2023 History Harvest
On April 1st, 2023 an event was held to preserve the memory of Farm Aid 1985. UIUC History Harvest, a class run by Dr. Dan Gilbert, worked in coordination with staff from the Champaign County History Museum, the University of Illinois Library, and the Spurlock Museum to digitize and preserve historic artifacts surrounding the event.
A History Harvest is an event where members of the community bring in historical materials in order to have them digitized and historically interpreted. Originally started as a project at the University of Nebraska: Lincoln, History Harvests have taken root at dozens of other universities around the United States including at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
Community members brought in hundreds of photographs, documents, artifacts, and memorabilia. They also told their stories to student interviewers. Students from the History Harvest course transcribed oral history interviews, carried out research on the megaconcert, and also wrote sections of this exhibit. Former CCHM museum manager Connor Monson and his team of museum volunteers collaborated with Dr. Gilbert and his class to process the hundreds of items brought in during the harvest.
The items and photographs collected were later used in a museum exhibit for the 40th anniversary of Farm Aid 1985 called "Songs of Solidarity" at the Spurlock Museum.