On March 3, 2019, Contingent published its first piece: Keri Leigh Merritt’s haunting photographic feature, “War Happens in Dark Places, Too.” The piece kicked off an exciting month, which included shorts about circus performers during the Third Reich, a comic about the making of museum exhibits, and a photo essay about the gift shop found at the Louisiana State Penitentiary. We threw ourselves into that first month’s issue, and subsequent issues. We aimed to grab readers’ attention and make it clear that we’re different. We knew our first month would set the tone for who we were, and who we were meant to be. Looking back at our first six months, I could not be prouder of what we have built together.
Contingent did not materialize out of thin air in March. In the fall of 2018, over many Skype chats, Erin, Bill, Emily, and I brainstormed what our then-untitled history magazine would look like and whom it would speak to. In early January 2019, we announced what we had been working on: Contingent. We identified the audiences we sought to engage and the types of writers we would publish. For all our planning and grand designs, it rested entirely on having support—financial or otherwise—and getting it fast. We needed people, and a lot of people, to believe in our project and trust us that we had a long-term vision for Contingent.
When we opened for donations and articles pitches, we gained a better sense of how much hunger and excitement there was for Contingent. We received dozens of pitches, enough for six month’s worth of articles. It was tough to say no to some, but we found authors willing to wait for their piece to run at a later time or refashion it as a short instead of a feature.
Regarding donations, we decided early on not to be affiliated with a university or archive, or to seek support from an interested venture capitalist. Instead, Contingent runs on donations and donors of all types. Our regular supporters include adjunct instructors, high school teachers, and graduate students, as well as many non-academics who simply love history and enjoy reading about the past. When donations first came in, donors would leave messages of support and it warmed our hearts to see people write, “This is a very worthy endeavor, and I am proud to lend my support” or “This is a wonderful idea” and the especially touching, “My husband’s on furlough but this is too important not to support. Wish I could do more.” Reading comments like those gave us the strength whenever we doubted ourselves. Contingent was no longer just about us or what it meant to us.
As March’s articles debuted and found receptive audiences, we pressed forward. Behind the scenes, we were editing April’s articles and approving pieces for May. The first contributors needed to be paid and the month’s books needed balancing. There were board and editorial meetings to schedule and work needed on our 501(c)(3) tax-exempt status application. This happened on two continents, in three time zones, by three people with the same amount of free time many of us have (none), but our passion drove us. Many of these tasks we were doing for the first time, slowly feeling our ways through them, but we managed. Before we knew it April had come and gone and then we reached summer.
From June to August, we experimented with different publishing formats, like our first roundtable where six historians offered short essays about Forrest Gump’s legacy 25 years after its initial theatrical release. Contingent published a photo collage assembled from trash about the experience of leaving academia during a hurricane. We published some of our strongest features, ones in deep conversation with contemporary issues like the plight of refugees or the dismantling of affordable and high equality higher education.
Brendan O’Malley’s June feature, “The Closure,” remains not just one of our most engaging and thoughtful articles, but one of the proudest pieces I have had the pleasure to help edit. I’m grateful we exist so we can publish features like Brendan’s. Before he started writing, Brendan reached out and asked if we could speak via Skype. No other author had asked to speak with me and I was curious to hear what he wanted to talk about. I am glad I said yes because nearly four months later, it remains one of the more meaningful and important conversations I’ve had with someone about the challenges and anxieties academics have about the state of the humanities, really education in general.
Talking with Brendan, and learning what his feature would explore, gave me a glimpse into what it feels like when you learn your college is closing. How do you cope and comfort your students who like you, now fear the worst? So many teachers tirelessly work to make each semester meaningful and memorable, but we know there is another one just around the corner. What does not work this semester will be dropped next time around and replaced with something better. But what happens when there is not another semester? Articles like Brendan’s are what we are trying to do at Contingent—peel back the layers and show there is so much more going on below the surface.
With every month, it gets a little easier to publish a full schedule of Contingent articles. The crew here is better at managing multiple tasks and seeing our publication schedule not in individual months, but in blocks. We have our fall publishing schedule planned and are about to announce a fun call for papers for December. Over the next few months, we aim to not just continue publishing features, short, reviews, and field trips, but also roll out new series as well as a sequel to our summer postcard series. We are looking to do more with visual media and recruit illustrators to help tell stories. Over time we want to experiment with video and even debut a short film. We are confident planning for an ambitious future because of the support you have given us. The trust and support you have given us sustains us when we’re struggling to edit a piece or navigating complicated and unfamiliar federal tax forms.
In my original Contingent story, right before our March 3 launch, I wrote that we were betting that “a different approach to historical scholarship would have an audience.” After six months, that bet is paying off. The writers we’ve meet, the stories we’ve told, and the responses we’ve received confirm we are doing something different and it is making a difference. I am excited for the next six months of Contingent articles and the six after that and so on and so on. We have built something incredible together and we cannot not wait to show you what’s next.
