Friday   

Explore 100 years of American history through objects often taken for granted in everyday life: signs. This course introduces the Museum’s origins and features a conversation with ASM’s founder about why signs matter. We will examine how signs have evolved due to trends in commerce and technology and explore case studies of three major food companies who used signage to shape their brands. In the final session, we will take a virtual visit to ASM’s neon shop to see how a neon sign is made.

Instructor:  Erin Holland

The American Sign Museum (Cincinnati, Ohio) covers more than 100 years of American sign history and displays more than 800 signs and artifacts, making it the most comprehensive museum of its kind. With a mission to educate the community about the history of the sign industry and its significant contribution to commerce and the American landscape, the Museum is organized to preserve, archive and display a historical collection of signs in their many types and forms.

Osher Online courses take place via Zoom and are not recorded.

ZOOM COURSE

The story of how the FBI surveilled the folk singers such as Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger, Bess Lomax, and others.  Using music, video, and records from extensive Freedom of Information Act filings, the lecture will bring to life these artists and the systemic way they were subject to government surveillance and suppression.