Indiana State Museum and Historic Sites

Brian K. Mitchell, Director of Research and Interpretation, Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum

The Death of Reconstruction

Dr. Brian K. Mitchell is the director of research and interpretation for the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum. The author of numerous books and papers, his most recent book, Monumental: Oscar Dunn and his Radical Fight in Reconstruction Louisiana (2021), is the winner of several prestigious awards including the Phillis Wheatley Book Award and The American Association of State and Local History’s Excellence Award. He was a finalist for the Organization of American Historians’ Best Civil War and Reconstruction Book Award.

2023 R. Gerald McMurtry Lecture

Edna Greene Medford, Professor Emeritus, Department of History, Howard University

The Pursuit of Freedom in a “Free” State: The Emancipation Proclamation’s Significance to African Americans in Indiana

Dr. Edna Greene Medford is professor emeritus and the former chairperson of the department of history at Howard University, specializing in slavery, the Civil War and Reconstruction. Her books include Lincoln and Emancipation (2015) and The Emancipation Proclamation: Three Views (co-authored with Harold Holzer and Frank Williams, 2006). She also edited Historical Perspectives of the African Burial Ground: New York Blacks and the Diaspora. Medford is currently working on a book about William Trail of Henry County, Ind., whose four sons served with the United States Colored Troops during the Civil War.

The McMurtry Lecture is supported by the Friends of the Lincoln Collection of Indiana.

Tyrone McKinley Freeman, Director, Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy

Madam C.J. Walker and Black Women’s Philanthropy in Historical Perspective

Dr. Tyrone McKinley Freeman is a 2022 inaugural laureate of the Dan David Research Prize. The award-winning scholar and teacher serves as director of the Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy. Previously, he was a professional fundraiser in community development, youth and family social services, and higher education organizations. His research focuses on philanthropy in communities of color and philanthropy in higher education. His latest book is Madam C.J. Walker’s Gospel of Giving: Black Women’s Philanthropy during Jim Crow (2020).

Ty Seidule, Professor Emeritus of History, West Point

Robert E. Lee and Me: A Southerner’s Reckoning with the Myth of the Lost Cause

Brig. Gen. Ty Seidule, U.S. Army (retired), is a visiting professor of history at Hamilton College. He is a professor emeritus of history at West Point and served in the U.S. Army for 36 years. Seidule served as vice chair for the Congressional Naming Commission tasked to rename department of defense assets that honor Confederates. His latest book, Robert E. Lee and Me: A Southerner’s Reckoning with the Myth of the Lost Cause, was named one of the best books of 2021 by NPR, Forbes and other news outlets, and can be purchased in the museum’s gift shop. His video lecture, “Was the Civil War about Slavery?” has 35 million views on social media.

This lecture is supported by