Jane Addams Hull-House Museum and Chicago Public Libraries partnered for “City of Stories”, a CPL Summer Learning Initiative. This partnership allowed CPL and JAHHM to share information, activities, and programs with library staff across eighty branches and tens-of-thousands of library visitors throughout Chicago’s neighborhoods.

JAHHM enhanced CPL's free drop-in programs with activities grounded in the social reform history and storytelling activities of Hull-House; this included bookbinding, zine making, art making, improvisation, and theater arts. The activities reveal collective and neighborhood stories and help everyone—children, teens, and adults—share their voices. Elements of “City of Stories” included professional development workshops led by Chicago-based artists (Regin Igloria, Aram Han Sifuentes, and improviser Mo Phillips-Spotts), programs led by librarians, JAHHM educational resources and materials, books recently awarded the Jane Addams Peace Association Book Award, and other books based on the theme “City of Stories.” Jane Addams herself believed everyone had a story to tell and public institutions could harness those voices for the common good.

UIC Press Release

Chicago Public Library events inspired by Hull-House Story-Making Workshops

Featured Activities

The following activities were featured throughout CPL locations over the course of the summer. These activities were designed by Chicago artists, activists, and educators, along with JAHHM educators, and were implemented by CPL staff for library patrons to participate in and enjoy. If you’d like to try these activities out at home, we’ve included PDFs of JAHHM activity guides that describe the activities and their importance to Hull-House history, as well as how relevant and important these activities still are when telling our own stories today.

• Identity and Story-making Through Ceramics

  This activity allowed youth to express themselves and explore their identities by learning about the history of the Hull-House Kilns and how young people like them used pottery as a form of self expression nearly a century ago. Participants learned about the history of immigrants who worked in the kilns and how they became famous for embracing their culture through pottery. Participants were asked to reflect on their own identities and culture such as family history, traditions, and symbolism in order to reflect that through painting their pots like artists at the Hull-House kilns.

  • Hull-House Museum Activity Packet: Pots, Clay, Identity: Painting Pinch Pots. Expressing identity through clay - no kiln necessary! The Hull-House Kilns (1925-1935) provided a space for highly skilled Mexican immigrants to make ceramics and earn proceeds from the sale of their creations. This packet includes step-by-step instructions for making and decorating clay pots, along with prompting questions about identity and heritage. 

• Story-making Through Community Binding

  This activity introduced participants to beginners’ bookbinding techniques that allowed for a variety of interpretations of the book form. Single-sheet folds and pamphlet stitching were taught as initial methods for recording narratives/stories, and participants came away with technical options to explore how stories can be shared through multiples, distribution, and sharing of work.

  • Hull-House Museum Activity Packet: Public Health Zines. How can art help us talk about problems in our communities? Hull-House Residents made countless strides toward public health reform in Chicago’s 19th Ward, from establishing the city’s first public baths to introducing the first child labor legislation in the state. Using this guide, create and illustrate a zine around a public health issue in your own community.

• Theater Games, Community and Connection

  This activity will demonstrate improv, theater, and group play techniques, first developed from folk and children’s games at Hull-House. The games can be played in small groups and are particularly effective with children, but can be used with mixed age groups and adults.

  • Hull-House Museum Activity Packet: Theater Games for your Classroom: Origins of improv and Community Theater at Hull-House:  Engage with Hull-House’s rich history of theater arts, innovated by Progressive Educators Viola Spolin and Neva Boyd, and explore improvisation exercises as a device for storytelling and collaboration in your classroom.

Meet our Story-Maker Collaborators

Aram Han Sifuentes (she/her/hers, they/them/theirs) is a fiber and social practice artist, writer, and educator who works to center immigrant and disenfranchised communities. Her work often revolves around skill sharing, specifically sewing techniques, to create multiethnic and intergenerational sewing circles, which become a place for empowerment, subversion, and protest. Han Sifuentes earned her B.A. in Art and Latin American Studies from the University of California, Berkeley, and her M.F.A. in Fiber and Material Studies from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She is an associate professor, adjunct at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. 

In addition to workshops and events, CPL and Hull-House offered take-home activities:

• Activity Guide

  Activity guides are still available at Hull-House and in many CPL locations! The activity guide is a booklet of activities that encourages youth to write about their own lives in order to learn about themselves and the world around them. It includes short biographies of important social reformers from Chicago’s history and activities involving drawing, writing, and dance! The activity guide also includes activities involving drawing, writing, and dancing.

• Grab and Go Kits

  CPL locations offered grab and go kits based off of Hull-House programs. The most commonly offered kits were beginner bookbinding materials.