history organization which oversees the state's historic collections, public history programming, and the Museum of Utah, the state's first state history museum to be opened in 2026. The Peoples of Utah Revisited is the agency's Utah250 and America250 effort to widen the lens of Utah's history and help amplify the undertold history of the last fifty years of the state.

A rare combination of historian and business leader, Brian W. Martin provides a range of historical, planning, and project management consulting services to stewards of history across economic sectors.

From 2018-2021, he served the U.S. Semiquincentennial Commission and its non-profit partners providing contextual understanding of federal Bicentennial planning, serving at the principal author of the Commission's initial plan Inspiring the American Spirit, and leading early engagement with national program partners and facilitating program recognition nationwide.  For 34 years, Brian rose through the ranks of History Associates Incorporated, serving as president when the firm grew to nearly 80 employees, expanded into new markets, and attained record results.  He received his Ph.D. in History and Policy and Master of Science in Applied History and Social Science from Carnegie Mellon University and is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Gettysburg College.

John Dichtl became AASLH President & CEO in 2015. Prior to that he was the executive director of the National Council on Public History (NCPH) for nine years, and worked for the Organization of American Historians for fourteen years as deputy director and in several other roles. John received his MA and PhD in early American history from Indiana University, and from 2006 to 2015 was an adjunct faculty member of the history department at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis. Before graduate school he worked for the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee. He is a 2004 graduate of the Seminar for Historical Administration, a program that stems from an AASLH partnership with the Indiana Historical Society and other organizations. John helped to found the History Relevance Campaign, the International Federation for Public History, and is active in the National Coalition for History.

Michelle Lanier is an AfroCarolina folklorist, oral historian, museum professional, filmmaker, author, and educator with over two decades of commitment to her callings.

Michelle is a graduate of Spelman College and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. 

As the former, inaugural director of the North Carolina African American Heritage Commission, in 2018, Michelle was named as the first African American director of North Carolina's 26 state-owned historic sites, under the auspices of the state's Department of Natural and Cultural Resources.

She has also served as faculty of the Center for Documentary Studies at Duke University since 2000 and as a Commissioner of the Gullah Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor since 2020.

Michelle is proud to lead, through the North Carolina Division of State Historic Sites and Properties, a team increasingly committed to a value of True Inclusion.