[et_pb_section fb_built=”1″ _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” custom_padding=”||3px|||” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_row _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″ _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_audio audio=”http:\/\/www.huronresearch.ca\/officehours\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/125\/2025\/12\/OHS02E01_Dr-Tim-Compeau.mp3″ title=”OHEP1 Guest: Dr. Tim Compeau” artist_name=”Office Hours” album_name=”Host: Madison Thompson” image_url=”http:\/\/www.huronresearch.ca\/officehours\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/125\/2025\/02\/Madison-Portrait.jpg” _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” background_color=”#971B2F” text_orientation=”left” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_audio][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][et_pb_row _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″ _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_accordion toggle_icon=”h||divi||400″ _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” toggle_font=”|600|||||||” closed_toggle_font=”|600|||||||” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_accordion_item title=”Episode Transcript” open=”on” _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n
OHS01E01 Intro<\/strong><\/p>\n [Dr. Compeau]<\/strong> I love these intimate stories of individual lives, of families that are facing these incredible historical moments. But I’m also really fascinated with the imperial structures, the way that empires move people against their will as willing migrants, how empires move stuff, commodities, how empires move disease and mail, so these big networks fascinate me, but I also love the intimate individual lives. And so, I find myself from project-to-project sort of veering from one to the other.<\/p>\n [Madison]<\/strong> Hi, I’m Madison.<\/p>\n [Olivia]<\/strong> I’m Olivia.<\/p>\n [Varun]<\/strong> And I’m Varun.<\/p>\n [All]<\/strong> And we’re your hosts of Office Hours Season 2.<\/p>\n [Olivia]<\/strong> What’s Office Hours Madison?<\/p>\n [Madison]<\/strong> Oh, good question, Olivia. Office Hours is a monthly podcast produced by us, your peer research coaches, and the Huron University Library, where research takes center stage. Each month, we interview a professor at Huron to hear more about what they are up to.<\/p>\n [Varun]<\/strong> Varun 0 Oh, oh, and don’t forget, we also talk to undergraduate students each month about their own research project in our Student Spotlight episodes.<\/p>\n Before we dive in, we want to acknowledge that we are bringing you this podcast on the land of the Dishkan Zibing Anishinabek, Chippewas of the Thames First Nation, Luna Peiwa, Mansi, Delaware Nation, and Onyota Ka Oneida Nation of the Thames. We encourage you to read our full land acknowledgement on the Office Hours website or the show notes to learn more about the lands that Huron occupies and get informed about indigenous news and resources.<\/p>\n Full Land Acknowledgement and Local Indigenous News & Resources<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n OHS01E02 Transcript<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n [Madison]\u00a0<\/strong>Hello, and welcome to the first episode of Office Hours for this school year.\u00a0I’m\u00a0Madison, your host of today’s episode, and joining me in\u00a0studio\u00a0is Dr. Tim\u00a0Compeau.<\/p>\n Dr.\u00a0Compeau\u00a0is a history professor here at Huron with research interests in revolutions, Upper Canada, cultural, military, and global history, and public and social memory.<\/p>\n Anything else to add, Dr.\u00a0Compeau?<\/p>\n [Dr. Compeau]<\/strong>\u00a0No, that sums it up.\u00a0Thanks\u00a0for having me.<\/p>\n [Madison]\u00a0<\/strong>Quite a wide range and a lot to dig into, so\u00a0let’s\u00a0get into it.<\/p>\n So,\u00a0to kick things off, can you share a bit more about what the focus of your research is and what types of projects you are working on?<\/p>\n [Dr.\u00a0Compeau]\u00a0<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, so I research broadly the British Empire from, say, the 1760s,\u00a0sort of the\u00a0end of the Seven Years’ War, through to the end of the Napoleonic period, 18-teens, 1820s, that kind of era.<\/p>\n My\u00a0main focus\u00a0has been, for the past few years, the loyalists of the American Revolution, and then what happened to them during and after the war.