Our 2022 symposium, The Presidency and Historic Preservation, was a day-long event hosted by the White House Historical Association in partnership with the National Trust for Historic Preservation. This symposium featured prominent scholars, historians, preservationists, and professionals who discussed preserving presidential sites; women in historic preservation; presidential sites of enslavement; and preservation of the White House.

This video is the morning panels, which included the following:

Welcome

• Stewart McLaurin, President, The White House Historical Association
  
• Paul Edmondson, President and CEO, The National Trust for Historic Preservation

Preserving Presidential Sites

This panel will discuss the many challenges of preserving the residences of American presidents, along with how interpretations of those spaces (and the legacies of the presidents who lived there) have shifted and changed over time.

• Introduction: Brandon Robinson, Attorney and Independent Historian
• Katherine Malone-France, Chief Preservation Officer, The National Trust for Historic Preservation (moderator)
• Sara Bon-Harper, Executive Director, James Monroe’s Highland
• Dawn Hammatt, Director, Dwight D. Eisenhower Presidential Library and Museum
• Michael Atwood Mason, CEO and Executive Director, Lincoln’s Cottage

Women in Historic Preservation

This panel will explore how the field of historic preservation has been largely defined and shaped by women as organizers, museum professionals, curators, and as first ladies.

• Introduction: Brandon Robinson, Attorney and Independent Historian
• Colleen Shogan, Senior Vice President and Director of the Rubenstein Center, The White House Historical Association (moderator)
• Elaine Rice Bachmann, State Archivist of Maryland and co-author of Designing Camelot
• Melissa Naulin, Associate Curator of Decorative Arts, The White House
• Susan P. Schoelwer, Executive Director, Historic Preservation and Collections and Robert H. Smith Senior Curator, George Washington's Mount Vernon