EUGENE R. TESDAHL

4 p.m. | College of Liberal Arts and Education and Associate and Master’s Degree Candidates

Dr. Eugene Tesdahl serves as Associate Professor of history. He arrived at UW-Platteville in 2014. He holds a bachelor’s from Luther College in Decorah, Iowa, where he studied history, secondary education, and museum studies; a master’s in history from Miami University, in Oxford, Ohio; and a doctorate in history from the University of Colorado at Boulder. Tesdahl specializes in Indigenous history, early American history, women’s history, history of gender, and public history.

Tesdahl’s recent scholarship explores Haudenosaunee cosmology, new approaches to historical interpretation, and illegal slavery in early Wisconsin. He has consulted on numerous museum exhibits in the U.S. and Canada on topics ranging from smuggling in 18th century Canada, free Black entrepreneurs and enslaved lead miners in the Driftless area, and the history of beer in Wisconsin.

Tesdahl empowers his undergraduate students to follow their learning outside the classroom. He and his students often build public partnerships with community and regional organizations. Recent partnerships have restored the headstones of Black Wisconsinites who were illegally enslaved but not forgotten. In 2018, he and an undergraduate researcher presented at a symposium at the U.S. House of Representatives in Washington, D.C. Many of his former students go on to teach social studies. Others practice law, serve as national park rangers, or inspire others as librarians, museum directors, or writers.