Program:  Master's Program in Public History

Email:  schmelik@luc.edu

Faculty Advisor:  Theodore Karamanski

MBA, University of Illinois - Chicago, 2004

MSLIS, Simmons GSLIS, 1995

BA cum laude, Wellesley College, 1993

Conflict among classes and immigrants in 19th century Chicago is my research purview.  I am specifically interested in how groups of multi-lingual people communicated and how symbols facilitated and enshrined these conflicts.  I am currently exploring the use of symbols on limestone tree grave markers.  With my public history focus, I am interested in using museums and educational programs to perpetuate knowledge and to encourage enthusiasm for history in general and specific historical topics.  As an educator at both a science museum and a fine & decorative arts museum, I experiment with different communication and pedagogic techniques to discern the most effective teaching methods in a museum setting.

Chmelik, Samantha. "Otto Y. Schnering." in Immigrant Entrepreneurship: German-American Business Biographies, 1720 to the Present, vol. 4, edited by Jeffrey Fear. German Historical Institute. July 05, 2012.

Chmelik, Samantha.  “The Mallin Artwork Restoration Project.”  CSA Journal.  April 2012.

Trees That Talk:  Reading the Symbols on Limestone Tree Grave Markers.  Friends of Bohemian National Cemetery Summer Program.  Sponsor:  Friends of Bohemian National Cemetery.  August 2012.

Grave Markers as Protest Symbols:  Using Cemeteries to Interpret the Intra-Ethnic Conflicts of Chicago’s Bohemian Immigrants.  Organization of American Historians/National Council on Public History Annual Meeting.  Sponsor:  OAH/NCPH.  April 2012.

Market Research for Libraries.  ClickU.  Sponsor:  Special Libraries Association.  March 2006.