RICK WOTEN
ABOUT
I am an assistant professor of
history at Montana State
University Northern with
experience as a museum director,
non-profit director, and subject
matter expert. I am a graduate of
the Agricultural History and
Rural Studies PhD program at
Iowa State University. My areas of
emphasis are 19th century
United States, sport,
environmental history, and
historical preservation. In
addition, I am an avid researcher,
digital humanist, scholar,
lecturer, and public speaker on
environmental, Iowa, Midwestern,
agricultural, rural, transportation,
and bicycling history.
I am currently involved in numerous
areas of research and delivery
methodologies. I am re-examining the
role and importance of landscapes,
the midwestern frontier, and built
environments, specifically the regions
of the Ohio River and Mississippi
River valleys, and internal
improvements in the formation of
state. Although regionalism often is a
limiting term, I seek to refocus a
portion of the historiography on the
importance that states held in
defining the roles of state, citizens,
private business, nationalism, and
federalism.
It is my intention that the
examination of early United States
life, culture, and law will contribute to
the development of an immersive
digital humanities project. The
project, available via the Internet, will
serve as a widely accessible digital
history resource for scholars,
educators, students, and the general
public. The project's development will
offer students (undergraduate and
graduate), fellow faculty, and
interdisciplinary colleagues great
collaborative opportunity to
contribute scholarly, ideas, content,
and topics while serving as a digital
tool for historical education,
awareness, and preservation.
PAST RESEARCH
CURRENT RESEARCH
I am honored to be a research fellow
for both The Gilder Lehrman
Institute of American History and
The Filson Historical Society. The
fellowships have assisted my
research efforts and I am humbled
by their support.
I have had several great
opportunities to assist the research
of professors while a graduate
student within the ISU Department
of History that included assisting in
GIS mapping, orthorectification, and
metadata analysis with Dr. Sara
Gregg to map historical change in
Appalachia. Her subsequent
monograph, Managing the
Mountains: Land Use Planning, The
New Deal, and the Creation of a
Federal Landscape in Appalachia,
has been published by Yale
University Press.
I oversaw the operation and
development of the digital history
project Agricultural History Primer
made possible by the ISU Center for
On-Line Learning and the
Department of History.