Johnathan Thayer

GSLIS Associate Professor (2025-present)
GSLIS Assistant Professor (2018-2025), Substitute Lecturer (2017-2018), Visiting Lecturer (2015-2017), Adjunct Lecturer (2013-2015)
Former GSLIS Department Vice Chair (2023-2024)
GSLIS Coordinator for MLS/MA Dual Degrees (2015-present)
Former Coordinator of the Advanced Certificate in Archives and Preservation of Cultural Materials (2014-2022)
Former Faculty Advisor for the Queens College Student Chapter of the Society of American Archivists (2014-2025)

Fellowships :

Queens College Pedagogies of Place Fellow (Summer 2025)
Queens College AANAPISI Faculty Fellow (Summer 2025)
Queens College Community-Engaged Learning Fellow (2024-2025)
CUNY BRES Fellow (Black, Racial, and Ethnic Studies) (2024-2025)
E.P. Thompson Fellowship in United States History (2017-2018)
Graduate Fellow in Public Humanities, Humanities New York (2016-2017)
Graduate Fellow in Labor Studies, CUNY School of Labor and Urban Studies (2013-2015)

Courses Taught:

LBSCI 709: Research in Library and Information Studies (GSLIS)
LBSCI 710: Applied Research in Information Studies (GSLIS)
LBSCI 728: Public History (GSLIS)
LBSCI 730: Archival Appraisal, Arrangement, and Access (GSLIS)
LBSCI 732: Introduction to Archival Studies (GSLIS)
LBSCI 757: Digitization of Cultural Materials (GSLIS)
LBSCI 790.3: Local History Methods (GSLIS)
LBSCI 795: Internship (GSLIS)
U.S. Labor History (CUNY School of Labor and Urban Studies)

Research & Professional Interests

I am an Associate Professor at the Queens College Graduate School of Library and Information Studies, City University of New York (CUNY), where I teach classes in archival studies, public history, local history, and community memory. I am Coordinator of the MLS/MA Dual Degree in Library Science and History and new Dual Degree programs with Art History, English, Media Studies, and Urban Affairs.

I am a coastal history and local history researcher and a public history and archival studies educator. My publications include the book Citizenship, Subversion, and Surveillance in U.S. Ports: Sailors Ashore (Palgrave Macmillan, 2023) and the co-edited volume Negotiating Masculinities and Modernity in the Maritime World, 1815-1940 (Palgrave Macmillan, 2021), both part of the Global Studies in Social and Cultural Maritime History series. Currently, I am co-editor of the book Preserving Maritime New York City: Engaging Public History in New York Harbor, which is under contract with SUNY Press. The book is a collection of chapters contributed by practicing public historians and memory workers from the front lines of maritime history in NYC, representing a motley crew including historic barge, tug, and oil tanker dwellers, lighthouse keepers, champions of polluted waterways, artists, and curators at marginal museums. As preservationists, we (the book editors and contributors) contend that spending critical time with maritime heritage at the margins of NYC brings into especially sharp focus many of the urgent issues facing public history in general in our current era of neoliberalism, hyper-urbanization, and climate crisis.

I have worked in maritime libraries and archives for more than twenty years, with experience in both small and large-scale digitization projects, oral history projects, and public-facing interpretive research. My time at sea includes a stint as a 38th Voyager on the nineteenth-century whaleship Charles W. Morgan, as oral history interviewer on the liberty ship SS John W. Brown, and as ship’s librarian on SUNY Maritime College’s training ship Empire State VI. Other fieldwork includes the Seamen’s Church Institute’s American Merchant Marine Veterans Oral History Project, a publicly accessible digital archive consisting of over 800 audio clips from interviews with more than 70 veteran merchant mariners.

Finally, I am a faculty partner with Queens Memory and have worked with them to coordinate student-led collaborations focused on the Olde Towne of Flushing Burial Ground, a former potter’s field used in the 19th and early-20th centuries adjacent to historically racially segregated Flushing Cemetery. Currently, I am current;y working on major grant proposals to develop a community memory framework for public MLS programs.

Selected Publications

Books

Thayer, Johnathan and Dreisbach-Williams, Stefan, editors. Preserving Maritime New York City: Engaging Public History in New York Harbor. (under contract with SUNY Press).

Thayer, Johnathan. Citizenship, Subversion, and Surveillance in U.S. Ports: Sailors Ashore. Global Studies in Social and Cultural Maritime History. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2023. https://link.springer.com/book/9783031456176

Downing, Karen, Thayer, Johnathan, and Begiato, Joanne, eds. Negotiating Masculinities and Modernity in the Maritime World, 1815-1940. Global Studies in Social and Cultural Maritime History. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2021. https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-030-77946-7

Journal Articles

Thayer, Johnathan and Wallach, Lori DiBella. “Intergenerational Public History at the Olde Towne of Flushing Burial Ground.” Public Historian 47, no. 4 (November 2025).

Thayer, Johnathan. “”Fugitive Slave / Fugitive Sailor”: Mobility and the Rhetoric of Emancipation in U.S. Progressive Era Maritime Reform.” Northern Mariner 35, no. 1 (2025). https://doi.org/10.25071/2561-5467.1248

Thayer, Johnathan and Dreisbach-Williams, Stefan. "Early Innovations in Maritime Telemedical Services: The KDKF Radio Medico Station." Journal of the Medical Library Association 111, no. ½ (2023): 625-629. https://doi.org/10.5195/jmla.2023.1567

Williams, Constance B. and Thayer, Johnathan. "Connecting Community College Students to Primary Source Archival Materials." College and Undergraduate Libraries, (2020): 119-127. https://doi.org/10.1080/10691316.2020.1739585

Thayer, Johnathan. "Mythmaking and the Archival Record: The Titanic Disaster as Documented in the Archives of the Seamen’s Church Institute of New York and New Jersey." The American Archivist 75, no. 2 (2012): 393-421. https://doi.org/10.17723/aarc.75.2.0qh07764615770x4

Chapters in Books

Thayer, Johnathan, Tummino, Annie, and Thorn, Max. “Rethinking Internships in United States Graduate Programs in Archival Studies: The Queens College Graduate Archives Fellowship.” in Archival Pedagogies. (accepted).

