Downtown West Chester

National History Day

The Annual Southeast Regional National History Day competition, sponsored by the West Chester BID, brought hundreds of middle and high-school students, their families, and volunteers to downtown West Chester for an eventful weekend on Friday, March 24th and Saturday, March 25th, 2017. Thank you to everyone who volunteered their time!

 CONGRATULATIONS TO THE 2017 NATIONAL HISTORY DAY WINNERS!

Junior Individual Documentary

First Place: Henry Wandover (Phoenixville Area Middle School)
Heroes of the Forest: How the Bielski Partisans Stood Up to the Nazis and Saved 1,200 Jews

Second Place: Lauren Karpyn (Strath Haven Middle School)
"My Ambition is Prevalent": The Defiant Stand of Young Alexander Hamilton

Second Place (tie): Rory Harper (Radnor Middle School)
The Story of Dred Scott: How Dred Scott Took a Stand Against Slavery and Helped Shape America Into What It Is Today

Junior Group Documentary

First Place: Hannah Guan, Julia Martin, and Rachel Andiario (Fugett Middle School)
Charles de Gaulle and the French Resistance 

Second Place: Elizabeth Guan and Joshua Cuozzo (Fugett Middle School)
Taking a Stand Against Injustice: Thoreau's Concept of Civil Disobedience

Third Place: Evan Gattoni, Tyler Coccia, Ryan Cogill, Jackson Allen, and Michael Cichanowsky (Fugett Middle School)
Winston Churchill

Honorable Mention: Neya Anand and Janie McRae (Radnor Middle School)
Deborah Lipstadt: Taking a Stand Against Holocaust Denial

Junior Individual Exhibit

First Place: Brendan Hung (Radnor Middle School)
Mary Beth Tinker: The Voice Behind Student Free Speech

Second Place: Jesse Conen (Radnor Middle School)
Ruby Bridges: Taking a Stand for All Students

Third Place: Chloe Hannum (Radnor Middle School)
Katherine Switzer: Marathon Woman

Honorable Mention: Carina Vale (Radnor Middle School)
Sojourner Truth: An Advocate

Honorable Mention: Bryn O'Hara (Academy of Notre Dame)
AIDS: The Ryan White Story

Honorable Mention: Annalise Devito (Fugett Middle School)
Malala

Junior Group Exhibit

First Place: Owen Rokke and Joseph Sheridan (St. Agnes School)
Elie Wiesel: A Shining Light in the Night

Second Place: Juliana Bryant and Uzma Khan (Radnor Middle School)
Mahatma Gandhi

Third Place: Elizabeth Kunz and Amanda Wildauer (Phoenixville Area Middle School)
Ida B. Wells: Powerhouse with a Pen

Honorable Mention: Elodie Prigent and Sepideh Toshtzar (Paxon Hollow Middle School)
The White Rose's Stance Against Hitler

Honorable Mention: Kellen Narke and Hudson Narke (Phoenixville Area Middle School)
John Muir's Stand for Nature

Honorable Mention: AJ Dilks and Cian McCrory (St. Norbert)
Witold versus War

Junior Individual Performance

First Place: Gabrielle Palmer (St. Norbert)
Josephine Baker: Singer Spy and Actress Activist

Second Place: Aleni Voskeridjian (Radnor Middle School)
Stonewall: A Clash of Psychiatric Ethics and American Egalitarianism

Third Place: Bailey Cavallaro (St. Norbert)
Newsboys Stop the World: The Newsboys Strike of 1899

Junior Group Performance

First Place: Megan Elguicze and Olivia Hoffman (St. Norbert)
Irena Sendler: Selfless Savior to the Helpless

Second Place: Marguerite Gruelich, Victoria Brady, Mahima Chacko, and Nicole Huff (Fugett Middle School)
Risk-Taker, Right Maker: Susan B. Anthony

Third Place: Christine Paski, Christine Fair, and Ashlynn Massimiano (St. Norbert)
Dorothy Day: A Deliberate Catholic Worker

Junior Individual Paper

First Place: Ari Jones-Davidis (Radnor Middle School)
Escalating Fear Through Falsehood: Joseph McCarthy's Stand Against Communism in America

Second Place: Gabrielle Becker (Fugett Middle School)
The Unsung Holocaust Hero: Raoul Wallenberg

Third Place: Shane Briggs (Fugett Middle School)
Galileo: "Eppur si muove - And yet it moves"
 
Honorable Mention: Ian Martin (Fugett Middle School)
The Story Behind the Creation of the National Park Service

Junior Individual Website

First Place: Anya Chan (Radnor Middle School)
The Age of Lynching: Ida B. Wells

Second Place: Sishil Namana (Radnor Middle School)
William Lloyd Garrison and the Liberator: Taking a Stand Against Slavery

Third Place: Margaret Atkins (Academy of Notre Dame)
Hernando De Soto: An Economic Answer to Terrorism
 
Honorable Mention: Leo Sereni (Phoenixville Area Middle School)
How the Residents of Warsaw Took a Stand Against the Nazis - and Almost Won

Junior Group Website

First Place: Justin Nourian and Margaret Davis (Radnor Middle School)
Elizabeth Blackwell: A Pioneer in the Medical Field

Second Place: Alexandra Plaisted, Natalie Manes, Megan Merten, and Charlotte Little (Fugett Middle School)
Taking a Stand Against Slavery: John Brown

