Hey, quick favor. We need your input. For a few weeks, this August, we are going to be giving

ourselves our usual late summer break, and as usual, we'll be running some favorites from the

archives. But this year, we are asking for your help in deciding what to run. In our newsletter,

we're going to be doing a series of votes on what episode we should feature each day.

So it's up to you to chime in,

and that will help us decide. All you have to do is subscribe to the This Day newsletter at

thisdaypod.com. We'll be sending on our first poll soon, so jump on it.

Hello and welcome to This Day, a history show from Radiotopia.

My name is Jody Avergan.

This day, July 25th, 1913, the state of Pennsylvania creates the Pennsylvania Historical Commission, which, other things is tasked with creating and maintaining, quote, monuments, tablets, or other markers on places

or building where historical events have transpired. And this moment, in many ways, is the birth

of the modern historical marker industrial complex.

Listeners, you know that we love a good plaque on this show.

We love a good historical marker.

Shout out to all of you listeners who from time to time will send me an email with an interesting plaque that you've stumbled across.

We also love stories about how the way in which we choose to tell history says a lot about the present. And the story of

historical markers reflects a lot about the early part of the 20th century and the decades since.

Plus, anyone who has taken a great American road trip can attest that there are a lot of weird

historical markers out there. So we're going to dive into all of it here to discuss, as always,

Nicole Hammer of Vanderbilt and Kelly Carter Jackson of Wellesley. Both card carry members of the

Always Read the Plack Club, correct? Absolutely. Absolutely. Hello, Jody. Hey there. Hey there.

Now, before we get going, I want to give a quick shout out to a listener, Bob Cook, who runs this

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