\u00a0So,\u00a0I had a book come out two years ago now about their experiences in the conflict and\u00a0sort of their\u00a0afterlives in the British Empire.<\/p>\n And then right now\u00a0I’m\u00a0working on a biography of a loyalist exile who came from Connecticut and ended up in Canada, but\u00a0really,\u00a0he went on a sort of odyssey throughout the British Atlantic in the 1780s and 1790s.<\/p>\n And then\u00a0I’m\u00a0working on a website called Loyalist Migrations, which is an attempt to sort of trace and visualize the human migrations, the exiles, the people that left from the United States in the aftermath of the American Revolution.<\/p>\n [Madison]\u00a0<\/strong>I did notice quite a few of the journal articles on your Huron\u00a0Staff page are about technology and history,\u00a0specifically augmented reality and how it could be used to teach people to see the past like a historian.<\/p>\n I have two questions.\u00a0One is\u00a0relating\u00a0to this.\u00a0How do you see the future of historical study going as technology continues to advance?\u00a0And then what is seeing the past like a historian to you?\u00a0How would you say that way of thinking is different than just thinking about it?<\/p>\n [Dr.\u00a0Compeau]<\/strong>\u00a0\u00a0OK, well, those are two big questions.<\/p>\n So that research I wrapped up in 2019.\u00a0And the one lesson I learned from doing all of that is how quickly technology changes and how hard it is to keep up with\u00a0it and\u00a0keeping\u00a0your research and your output relevant.<\/p>\n So,\u00a0I started doing research on augmented\u00a0reality way\u00a0back.\u00a0It must have been in 2012, I think.\u00a0And augmented reality, for those of you who\u00a0don’t\u00a0know, is the overlaying of digital information, digital content onto real world environments through screens.\u00a0So,\u00a0the best example of that is your backup camera that shows where your car is steering\u00a0and the lines of that, of which way your car is going.<\/p>\n And\u00a0so,\u00a0I started\u00a0working\u00a0with a professor here at\u00a0Western\u00a0named Rob McDougall way back when I was a PhD student studying some of the implications of augmented reality as a disruptive technology for public history.\u00a0How is this going to change how we go to museums, how we look at artifacts,\u00a0how\u00a0we\u00a0interact with historical sites?<\/p>\n And perhaps there\u00a0was\u00a0ways to sort of have a subversive kind of commemoration.\u00a0Okay, here is a plaque.\u00a0The plaque gives one version of history.\u00a0But if I put on my historical AR goggles,\u00a0perhaps it’ll\u00a0tell me a competing form,\u00a0a form that centers on decolonization or anti-racism,\u00a0some kind of alternative story of the past.<\/p>\n So,\u00a0I worked with Professor Kevin Key,\u00a0who is at Brock and is now\u00a0at\u00a0Ottawa, producing a collection called\u00a0“Seeing the Past with Computers,”\u00a0which looked at both AR and computer vision. Now, at this point in my career, looking back at AR,\u00a0it almost seems quaint because\u00a0we’ve\u00a0moved on so much so fast since then. And\u00a0AI, not AR, is\u00a0the\u00a0new\u00a0big thing.\u00a0So,\u00a0I think I’ve\u00a0sort of left\u00a0AR behind and\u00a0haven’t\u00a0really\u00a0touched it\u00a0in quite a few years.<\/p>\n But that taught me a lesson, though, in the sense that this was\u00a0pegged to be the new\u00a0big thing.\u00a0This was going to be\u00a0the disruptive\u00a0technology. Get on board right\u00a0now. This is going to change how your museum works. And it\u00a0didn’t. And\u00a0so\u00a0I think\u00a0that’s\u00a0an\u00a0important lesson,\u00a0whether or not\u00a0I\u00a0don’t\u00a0think AI is going to have that kind of fizzle out kind of\u00a0experience. But who knows, right? And\u00a0so\u00a0this has made me\u00a0kind of a\u00a0digital skeptic in some ways of\u00a0the\u00a0new thing.<\/p>\n But I still think, to your second question, that the study of AR is helpful in that sense of seeing\u00a0the past\u00a0like\u00a0a historian.\u00a0So,\u00a0when I visit a new\u00a0city, when\u00a0I even go downtown London and look\u00a0around, I see street signs and it\u00a0kind of triggers\u00a0something for me. Like, oh, there’s Victoria\u00a0Avenue,\u00a0or there’s\u00a0Trafalgar Street, or, you know,\u00a0different\u00a0places, things that just might be part of the environment.\u00a0But they are filled with history.<\/p>\n And the history, it informs so much of how the city is built, the ideas that are\u00a0sort of\u00a0impregnated\u00a0into it.