Torren Gatson holds a bachelor's degree in history and master's degree in American history (public history focus) from North Carolina Central University. He holds a Ph.D. in Public History from Middle Tennessee State University. His research interest include U.S. Southern history, specializing in 19th- and 20th-century African American built environments, the practice and pedagody of museum studies, material culture and historic preservation. A dedicated historic preservationist, he collaborates with communities to create public-facing projects that confront and illuminate the complexities of African American history.

His work has appeared in leading academic journals including The Journal of Southern History, The Southern Quarterly, and The North Carolina Historical Review. He is the author of Fighting for Freedom: Black Craftspeople and the Pursuit of Independence (UNC Press, 2025), and a contributor to Teaching Public History (UNC Press, 2023) and Fashioning America: Grit to Glamor (University of Arkansas Press, 2022).

Gatson is Co-Director of the Black Craftspeople Digital Archive, the premier resource on Black artisans in America, which has documented over 10,000 individuals nationwide. His nationally recognized exhibition, Fighting for Freedom, debuted at the DAR Museum and is traveling to six institutions across the country. He serves on several boards in the fields of material culture and history, including the Winterthur Portfolio Editorial Board, Old Salem Museums & Gardens, Historic Magnolia House, the Decorative Arts Trust, and People Not Property. 

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Books

Gatson, Torren. We Built This: The Legacies of Black Builders in the Old North State. (Advanced contract, UNC Press), expected 2026.

Edited by Gatson, Torren, Tiffany Momon and William Strollo. Fighting for Freedom: Black Craftspeople and the Pursuit of Independence. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2025.

Book Chapters

Gatson, Torren and Tiffany Momon, “The Power of Black Hands: Honoring Black Craftspeople of the Southern Landscape,” in Georgia in Our Times: Modern Design and Contemporary Lens: The 11th Henry D. Green Symposium of the Decorative Arts, Edited by Dale L. Couch. Pg 14-29. Athens: Georgia Museum of Art, University of Georgia, 2024.

Gatson, Torren.“Upbuilding an Inclusive Future: A Semester of Reciprocal Learning,” in Teaching Public History, edited by Evan Faulkenbury and Julia Brock. Pg 75-92. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2023.

Gatson, Torren and Tiffany Momon. “Woven into the American Fabric: Black Craftspeople and the Clothing Trades in Pre-Civil War Charleston, South Carolina. ”In Fashioning America: Grit to Glamour, edited by Michelle Tolini Finamore, Fayetteville: University of Arkansas Press, October 2022.

Articles

Gatson, Torren and Louis Woods II. “To Tighten the Walls of the Negro Ghettos: The NAACP’s Fight Against Discriminatory Federal Housing Administration Mortgage Insurance Policies, 1937-1962.” The Journal of North Carolina Association of Historians, Vol 28, (September 2020). Gatson, Torren, and Tiffany Momon. “Labor or  Artistry? Reconceptualizing Black Craftsmen: The Creation of the Black Craftsman Digital Archive.” The Southern Quarterly, (November 2021).

Book Reviews

Gatson, Torren L. Review of Confronting Jim Crow: Race, memory, and the University of Georgia in the Twentieth Century, Robert Cohen. North Carolina Historical Review Vol. 102, Issue 2. (2025): 218-220.

Gatson, Torren L. Review of Terror and Truth: Civil Rights Tourism and the Mississippi Movement, Stephen A. King and Roger Davis Gatchet. Journal of Southern History Vol. 90, No. 3 (2024): 654-655.

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Recent Selected Presentations Include:

Keynote Lecture

“I Made This”: Black Artists and Artisans, Hosted by The ColonialWilliamsburg Foundation held at the Dewitt Wallace Decorative Arts Museum, Keynote address “Dispelling One Myth with Two Truths: The Presence and Significance of Black Material Culture in the Building of America.”

National Council on Public History keynote address: In the Making: Turning an Idea into a Movement!

11th Annual Green Symposium hosted by The Georgia Museum of Art, keynote address "The Power of Black Hands: Honoring Black Craftspeople of the Southern Landscape.” Harvest Lecture Series, keynote address: “Mobility in America’s First Planned City: Understanding Salve Badges and Enslaved Autonomy on the Southern Landscape. (Event held at Davenport Museum & Historic Savannah Foundation, Savannah Georgia)

Invited Lectures

Northwestern University, “Black craftspeople, a Conversation of Freedom by Design,” Invited by Joshua Crutchfield (professor of record) North Carolina History Center on the Civil War, Emancipation & Reconstruction, Teachers Institute Workshop, “Understanding the Causation of the American Civil War through Primary Sources”

North Carolina History Center on the Civil War, Emancipation & Reconstruction, Teachers Institute Workshop, “Understanding the Causation of the American Civil War through Primary Sources”

John Hope Franklin Humanities Institute, Forum for Scholars and Publics at Duke University, “Recollections Workshop: Practice, Critiqu, and Coalition through the Memorial Museums,” Invited Discussant

Diversity in Librarianship lecture Series: “Ubiquitous in Design: Planning, Building, and Launching the Black Craftspeople Digital Archive”, Columbia University (Held at Columbia’s Butler Library)

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Fall 2025 “Curious Objects” podcast, The Magazine Antiques, hosted by Ben Miller

Fall 2024 U.S. Civil Rights Trail, Season 6 episode 2 “The A&T 4 Sit Down”

Spring 2023 “Humanities for Good” podcast, interview with Dr. Anne Parsons

Fall 2021 Classical American Homes Preservation Trust mini-video on “Ayr Mount”

Fall 2020 NC Public Radio- WUNC (station) “The State of Things” (segment)

Fall 2020 ‘YES! And Café’ Podcast, UNCG, episode 12

Fall 2020 UNCG Research Magazine (Winter Issue)

Fall 2020 “Curious Objects” podcast, The Magazine Antiques, hosted by Ben Miller

Spring 2019 “The Slave Deeds of Guilford County,” Guilford County Register of Deeds

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