Third Place: Michaela Schiele, Jessica Gomez, and Gretchen Smeins (Fugett Middle School)
Eleanor Roosevelt: The Face of Equality

Honorable Mention: Claire Chaplin and Honor Henry (Academy of Notre Dame)
The Married Women's Property Acts of 1870 and 1882 

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Senior Individual Documentary

First Place: Rachel Holt (Upper Darby High School)
A Question of Ethics: The Black Panther Party’s Legacy of Fighting for the Rights of Black Americans

Second Place: Mathew Iozzi (West Chester East High School)
The Media Files: Taking a Stand for the First Amendment

Third Place: Zoe Allen (West Chester East High School)
Jury Nullification and the Camden 28

Senior Group Documentary

First Place: Alexa Gallo, Ally Long, and Lyndsey Della Vechia (Penncrest High School)
Alice Paul: Paving the Way to Equality

Second Place: Lia Fourakis, Marie Fourakis, Abhirami Suresh, and Kenneth Boggess (West Chester East High School)
The One Child Policy: The Unprecedented Effects of China’s Stand

Third Place: Lauren Gaetano and Kathryn Biedermann (Academy of Notre Dame)
Buck v. Bell: The Eugenics Movement Takes the Stand

Honorable Mention: Amanda Reed and Taylor Brekus (Marple Newtown High School)
Rosa Parks: Sitting Down to Take a Stand

Senior Individual Exhibit

First Place: Anna Trantas (Marple Newtown High School)
Harriet Tubman and the Underground Railroad

Second Place: Anna-Colette Haynes (Sun Valley High School)
The Making of an Impression

Third Place: Tony Cutrara (The Concept School)
Martin Luther: The Father of the Reformation

Honorable Mention: Jane Marquis (The Concept School)
The Continental Army’s Forge Through Valley Forge

Senior Group Exhibit

First Place: Reeti Patnaik and Sarah Chang (Penncrest High School)
Indira Gandhi: Standing for the Rights

Second Place: Evan Rosenberg and Jacob Cieseilski (Penncrest High School)
A. Philip Randolph

Third Place: Quinn Norris and Caroline Grimm (Academy of Notre Dame)
The Stonewall Riots

Senior Individual Performance

First Place: Rose McDonald (Academy of Notre Dame)
Taking a Stand: The Constitutional Convention

Second Place: Connor Wells (Conestoga High School)
1848: The Year of Taking a Stand

Senior Group Performance

First Place: Juliet McAlee, Angelina Ziarno-Shrum, Juliana Schiano, and Ellie Sedor (Conestoga High School)
The Newsboys Strike of 1899

Second Place: Sarah Woods, Catherine Heffernan, Charlotte Kalilec, Claire Young, and Celine Huang (Conestoga High School)
Joan of Arc

Third Place: Gabrielle Greco, Emma Speck, Catherine Vivo, and Evelyn Shetzline (Upper Darby High School)
Del Martin and Phyllis Lyon: Combatting Oppression

Senior Individual Paper

First Place: Emma Tierney (Conestoga High School)
A Woman Rebel: Margaret Sanger’s Stand for Birth Control

Second Place: Arya Vandayar (Garnet Valley High School)
Indira Gandhi “Taking a Stand in Feminism”

Third Place: Ryan Andrews (Upper Darby High School)
Franklin Delano Roosevelt: Taking a Stand Against the Courts to Establish Workers’ Rights

Senior Individual Website

First Place: Gwendolyn Pohlmann (Academy of Notre Dame)
The Hellcat Who Defended Birds: How Rosalie Edge Reformed and Revolutionized 20th Century Conservation

Second Place: Ian Ong (Conestoga High School)
Oskar Schindler: From Profiteer to Protector

Third Place: Emmeline Lignowski (Academy of Notre Dame)
Dr. Mildred Fay Jefferson

Honorable Mention: Sofia Suero (Academy of Notre Dame)
Painting History

Senior Group Website

First Place: Sanketh Raju and Joseph Delaney (West Chester East High School)
Giuseppe Garibaldi: Father of a Unified Italy

Second Place: Andrew Li and Xavier Zhang (Garnet Valley High School)
Japanese Westernization

Third Place: Jakob Gibson, Ian Hauck, and Cole Robinson (Marple Newtown High School)
Lenin and the Rise of Bolshevism

• National History Day

• Regional NHD Topics

• FAQs Contest Rules

• About Primary Sources

• NHD Calendar

PARKING
Your best option for parking in downtown West Chester is the long-term parking at the Chestnut Street Parking Garage, Chestnut & Walnut Streets, across from the Chester County Historical Society. Park as long as you want and have no fear of getting an overtime parking ticket. Parking is free at the meters on Saturday until 5pm. Go to the Parking Tab for details. Download the updated downtown parking map (PDF).

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While visiting West Chester, explore the downtown with its outstanding historical structures dating back to the colonial period. Browse at the many shops and dine in the restaurants.

• Directory of shops at DowntownWestChester.com/shopping

• Directory of restaurants at DowntownWestChester.com/restaurants

The West Chester Business Improvement District is a proud sponsor of National History Day which believes student interpretation of our rights and responsibilities will lead to a better understanding of our place in history. Contact Malcolm Johnstone at 610-738-3350 with any questions.