\u00a0So,\u00a0seeing like a historian is seeing the past all around us and how it shapes\u00a0our landscapes, how it shapes our present, how it shapes our relationships with people,\u00a0where\u00a0we live in the city. And augmented reality was\u00a0sort of a\u00a0way, a theoretical way, I suppose,\u00a0of imagining putting goggles on people’s heads to let them see all this historical information\u00a0sort of\u00a0pinging\u00a0off in real time.\u00a0We never got there, but that was the idea.<\/p>\n [Madison]\u00a0<\/strong>\u00a0So\u00a0it sounds like it was a way to, I guess, show people how somebody that is used to seeing the past,\u00a0like a historian,\u00a0would typically see stuff.\u00a0I guess, give them a view into that world,\u00a0whereas\u00a0they might not usually just see a street\u00a0sign and think of all the history with that.<\/p>\n [Dr. Compeau]<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, exactly.\u00a0Like, not everybody, in fact, most people do not spend every waking hour thinking about history,\u00a0reading history, so they\u00a0don’t\u00a0become equipped with all that sort of knowledge in their heads.<\/p>\n So,\u00a0this is what, that was the idea that we could, you know, create a system that would\u00a0allow people to see that.<\/p>\n [Madison]\u00a0<\/strong>That\u00a0is very cool.<\/p>\n [Dr. Compeau]\u00a0<\/strong>And we did try a couple examples working with groups at Brock University.\u00a0They had worked on projects at the Battle of\u00a0Queenston\u00a0Heights and Niagara-on-the-Lake\u00a0that were\u00a0sort of gamifying, making apps, gamifying\u00a0sort of history.\u00a0But as you walked through the town, you know, different historical sites, plaques, old ruins, things like that,\u00a0with\u00a0sort\u00a0of\u00a0monuments, with\u00a0sort\u00a0of\u00a0lighthouses.\u00a0Monuments would sort of light up on their app and take them along this route of historical tour.<\/p>\n [Madison]<\/strong>\u00a0So,\u00a0can you tell us more about your research journey from the time you were a student until now?<\/p>\n [Dr. Compeau]<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah,\u00a0it’s\u00a0a long story. Since I was a little kid, I\u00a0was\u00a0always interested in history.\u00a0I remember when I was\u00a0probably nine\u00a0or ten, my parents were like, you know,\u00a0where\u00a0would you\u00a0like to go on holiday?<\/p>\n We can go to\u00a0Disneyland,\u00a0we can\u00a0go to\u00a0here.\u00a0I wanted to go to Colonial Williamsburg, and so that was a formative experience for me to see,\u00a0sort of,\u00a0that\u00a0site of the American Revolution, the way that historical site comes alive.<\/p>\n So,\u00a0things like that were really important for, I guess, firing a zeal to want to study history\u00a0every chance you get.\u00a0But\u00a0specifically\u00a0for what I do\u00a0now, so\u00a0I grew up in\u00a0a little town\u00a0called Gananoque.\u00a0It’s\u00a0in eastern Ontario.\u00a0It’s\u00a0on the Thousand Islands and the St. Lawrence River.\u00a0And when I was just at the end of high school, so it would have been the summer after I graduated,\u00a0I took a job at the little museum that was there. And this museum at that point was\u00a0kind\u00a0of crumbling. The collection\u00a0wasn’t\u00a0well\u00a0maintained. It was a real mess. And that was so much fun because I was allowed to just sort of roam through this collection\u00a0and look at whatever I wanted to and try and build exhibits with really no knowledge about\u00a0anything. It was just sort of, you know, getting paid\u00a0minimum\u00a0wage as a high school student.<\/p>\n And then\u00a0in\u00a0one of\u00a0those sort of days\u00a0of just sort of wandering around this little museum,\u00a0I came across a\u00a0suitcase\u00a0and it was full of letters,\u00a0really old\u00a0letters,\u00a0still folded in the little way that they would have been sent in the 1700s.\u00a0Some of them still had little bits of wax on them. And there\u00a0was\u00a0about 20 or\u00a030\u00a0and they were all\u00a0letters from the town’s, from the town founder to his family back in Connecticut. And I was really\u00a0struck by these, obviously. A, just because they were so old. B, I could sit\u00a0down\u00a0and I could\u00a0read\u00a0them. And there\u00a0were\u00a0this tangible sort of connection with the deep roots of the community\u00a0where\u00a0I lived. And it was also a mystery. Who were all these people he was talking to?\u00a0What were their connections to him? And that was 25\u00a0years ago.