In the fading years of the Gilded Age, Louisville emerged as an important center of Kentucky history, thanks to the efforts of the Filson Club (now the Filson Historical Society). Founded in 1884, the Filson Club fostered discussions and launched public history initiatives that can seem strikingly modern today. Dubbed “Benefactors of Posterity” by one founder, the Filson was often in the vanguard of collection and commemoration, rivaling more established historical societies in the East. Its output was also deeply mired in systemic racism and Jim Crow culture, and members actively worked to distort and erase the history of African Americans and Native Nations.

Writing during the organization’s 140th anniversary, historian Daniel Gifford recreates a 360-degree view of the Filson’s founding era. Benefactors of Posterity revises our understanding of key moments in Louisville and Kentucky history, including Enid Yandell’s Daniel Boone statue; the Southern Exposition; Louisville’s public parks; and the Ku Klux Klan. It is an explicit and intentional reckoning with the Filson Historical Society’s past, one that reverberates with the challenges facing our communities in the 21st century.

“He who would be counted among the benefactors of posterity, must, by his own toil, add to the acquisitions of his ancestors.” These are words worthy to be inscribed on the banner of the Filson Club.

—Captain Thomas Speed, evoking Samuel Johnson at the Filson Club’s Centenary of Kentucky banquet, June 1, 1892, Louisville, Kentucky

Topics: Gilded Age; Louisville; historical societies

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