Kayly joins our US office in San Francisco for an internship over the winter of 2015 and beginning of 2016, in collaboration with the wonderful youth development program New Door Ventures. Below she tells us a little bit about herself and her time so far at Historypin.

Name: Kayly Dodd                                                                

Role: Intern, Historypin US office

Hometown: Huntington Beach, CA

Why did you want to intern at Historypin?

The desire to intern at Historypin came while briefly reviewing all of the companies paired with New Door for this program. Historypin had an interesting set up online, allowing easy access to view all the collections and possible projects to work on. The website proved very effective and easy to use, going into well written detail about the opportunities available as well as providing a helpful “About Us” button which gave background details that explained how the community felt about Historypin, which was interesting to know how user based the system was. The business itself proved to motivate others to be more involved in their community and get a better understanding of their local history, which I personally found internally motivating because I consider all opportunities to have the community work together as a good opportunity.

How did you come to hear about the project?

I heard about this project through the New Door Ventures program which I am currently a part of. New Door aligns with many programs and to help us sort through which internship would be the best fit, we heard short summaries of each. They recommended this job to me because of my desire to write and my interest in local history.

What are you working on now?

Currently, I am working on placing the locations for a plethora of Harvey Wilson Richards photos from the 1960’s. I sort through hundreds of his photos (many relating to social justice and civil rights history) and find small details that correlate to a specific place so that when we are finally able to pin them on our site, we have close to an exact location as to where the pictures were taken. I also have the opportunity to look through recent posts to Historypin and check them for spam or incorrect location pinning.

 

What goals would you like to have achieved by the end of your internship period/what types of activities you would like to be involved in?

The most realistic goal I have working at Historypin is to gain the experience of working with a small team to help get the community involved in local history and continuing that desire to build up community networking in other cities. The types of activities that I would enjoy working with relate mainly to works of art as well as things relating to local and current news in the surrounding areas.

What do you like to do when you’re not at Historypin?

When I am not at Historypin I spend a lot of time working on a novel that I hope to finish by the Fall of 2017. I also take interest in spending time with my family, who I travel to go see every other weekend in Nevada City and Huntington Beach. Mainly my favorite thing to do is explore. Most days some companions and I will take a long drive with no real direction and then just stop and explore the place we found.

What’s it like working in San Francisco (Historypin US headquarters)?

Coming from Southern California, San Francisco is a very big change. I had to go buy a raincoat one of my first days in the city and learning the ways of public transportation has been an interesting experience. This city is filled with so many different types of people and it’s been a great experience to be here.

What’s your favorite piece of content that’s been pinned to Historypin and why?

My current favorite piece that’s been pinned is the “Putting Art on the Map” collection started by the Imperial War Museum. This is because not only does it show all the paintings that were done during the First World War, but it allows people to interact with the collection to help find out where the paintings were trying to depict. It’s a great way to gain some following to the collection by getting more people involved in solving its mysteries.

 

Can you share something you’ve personally pinned to Historypin (optional)?

Personally the only content I was able to pin was in regards to the “LGBTQ Places in California” collection because my high school was the first school to ever have a transgender homecoming queen. So I did pin some content with regards to our 2013 Homecoming Queen Cassidy Lynn. I plan on pinning some more content but that was the first pin I ever made.

 

What kind of content would you like to see more of on Historypin?

I think the content that would be the most interesting to see are people’s own stories and tales about their experiences with world history. I’d like to see more people pin the pictures they took, or ones that were passed down to them, so that we can get a better view on how the world itself saw how our history affected them.

Why do you think people should add their stories to it?

I think people should add their stories to Historypin because it’s a great way to share information. Our stories shape who we are and then goes to shape the people we surround ourselves with. If people add their stories onto Historypin, it gives a greater access to the reasoning behind the people we have become.

What do you think the future of Historypin looks like?

I think the future of Historypin could be an extraordinary way to learn more in depth how people experienced parts of history differently. If people felt more open about sharing their stories, or even just their pictures, with the public then we would be able to have a firmer grasp on how exactly these momentous moments in history have shaped us as a whole. Historypin could be a great way for people to learn about their family experiences as well as learn more about the community they live in. If more people got involved in Historypin, it could really grow to be something pretty amazing. But the best way to insure that this website gets the recognition it needs to grow to be that something amazing, is to talk about it with your friends and share it. The biggest point for Historypin is to share your story, and if people learn to grasp that and continue sharing their story then things will end up going greatly for this website. I hope the best for this site and hope it’ll just keep getting better in the future.