\u00a0And that started me on this path of just the love of getting into the archives,\u00a0of\u00a0seeing\u00a0the original papers and documents and letters.<\/p>\n So that in general, but then the story of the Loyalists that left the American Revolution,\u00a0and\u00a0also\u00a0the War of 1812, and then the bigger picture of the British Empire in which\u00a0all\u00a0of\u00a0these things are situated.<\/p>\n And\u00a0so,\u00a0when I did my\u00a0undergrad, you know, you take, I took a lot of global history,\u00a0I took a lot of international\u00a0global history.\u00a0I took a lot of American history and British history across the board.\u00a0And then when I began my MA, my master’s in public history, I was really focused on at that point,\u00a0I wanted to be a museum\u00a0curator,\u00a0and I wanted to make history accessible to the public. And I wanted\u00a0them to really get as excited about it as I was. And\u00a0so,\u00a0my project during my MA, so when you do your\u00a0MA in public history, you do coursework and then you do either a cognate or an internship. And\u00a0so,\u00a0I\u00a0kind of did\u00a0both.\u00a0I worked as an intern for Professor Bill Turkel. And then I was writing\u00a0this big cognate\u00a0essentially on\u00a0this Loyalist that I had come across. His name was Joel\u00a0Stone,\u00a0he\u00a0was accredited as the founder of Gananoque. And\u00a0so\u00a0I made a website,\u00a0an online\u00a0exhibit, and\u00a0then did a museum exhibit back home. And so that’s\u00a0where\u00a0things\u00a0got started for me.<\/p>\n And then I\u00a0can’t\u00a0remember exactly how I got talked into doing the PhD,\u00a0because that was not really what I wanted to do.\u00a0I wanted to be a public\u00a0historian,\u00a0I wanted to be out in museums with\u00a0the people. And at any rate, I ended up back at Western.\u00a0And when I was doing my MA,\u00a0I’d\u00a0met Nancy Roden, who is\u00a0their\u00a018th century British Atlantic specialist. And\u00a0so\u00a0I came back to work with her on a PhD, but also\u00a0keeping a foot in the world of public history.\u00a0So,\u00a0I\u00a0kind of joke\u00a0that I did two PhDs. On the one\u00a0hand, I did my dissertation, which was on the Loyalists and their migrations. And then on the\u00a0other hand, I did all these extra research projects that\u00a0weren’t\u00a0really part of the PhD\u00a0on\u00a0AR, on\u00a0gaming. And\u00a0so,\u00a0kind of two threads there. And then when I finished my PhD, I did\u00a0a, as I mentioned earlier, I did a\u00a0postdoc with Kevin Key at\u00a0Brock, and\u00a0then got a job at Huron.<\/p>\n And\u00a0I’ve\u00a0been here ever since. But it’s actually kind of fun, because right now I’m working on\u00a0the\u00a0full length\u00a0biography of that Loyalist, Joel Stone, who I first\u00a0encountered\u00a0in the archives,\u00a0or in the\u00a0in the Gananoque Museum. So\u00a0that’s\u00a020 plus years on,\u00a0I’m\u00a0finally getting back\u00a0to\u00a0writing\u00a0his story properly.\u00a0And so\u00a0that’s\u00a0what\u00a0I’m,\u00a0that’s\u00a0what\u00a0I’m\u00a0working on,\u00a0right\u00a0now, in addition to the Loyalist Migrations Project.\u00a0And then\u00a0I’m\u00a0working on the full-length biography of the Loyalist and their\u00a0migrations\u00a0project.<\/p>\n [Madison]\u00a0<\/strong>So would you say you\u00a0kind of started\u00a0with a narrow focus on what you wanted to do,\u00a0and then it expanded out and then you\u00a0kind of found\u00a0yourself narrowing your study area back\u00a0down to that one Loyalist?<\/p>\n [Dr. Compeau]<\/strong>\u00a0I would say it kind\u00a0of,\u00a0it\u00a0stretches,\u00a0and it comes back.\u00a0So,\u00a0when I started the PhD, no one told me\u00a0I\u00a0couldn’t\u00a0do a biography for my\u00a0PhD,\u00a0it just\u00a0didn’t\u00a0seem like the right thing to do.\u00a0So\u00a0my\u00a0PhD dissertation, which became my first book, is more of a general discussion,\u00a0or a general history,\u00a0of the Loyalists.\u00a0And\u00a0then\u00a0now\u00a0I’m\u00a0kind of getting\u00a0back that\u00a0I’m\u00a0more established, I can write this\u00a0biography and have fun with it.\u00a0So,\u00a0in many senses,\u00a0I’ve\u00a0started\u00a0narrow, went expansive,\u00a0I’ve\u00a0narrowed\u00a0it back again.\u00a0And I think\u00a0that’s\u00a0how my career will go.<\/p>\n Because the other thing that\u00a0I’m\u00a0really\u00a0interested\u00a0in,\u00a0is\u00a0to be able to have these intimate stories\u00a0of\u00a0the individual\u00a0lives of families that are facing these incredible historical moments.