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White House History Quarterly Advisors

Bill Barker

Veteran historical actor-interpreter Bill Barker is widely recognized as the nation’s foremost interpreter of Thomas Jefferson. After portraying Thomas Jefferson at Colonial Williamsburg for 26 years, Barker joined the Thomas Jefferson Foundation at Monticello in 2019. Barker began interpreting Jefferson in 1984 at Independence Hall in Philadelphia. Barker has performed as Jefferson around the world, including the White House, the U.S. Capitol, the Palace of Versailles, and more. He has been featured as Jefferson in Time, People, and Southern Living, and has appeared as Jefferson on ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, C-SPAN and Comedy Central’s Colbert Report.

Matthew Costello

Matthew Costello is the Vice President of the David M. Rubenstein National Center for White House History and White House Historian. Matthew has a Ph.D. and M.A. from Marquette University, and B.A. from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He has published articles in The Journal of History and Culture, Essays in History, The Dome, and White House History Quarterly. His book, The Property of the Nation: George Washington’s Tomb, Mount Vernon, and the Memory of the First President was published in 2019.

Mac Keith Griswold

Mac Griswold is a cultural landscape historian and writer. She is the author of Washington's Gardens at Mount Vernon: Landscape of the Inner Man, Pleasures of the Garden: Images from the Metropolitan Museum of Art, with Eleanor Weller The Golden Age of American Gardens: Proud Owners, Private Estates 1890-1940, and The Manor: Three Centuries at a Slave Plantation on Long Island. She is presently at work on a comprehensive biography, forthcoming in 2021, of Bunny Mellon, who designed the Rose Garden at the White House for President Kennedy.

Scott Harris

Scott H. Harris became Executive Director of University of Mary Washington Museums in 2018 after serving as Director of the James Monroe Museum. He has also worked at the New Market Battlefield State Historical Park, The Manassas Museum, the John Marshall House, and the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation. Scott has a BA from the University of Mary Washington and an MA from the College of William and Mary. Scott has written for White House History Quarterly, Augusta Historical Bulletin, Civil War Traveler, and the Dictionary of Virginia Biography, amongst others.

Joel Kemelhor

For over 50 years, Joel M. Kemelhor has been a writer/producer for "It's Academic," the longest-running quiz program in television history. Now the Contributing Editor, he continues to provide and review questions for the show, whose contestants are all secondary school students. A native Washingtonian, he is a graduate of Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut.

Jessie Kratz

Jessie Kratz is the Historian of the National Archives, where she established the National Archives History Office to ensure National Archives history is being captured, preserved, and shared. She is the editor of the National Archives blog, Pieces of History, and runs the agency’s Oral History Program. Jessie has also worked at the Center for Legislative Archives in Washington, DC. She is a former President of the Society for History in the Federal Government (SHFG), and currently a member of the Government Historians Committee for the National Council on Public History (NCPH).

Rebecca Roberts

Rebecca Boggs Roberts has been many things including, but not limited to, journalist, producer, tour guide, forensic anthropologist, event planner, political consultant, jazz singer, and radio talk show host. Currently, she is Curator of Programming for Planet Word, a museum set to open in 2020. She looks forward to creating a new institution that will become part of the intellectual and cultural life of our capitol city. Roberts lives in Washington, D.C. with her family.

Lydia Tederick

Lydia Tederick is curator of the White House, where she has worked since 1979 when she started as an intern while a graduate student in art history and museum studies at the George Washington University. Lydia has a special interest in the fine arts collection and photographic images of the White House and has contributed to each edition of Art in the White House: A Nation’s Pride. She has also written many articles for White House History Quarterly.

Bruce M. White

Bruce M. White is a photographer of art and historic architecture. Formerly a staff photographer at Sotheby’s and The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Bruce is author of At Home in the Presidents Neighborhood: A Photographic Tour and is the principle photographer for many White House Historical Association publications. Other notable publications include, with co-author James Goode, Capital Houses, with Pierre Terjanian, The Last Knight - The Art, Armor and Ambition of Maximilian I, and Majolica Mania, with Susan Weber.

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