Things we think are relavant that you should look at:
Mark Dion's Bartram Travels Revisited.Driving East Through Indian Country.Invisible5.mis-GUIDES.
Institute for Small Town Studies.Worlds Largest Things.Tulca Freedom Trail.
Temporary Travel Office.Hand Held Histories as Hyper Monuments.
Decode Jerusalem.Catastrophic Space.Critical Tourism: The People's Atlas of Zagreb.
Platial History. Place in Place of: Alexandria.
This list is incomplete. Please help add to it. Email ideas to:
khargrav (at) gmail .dot. com
© Hope Hilton and Katie Hargrave 2008
Manifest Destiny (Salt Lake, 5 states + Rushmore)
A collaborative road trip between Hope Hilton and Katie Hargrave to explore and research sites of male Americana: Carl Sandburg, John Brown, Salt!, the Badlands, Mt. Rushmore, and Spiral Jetty.
Scheduled for late May 2009.
-Hope + Katie
May 28, 2008
We've decided (because of gas prices, timing, and weather, etc.) to put this trip off and save up for it for next year. Look for MD 2009!
xo, K + H
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March 13, 2008
We have been adding cites to our list, including the home in which Robert Ford shot Jesse James (which was moved and then moved back, but now sits two blocks away from the original location), the two centers of the US (the contiguous in Lebanon Kansas and the 50 states in rural South Dakota), the hometown of both Thomas Hart Benton (painter and senator) in Missouri, Cahokia mounds, Promotory Point (hello first national media event!), and Lincoln's parents' log cabin (replica). Please add to our list by shooting Katie an email (khargrav *at* gmail *dot* com).
The clock is counting down, and we're looking forward to it. If you'd like us to send you a postcard, send us your address and we'll pick the historically relevant spot.
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February 4, 2008
Here is a project description that gives you a bit more MEAT.
Manifest Destiny (Salt Lake, 5 states + Rushmore)
A collaborative road trip between Hope Hilton and Katie Hargrave to explore and research sites of male Americana: Carl Sandburg, John Brown, MLK, Salt!, the Badlands, Mt. Rushmore, and Spiral Jetty.
Through the thoroughly American form of the road trip, we seek to investigate sites of contention, power, and of incorruptible nature. Starting from the point where the West begins, Chicago, we examine representations of "the cult of manliness" (Peter Gay, 1993). Nearly every archetypal male is present: soldiers, authors, humanitarians, alcoholics, presidents, abolitionists, native americans, civil rights activists, cowboys, and artists. And so is almost every representation of these: places named for them, plaques commemorating them, their works left behind, monumental representations, the open road, and the wild-west.
Just passing through the landscape of the Western half of the United States, a shift in mentality occurs from the interwoven, dividual of the city to the independent, individual open space.
We propose to spend half a month on the road, driving, visiting sites, taking pictures, talking to locals, touching the earth, staying in motels, drinking beers, watching westerns. All the while, we'll squint so as to understand better what is occurring around us, asking just how the landscape is represented and experienced.
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February 2, 2008
We're still trying to piece together the ins and outs of this website, but for now, this is what we've got.
We have been plotting our course, as they say, and so far this is what we have come up with. Of course, some have pointed out that it is far too highway heavy and that we won't see enough of the great, wide west this way.