\u00a0But\u00a0I’m\u00a0also really fascinated with the imperial structures, the way that empires move people\u00a0against their will, you know, as willing migrants, how empires\u00a0move stuff, commodities, how empires\u00a0move\u00a0disease and mail.<\/p>\n So,\u00a0these big networks fascinate me.\u00a0But I also love\u00a0the intimate\u00a0individual lives.\u00a0And\u00a0so\u00a0I find myself from project to project, sort of veering from one to the other.<\/p>\n [Madison]<\/strong>\u00a0When\u00a0you’re\u00a0doing research into an empire or into individuals’ lives that may have been\u00a0affected by this, and\u00a0it’s\u00a0potentially on a group that may not have many primary sources,\u00a0either because they were destroyed or not seen as valuable to keep, or an opposing force\u00a0just wanted to get rid of their history. How do you go about finding information?<\/p>\n [Dr. Compeau]<\/strong>\u00a0Oh, it really depends on the topic and the subject\u00a0we’re\u00a0talking about.<\/p>\n There’s\u00a0a couple\u00a0things. Now, I would suggest that historians that are\u00a0doing sort of 18th century work always have an ancestry\u00a0account,\u00a0you would not believe the little\u00a0clues that you can pick up by\u00a0looking at\u00a0family trees and by genealogies.\u00a0And\u00a0so,\u00a0I think in the world we live in now, in which genealogy is\u00a0such a big deal, and so many people are\u00a0working on it, that historians are, or should be.\u00a0I am\u00a0really grateful\u00a0for\u00a0all the work\u00a0that citizen\u00a0historians,\u00a0family historians are doing, because you never know the kinds\u00a0of little tidbits that\u00a0they’re\u00a0going to pull out that you can then follow\u00a0these clues.<\/p>\n I’ll\u00a0give you an example, though, of one\u00a0things\u00a0I’m\u00a0working on right now, which\u00a0I’m\u00a0quite\u00a0excited\u00a0about.\u00a0I’m\u00a0reconstructing a Tory plot, a loyalist plot in one corner of Connecticut.\u00a0This was something that the people involved were deliberately trying to keep secret.\u00a0They did not want this information to come out, but we know it happened because of a\u00a0letter that was\u00a0submitted\u00a0to the British government in 1784 that is\u00a0basically a\u00a0testimony saying,\u00a0yeah, Joel Stone, this character\u00a0I’m\u00a0looking at, he helped me escape from jail. And\u00a0so\u00a0this<\/p>\n This\u00a0guy who was being held in, well, he\u00a0wasn’t\u00a0in jail, he was in some guy’s house, but he was\u00a0essentially imprisoned. And his name was David Matthews, and he was the mayor of New York.\u00a0And\u00a0we\u00a0don’t know really what he was up to.\u00a0It’s\u00a0a big mystery. He was either part of a plot to try\u00a0and kill George Washington, or to try and kidnap George Washington in 1776. Either way, it was bad.<\/p>\n And\u00a0so\u00a0the guy\u00a0I’m\u00a0studying, he has a letter in his file in the British government records that say\u00a0he helped this guy escape, and therefore he is worthy of compensation and reward by the British\u00a0state.\u00a0But how did this actually play out?\u00a0How did he do\u00a0what\u00a0is\u00a0sort of confirmed\u00a0in this letter\u00a0that he did? And\u00a0so\u00a0I’m\u00a0gathering up all the letters that sort of passed at this time, and then\u00a0finding newspaper,\u00a0little tiny\u00a0snippets, David Matthews has arrived back in town after six months\u00a0in imprisonment. And\u00a0that’s\u00a0on December 3, 1776. And sort of,\u00a0first of all,\u00a0trying from\u00a0these\u00a0little teeny\u00a0tiny clues, rebuilding the chronology, and then\u00a0to look\u00a0at little clues in their letters.<\/p>\n So\u00a0this is giving a little bit away from the book. But at one point, you can see that the mayor\u00a0is complaining that he has no winter clothes,\u00a0it’s\u00a0going to get cold here, I need to talk to\u00a0a merchant, I need to talk to a local merchant to give me clothes. Well, Joel Stone was\u00a0the\u00a0local\u00a0merchant. And\u00a0so,\u00a0you begin to start seeing, okay, I get now how they are finding ways to\u00a0communicate\u00a0with each other. Is it 100% sure? No. Is it plausible? Possible? It seems that\u00a0way. And\u00a0little tiny\u00a0clues like that, that you can then use to build a bigger\u00a0picture to build a better picture of a plausible picture of how this\u00a0came\u00a0out, because\u00a0we’ll\u00a0never know for sure. But\u00a0it’s\u00a0a lot of fun to try and piece together these\u00a0clues.