---
title: An AR-Aided View of Black History
date: 2024-06-18T05:30:00-04:00
author: University of Maryland
canonical_url: "https://today.umd.edu/an-ar-aided-view-of-black-history"
section: Articles
---
# An AR-Aided View of Black History

*June 18, 2024* — by [Brianna Rhodes ’17](/author/brianna-rhodes)


> UMD, Montgomery County Recreate Life at Historic African American Cabin

*IMG 3897 1920x1080 — With just a smart phone, visitors at Montgomery County's Oakley Cabin can learn about African American life after emancipation through an augmentative reality experience, including virtual park guides, property fly-overs and 3D models of the interior as it was in the 19th century. UMD's Postdoctoral Associate Stefan Woehlke (below, left) and graduate student Rachel Wilkerson gathered documentation of the site to help shape the experience.*

Visitors pointing their phones at the unassuming log cabin tucked along a wooded road in Olney, Md., may see a 19th-century wash basin still wet with laundry just outside the back door, chickens roaming around a wooden coop or a neighboring log cabin just yards away.

But when they lower their phones, all that remains is an empty yard and a deeper understanding of this property’s complicated past.

Through augmented reality (AR), a technology that overlays live scenes with computer-generated imagery, visitors to this African American heritage site in Montgomery County can now envision the livelihoods of Black families who lived in Oakley Cabin after the Civil War. Developed by the University of Maryland in collaboration with Montgomery County’s parks and technology departments, the project of digital recreations is believed to be the first AR experience created for an African American historic site in Maryland.

“This really important period of American history and the Black experience is underrepresented in academic research, in public sites and interpretation,” said Stefan Woehlke M.A. ’13, Ph.D. ’21, a postdoctoral associate in UMD’s Historic Preservation Program. “It was really important to me to work on a site where the county government is putting resources into and sharing this period of history through these digital tools.”


*two people look at smartphone near cabin*




**Topics:** [Research](https://today.umd.edu/tags/research)


**Tags:** [Augmented Reality / Virtual Reality](https://today.umd.edu/topic/augmented-reality-virtual-reality), [Historic Preservation](https://today.umd.edu/topic/historic-preservation), [Research](https://today.umd.edu/topic/research)


**Units:** [School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation](https://today.umd.edu/topic/school-architecture-planning-and-preservation)