Community organizations and longtime locals in Detroit's Mexicantown neighborhood work to preserve its past and prepare for the future.

Laura Chavez-Wazeerud-Din, president and CEO of Southwest Detroit Business Association, for one, wants to make sure the companies at the new technology hub don’t forget who’s in their backyard. “We want our students from César Chávez and Cristo Rey [high schools] to be participants there. We want to make sure we’re giving opportunities to our community first. We are here,” she says. “We cannot be ignored.”

In 1993, the Hollywood United Methodist Church attached a large red ribbon — a symbol for AIDS awareness — to its bell tower. Three decades later, it stands as a symbol to the church's broader legacy of inclusion.

“We do everything we can to try to say to this community that has been so ostracized and so beaten down that ‘You’re loved. We love you. You are welcome here,’” said filmmaker Pauly Perrette. “We’re very proud of that.”

Read about the Shawnee Tribe's efforts to restore, preserve, and reinterpret the Shawnee Indian Manual Labor Boarding School in Fairway, Kansas, a National Historic Landmark and a Shawnee Tribe Sacred Site.

“Our tribal citizens, myself included, have direct ancestral ties to the school,” said Shawnee Tribal Historic Preservation Officer Tonya Tipton. “But the story of the site is also about westward expansion, what was happening in that region during that era, and its deep history as an Indigenous homeland. It’s important to who we are today and important to the future of the tribal nations affected by its legacy.”

After the devastation caused by Hurricane Helene, this historic restaurant was a beacon of light, offering nourishment and a place to gather for Burnsville, North Carolina residents.

Amanda Keith, owner of the NuWray, said, “The NuWray has always been a gathering space for local people, so visitors get a real sense of the place. It’s been like that for hundreds of years. It’s still the case today."

A new project from Latinos in Heritage Conservation is transforming research and geodata into rich and engaging StoryMaps to honor and preserve Latine histories.

Sehila Mota Casper, executive director of Latinos in Heritage Conservation, said that at LHC, the Abuelas Project has earned the nickname “the People’s Register.” She said, “We are bringing community and practitioners together to help create solutions from a lack of representation and visibility.”

Today, preservation efforts at A.G. Gaston Motel, 16th Street Baptist Church, and Bethel Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama, ensure that these structures serve as points of reflection.

Looking to the future, Martha Bouyer and Rev. Thomas L. Wilder Jr. are continually applying for grants to help maintain the historic church and find new ways to tell the story of Shuttlesworth and Bethel Baptist....“Out of this modest community grows a revolution. We have so much to be proud of,” says Bouyer.

A conversation with Jerrick Hope-Lang (Lduteen) on these important sites of ritual, community, tradition, and memory.

“This is for all Lingít people, and the idea is to be inclusive and to share information, share knowledge. The possibility here is the ripple effect. This is where the pebble has landed, and we don't know what the outcome can be for other communities, and we're already networking ourselves in to see what that looks like.”

The South Asian American Digital Archive (SAADA) created the largest publicly accessible archive of South Asian American stories & offers an immersive walking tour through the streets of Philadelphia.

“For the organization, this project continues to be an important effort to reframe history to include groups that have too often been marginalized, ignored, or excluded. While the walking tour was affected by the pandemic beginning in 2020, as of October 2022, SAADA has resumed regular tours, and the archive’s mission to shine a light on the hidden histories of Philadelphia continues unabated.”

Recent federal actions are impacting historic sites nationwide. Angela Thorpe Mason, executive director of the Pauli Murray Center for History & Social Justice, discusses how they are navigating federal acts of erasure and financial loss.

Angela Thorpe Mason said, “We have also seen a significant increase in visitors since January. Oftentimes, you can tell that they are carrying something—oftentimes despair, confusion, a sense of hopelessness—and by the time they leave, they feel empowered and grounded because they can explore Pauli’s activist framework and the ways that Pauli coped with times that felt treacherous and impossible as well.

In the summer of 2024, 4 wall-mounted markers were added to the streets of Boston's Chinatown neighborhood to help share the histories of those who inhabited the area at different times.

“...We think that part of that is celebrating the history of the neighborhood as always being an anchor community for immigrant, working-class families. Whether it was the Irish, the Europeans, the Syrian and Lebanese communities, or the Chinese. And that’s why we called it the Immigrant History Trail [instead of] exclusively celebrating Chinese American history. Because it’s all part of that history of being that anchor neighborhood, and that’s what we’re trying to preserve. That’s all part of the history that we share.” Chinatown CLT Executive Director Lydia Lowe

For decades, the Hungarian Pastry Shop has been an unwritten chapter in New York’s cultural story. Generations of locals have found themselves drawn to the quiet comfort of this seemingly ordinary cafe.

“As was the case for many restaurants, the Hungarian Pastry Shop came to rely heavily on its neighbors during the COVID-19 epidemic. “The community members who lived here, the families who had lived here for generations, those were the people who kept us in business,” said Philip Binioris, owner of the Hungarian Pastry Shop. ”Those were the people lining up outside the door.”

Through research and oral histories, and with support from the National Trust Preservation Funds grant program, Historic Columbia's LGBTQ Columbia History Initiative preserves places of LGBTQ+ history in South Carolina.

“Terrance Henderson, a Columbia, South Carolinia-based artist and activist, said the feelings of empowerment and belonging he experienced at The Candy Shop decades ago are desperately needed in today’s political climate, “Queer stories, Black stories, and trans stories are being politicized currently, and there’s a history to it,” he said. “It’s important for us to understand that history and the history of trans and queer people living and thriving in their communities.”

Listed on the 2025 list of America's 11 Most Endangered Historic Places, the Wellington highlights how preservation has the promise to transform a small community in New York.

“By revitalizing and providing a community space, the Wellington is going to inspire other businesses to think about their facade, to clean things up, to think about the houses that are falling down or businesses that have gone under,” said Colleen McMurray, executive director at The Pine Hill Community Center. “Folks will start thinking about how we can bring them back to life and represent the life and the passion of the community in the face of some of these old buildings.”