<\/p>\n Finding the small clues, I think, and even the idea that\u00a0they’re\u00a0perhaps fit into it, I think,\u00a0would just make it worth it, because I think\u00a0it’d\u00a0be so satisfying to even be able to say that you\u00a0have a somewhat,\u00a0maybe kind of clearer,\u00a0picture of it.\u00a0So,\u00a0a large focus of this podcast is to help\u00a0undergraduate students learn about the research and interests of faculty members\u00a0and also\u00a0the\u00a0various potential relationships between faculty research, and independent undergraduate research\u00a0and learning.<\/p>\n [Madison]\u00a0<\/strong>Can you share some of your thoughts on what impact extracurricular research can have\u00a0during your\u00a0undergrad?<\/p>\n [Dr. Compeau]\u00a0<\/strong>Well, it could be huge. Because\u00a0it’s\u00a0an opportunity to do research that\u00a0you’re\u00a0not getting marked for. And some students might hear that and be like, well, why would I\u00a0bother?\u00a0Right?<\/p>\n [Madison]<\/strong>\u00a0Right.<\/p>\n [Dr. Compeau]\u00a0<\/strong>But it is an opportunity to do research in a kind of pure way, right?\u00a0You’re\u00a0not doing it to\u00a0please\u00a0anybody.\u00a0You’re\u00a0doing it to produce research that is intended for some audience.\u00a0It\u00a0doesn’t\u00a0just stop with the professor. It\u00a0doesn’t\u00a0disappear at the end of the course.\u00a0You can always point to an exhibit or a publication or a website or something like\u00a0that and say, look, there is my work.\u00a0That’s\u00a0what I did. And\u00a0it’s\u00a0part of the historical record now. And\u00a0you’ve\u00a0contributed to that.<\/p>\n So,\u00a0I think that\u00a0is an amazing opportunity. And in the history department,\u00a0we’re\u00a0very fortunate.\u00a0Nina Reid-Maroney has her Phantoms of the Past projects that\u00a0she’s\u00a0worked on.\u00a0And\u00a0she’s\u00a0been able to\u00a0hire on\u00a0many student researchers to help her with her work.\u00a0I know Professor Peace, the same with his indigenous research and hidden histories. And then\u00a0every year since 2019,\u00a0I’ve\u00a0been fortunate to be able to\u00a0hire on\u00a0an RA every summer to work on\u00a0Loyalist Migrations.<\/p>\n But Huron in general also has CURL, which\u00a0I’m\u00a0sure\u00a0you’ve\u00a0talked about on this\u00a0podcast before. And\u00a0I’ve\u00a0supervised CURL students. And\u00a0that’s\u00a0going to be,\u00a0that’s\u00a0a lot of fun.\u00a0And I had a student a few years ago\u00a0work\u00a0as an embedded researcher in\u00a0a kind of an\u00a0old-timey\u00a0anthropology way.\u00a0So,\u00a0I think\u00a0that’s\u00a0a great opportunity.\u00a0And I think\u00a0that’s\u00a0a great opportunity\u00a0with historical reenactors and finding out why they do what they do, how they do it,\u00a0the\u00a0value of it for public education and for their own sort of edification as hobbyists.<\/p>\n And\u00a0yeah,\u00a0the extracurricular\u00a0research is something that I never had an opportunity to do\u00a0until I got to\u00a0grad\u00a0school. And then I took advantage of it.\u00a0And it was really enriching\u00a0as a scholar for its own sake.\u00a0But then\u00a0it’s\u00a0also\u00a0great for\u00a0when\u00a0you’re\u00a0applying to jobs,\u00a0when\u00a0you’re\u00a0out in the market, and you can point to these things and say, “Look, I’ve done all this\u00a0work, not just in class, but I’ve actually applied what I’ve learned in class to real research.”<\/p>\n [Madison]<\/strong>\u00a0So,\u00a0if a\u00a0student’s\u00a0interested in pursuing history for their\u00a0undergrad, what are the specific\u00a0challenges they should be aware of, either with\u00a0the extracurricular\u00a0research or just, I guess, in\u00a0general\u00a0learning how to do stuff like a historian, for example?<\/p>\n [Dr. Compeau]\u00a0<\/strong>Well, I think the challenges for doing a history\u00a0undergrad\u00a0are the same\u00a0for any undergraduate degree, I suppose.\u00a0It’s\u00a0about managing your time.\u00a0It’s\u00a0about\u00a0making sure you apply yourself, listening to feedback and growing from that.\u00a0I think history can be tricky for some students because it is so open-ended.<\/p>\n My colleague, Tom Peace, refers to history, and I think\u00a0he’s\u00a0right, as\u00a0the interdisciplinary\u00a0discipline.\u00a0And\u00a0so,\u00a0if you are a psychology major and\u00a0you’re\u00a0doing a history minor,\u00a0you’re\u00a0doing a history\u00a0course, most of myself and most of my colleagues, we would encourage you to\u00a0sort of use\u00a0that lens of\u00a0psychology, the methodologies that you might have there, and bring them to the table. What can\u00a0psychology add to the study of history? What can\u00a0economics\u00a0or anything?