Meet the virtual exhibit coordinator

My name is Jared Craig and I am the virtual exhibit coordinator for “The Road from Hell is Paved with Little Rocks” made possible by a grant from the Digitizing Hidden Collections Initiative, sponsored by the Council on Library and Information Resources (CLIR).

I have long been interested in the history, politics, and culture of the American South. I studied at the University of Central Arkansas where I earned a bachelor’s degree in history and political science. Later, I graduated at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock with a master’s degree in Public History, focusing on museum studies and historic preservation.

As virtual exhibit coordinator, I collaborate with scholars across the state, nation, and the world to contribute content for exhibits on the web. These contributors come from different fields, and I work with them to write entries that support the exhibit’s theme. I have any historian’s pleasure to explore archival materials—photographs, documents, and audiovisual materials—and select those for public consumption. I served in the same role in the creation of a virtual exhibit about the desegregation crisis in Little Rock called “Confronting the Crisis: The Legacy of Little Rock Central High School.”

I put a high value on creativity. The process of putting together a virtual exhibit, its architecture, content, and graphics, has been a fun and challenging process. The act is similar to putting together a puzzle, where one has to find the appropriate pieces to create a recognizable and provoking image.

It is beneficial for the general public to have these virtual exhibits accessible to them. Empowering people with historical interpretation does not need to be limited. The public can explore a topic of interest from their school, their desktop at home, or on a mobile device.

Most of all, the virtual exhibit for “The Road from Hell is Paved with Little Rocks” will allow visitors to explore and seek to answer questions such as: How did the desegregation of schools in Charleston, Fayetteville, and other cities in Arkansas occur with less anger than at Little Rock Central High School? Why were private schools forming in the years after the Civil Rights Act of 1964? What was the role of religious communities? Through this project, I hope individuals can find some understanding on this difficult topic.