<\/p>\n And then so as a historian,\u00a0too, one of the\u00a0tricky things, one of the hard things is\u00a0what’s\u00a0your approach?\u00a0We’re\u00a0all empiricists.\u00a0We’re\u00a0all\u00a0using\u00a0the evidence that we find in the\u00a0archives, but\u00a0how are we going to interpret it? And so that\u00a0open-endedness can be tricky.\u00a0And then history\u00a0isn’t\u00a0for everybody because it is so big, and you\u00a0have to\u00a0have the ability to take in a lot of information and be able to process it and to make\u00a0it\u00a0coherent.\u00a0And that requires a kind of diligence, but also curiosity.\u00a0So,\u00a0all of\u00a0those things\u00a0are\u00a0opportunities for students who have those qualities in history, but they can be challenging too.<\/p>\n [Madison]\u00a0<\/strong>What’s\u00a0some advice you would share with a student about how to manage their time\u00a0when\u00a0they’ve\u00a0got all these projects and assignments on the go?<\/p>\n [Dr. Compeau]<\/strong>\u00a0Well,\u00a0yeah, time management is something I wish\u00a0I\u00a0knew\u00a0how to do better.\u00a0I’m\u00a0always racing towards deadlines. And I think that’s part of the life of a\u00a0historian.\u00a0But basically, just\u00a0keep a calendar, keep a\u00a0schedule\u00a0and stick to it. But in terms of\u00a0the extracurricular\u00a0research, talk\u00a0to your supervisor, students who work for me.<\/p>\n Um, you know, your courses do come first, right? You do want to get those good grades.\u00a0And so,\u00a0if\u00a0there’s\u00a0a conflict with something that I might want a student to be working on and their final\u00a0exam, the final exam is going to win. But I need to know about that.\u00a0So,\u00a0a good\u00a0communication\u00a0with\u00a0your\u00a0supervisor is\u00a0probably\u00a0number\u00a0one\u00a0in order to\u00a0maintain\u00a0the balance.<\/p>\n [Madison]<\/strong>\u00a0I think with communication, you\u00a0can almost\u00a0solve\u00a0almost anything, to be honest, when it comes to\u00a0coursework.<\/p>\n [Dr. Compeau]<\/strong>\u00a0Absolutely.<\/p>\n [Madison]\u00a0<\/strong>So,\u00a0moving into something, I guess, a bit more casual, we have some\u00a0rapid\u00a0fire\u00a0questions\u00a0for\u00a0students\u00a0to\u00a0get to know you better as a person. This is\u00a0a very important\u00a0one. Okay.\u00a0What’s\u00a0your favorite animal?<\/p>\n [Dr. Compeau]<\/strong>\u00a0I like big cats, snow leopards, tigers, lions, all that stuff.<\/p>\n [Madison]<\/strong>\u00a0Very cool. What do you do when\u00a0you’re\u00a0not preoccupied with history?<\/p>\n [Dr. Compeau]<\/strong>\u00a0It’s\u00a0my life.\u00a0I’ll\u00a0watch history documentaries. I like historical fiction. I do. To\u00a0really,\u00a0wind down, I will cook something elaborate,\u00a0a curry, something like that, and stare at the\u00a0window.<\/p>\n [Madison]<\/strong>\u00a0I guess\u00a0that’s\u00a0a way\u00a0to wind down.<\/p>\n [Dr. Compeau]<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah<\/p>\n [Madison]\u00a0<\/strong>What’s\u00a0your favorite kind of weather?<\/p>\n [Dr. Compeau]<\/strong>\u00a0Weather? I like a good, crisp fall day.<\/p>\n [Madison]<\/strong>\u00a0I agree.\u00a0Today is great, minus a bit of\u00a0the rain,\u00a0I think.<\/p>\n Are there any subjects you want to learn more about outside of history,\u00a0if\u00a0that’s\u00a0even possible, I guess? Because if\u00a0you’re\u00a0viewing it from a historical angle,\u00a0you’d\u00a0probably also\u00a0think about history in general, too.<\/p>\n [Dr. Compeau]\u00a0<\/strong>Yeah. Topics outside of history,\u00a0I’ve\u00a0always been\u00a0fascinated. Well, that’s\u00a0kind of a\u00a0cop-out. I was\u00a0going to say anthropology, but\u00a0that’s\u00a0so close that\u00a0I’m\u00a0not going to… There was a time when\u00a0I wanted to be an archaeologist.\u00a0So,\u00a0all that kind of stuff, the science side of studying the past,\u00a0I love.<\/p>\n I wish I knew more about music, and I have always struggled with languages. I took a bit of\u00a0French when I went to my\u00a0undergrad, because to get a PhD, you\u00a0have to\u00a0be able to\u00a0get by in a second language. However, in the decades since I got the PhD,\u00a0I’ve\u00a0not really\u00a0spoken French or practiced French. And\u00a0so,\u00a0I finally started to look at that again and\u00a0regain my footing in French.<\/p>\n [Madison]\u00a0<\/strong>I relate to you on the language aspect. I took German.<\/p>\n [Dr. Compeau]\u00a0<\/strong>Oh, really?<\/p>\n [Madison]\u00a0<\/strong>And\u00a0it was quite a daunting task, and\u00a0I’ve\u00a0managed to pass\u00a0with a\u00a050 in the exam, I think.<\/p>\n [Dr. Compeau]\u00a0<\/strong>Yeah.\u00a0I think I\u00a0did Latin in my first year, which\u00a0are\u00a0very similar, in some ways. And I\u00a0didn’t\u00a0do that well.<\/p>\n [Madison]<\/strong>\u00a0It’s\u00a0pretty hard\u00a0to do everything, I think, in a language, because\u00a0that’s\u00a0just such a different\u00a0part of your brain, I think, that\u00a0it’s\u00a0just so hard to, I think, grasp sometimes, for me at least.<\/p>\n [Dr. Compeau]<\/strong>\u00a0And you\u00a0can’t,\u00a0yeah, you\u00a0can’t\u00a0fudge it.<\/p>\n [Madison]<\/strong>\u00a0You either know\u00a0it\u00a0or you\u00a0don’t.<\/p>\n Well, thank you so much for joining us today. It’s been great to talk to you and learn more about your research.<\/p>\n And finally, do you have any words of wisdom or just general advice\u00a0for undergraduate students, anything you want to close out with or say to them?<\/p>\n [Dr. Compeau]\u00a0<\/strong>Well, thanks for having me. This has been great.<\/p>\n In terms of\u00a0advice, I think\u00a0let’s\u00a0go back to that communication. Talk to your\u00a0professors,\u00a0ask them questions. In terms\u00a0of, you know,\u00a0finding opportunities to do research outside of class,\u00a0the only way\u00a0you’re\u00a0going to do that is to speak to your professors and find out\u00a0what’s\u00a0coming and\u00a0what\u00a0opportunities\u00a0they have\u00a0available.\u00a0And so,\u00a0yeah, that would be my number one thing is\u00a0communicate, talk, and\u00a0keep in touch.<\/p>\n [Madison]<\/strong>\u00a0I agree. Again, thank you so much for joining us.<\/p>\n [Dr. Compeau]<\/strong>\u00a0Thank you.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_accordion_item][\/et_pb_accordion][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][et_pb_row column_structure=”2_3,1_3″ _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_column type=”2_3″ _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Welcome back to the Office Hours podcast!<\/p>\n In our first episode of season two, Madison welcomed Dr. Tim Compeau to discuss his lifelong fascination with history and the many projects he has worked on throughout his career. Dr. Compeau shares how his love of history began at a young age and grew as he experienced the wonder of close encounters with historical artifacts as a young adult working at his local museum. His experiences led to a career researching revolutions, Upper Canada, cultural, military, and global history, and public and social memory.<\/p>\n Notably, Dr. Compeau shares some important insights into the value of\u00a0 extracurricular research for undergraduate students:<\/p>\n \u201c…it is an opportunity to do research in a kind of pure way, right? You’re not doing it to please anybody. You’re doing it to produce research that is intended for some audience. It doesn’t just stop with the professor. It doesn’t disappear at the end of the course. You can always point to an exhibit or a publication or a website or something like that and say, look, there is my work. That’s what I did. And it’s part of the historical record now. And you’ve contributed to that.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n Join Madison and Dr. Compeau to hear more about the fascinating projects that Dr. Compeau has worked on including creating immersive historical experiences through AR, research on Loyalists of the American Revolution, and advice for any students interested in diving into more historical research.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”1_3″ _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_image src=”http:\/\/www.huronresearch.ca\/officehours\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/125\/2025\/12\/Tim-Portrait.jpg” alt=”Portrait of Dr. Tim Compeau” title_text=”Tim Portrait” _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_image][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][et_pb_row _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″ _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Centre for Undergraduate Research and Learning<\/a><\/p>\n Professor Tim Compeau\u2019s “Loyalist Migrations” project<\/a><\/p>\n Professor Nina Reid-Maroney’s \u201cPhantoms of the Past\u201d project.<\/a><\/p>\n Dishonored Americans: The Political Death of Loyalists in Revolutionary America<\/a> by Tim Compeau<\/p>\n\n
Projects and Resources Mentioned in this Episode<\/h4>\n