Thayer, Johnathan and Pagan, Erik. “Accommodating and Enabling Anxiety Disorders and Agoraphobia in Digital Access Systems for Cultural Heritage.” in Curating Access: Disability Art Activism and Creative Accommodations. London: Routledge, 2022. https://www.routledge.com/Curating-Access-Disability-Art-Activism-and-Creative-Accommodation/Cachia/p/book/9780367775230

Thayer, Johnathan. “Sailors’ Homes”: Sailors’ Boardinghouses, Maritime Reform, and Contested Masculinities in New York’s Sailortown." In Negotiating Masculinities and Modernity in the Maritime World, 1815-1940, edited by Karen Downing, Johnathan Thayer, and Joanne Begiato. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2021. https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-030-77946-7

Downing, Karen., Thayer, Johnathan, Begiato, Joanne. "Introduction: A Sailor's Progress?" In Negotiating Masculinities and Modernity in the Maritime World, 1815-1940, edited by Karen Downing, Johnathan Thayer, and Joanne Begiato. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2021. https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-030-77946-7

Fontánez Rodríguez, Cristina, Hernández, Pedro Juan, and Thayer, Johnathan. “Connecting Graduate Library and Information Studies Students with Ethnic Studies Archives: Towards a Community-Centered Model for Archival Education.” In Ethnic Studies in Academic and Research Libraries, edited by Ray Pun, Melissa Cardenas-Dow, and Kenya S. Flash. Chicago: Association of College and Research Libraries, 2021. https://www.alastore.ala.org/content/ethnic-studies-academic-and-research-libraries

Thayer, Johnathan. "Sailors Ashore in New York’s Sailortown." In City of Labor, City of Struggle: How Labor Movements Changed New York, edited by Joshua B. Freeman. New York: Columbia University Press, 2019. http://cup.columbia.edu/book/city-of-workers-city-of-struggle/9780231191937

Thayer, Johnathan. "Merchant Seamen, Sailortowns, and the Philanthropic Encounter in New York City’s Sailortown." In The New Coastal History: Cultural, Urban and Environmental Perspectives, edited by David Worthington. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017. https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-319-64090-7

Editorial Board

Coastal Studies & Society

Peer Reviewer

Archival Science
Coastal Studies & Society
Journal of Library Administration
Journal of Education in Library and Information Studies
Journal of Urban History

Book Reviews

Thayer. Johnathan. "Review of Miller, R. H. W.. One Firm Anchor: The Church and the Merchant Seafarer." The International Journal of Maritime History XXV, 1 (2013): 404-405. https://doi.org/10.1177/084387141302500162

Public Writing

Thayer, Johnathan. (2020). “Gabe: A Tribute to the U.S. Merchant Mariner Veterans of WWII.” Gotham: A Blog for Scholars of New York City History (https://www.gothamcenter.org/blog/gabe-a-tribute-to-the-us-merchant-mariner-veterans-of-world-war-ii)

Thayer, Johnathan. (2016). “Is Coastal History Public History?,” Firths and Fjords: Comparative Historical Perspectives on Adjacent Coasts (https://firthsandfjords.com/2016/05/02/is-coastal-history-public-history/)

Thayer, Johnathan. (2016). “On Records and Recognition.” The Seamen’s Church Institute Archives. https://web.archive.org/web/20200729113758/https://seamenschurch.org/article/on-records-and-recognition-follow-up-on-women-and-children-coastwise-mariners-of-wwii

Thayer, Johnathan. (2015). “Twenty-Four Hours On the Charles W. Morgan: Thoughts on the Maritime History of the Oil Industry.” The Seamen’s Church Institute Archives. https://web.archive.org/web/20200729103716/https://seamenschurch.org/article/twenty-four-hours-on-the-charles-w-morgan-thoughts-on-the-maritime-history-of-the-oil

Thayer, Johnathan. (2014). “Living History at Sea: Recording Oral Histories on the SS John W. Brown.” The Seamen’s Church Institute Archives. https://web.archive.org/web/20200928052822/https://seamenschurch.org/article/living-history-at-sea-recording-oral-histories-on-the-ss-john-w-brown

Thayer, Johnathan. (2014). “Seafarers and the Thirteenth Amendment.” The Seamen’s Church Institute Archives. https://web.archive.org/web/20200928045603/https://seamenschurch.org/article/seafarers-and-the-thirteenth-amendment

Thayer, Johnathan. “For the Gallant Men of the Merchant Marine: The Merchant Marine and Seamen's Church Institute during World War II,” Sea History 114 (2013): 24-27. https://issuu.com/seahistory/docs/sh_144_autumn-2013/27

Thayer, Johnathan and Parker, Christine. “Collaboration and Digitization: Transitions in Collections Access at the Seamen’s Church Institute Archives.” Metropolitan Archivist 18, 2 (2012): 15-16. https://www.nycarchivists.org/resources/Pictures/Metropolitan_Archivist/Metropolitan-Archivist-Vol-18-No-2.pdf

Conference Presentations:

Agish, Meral, Anderson, Kalli, Fontánez Rodríguez, Cristina, Martinez, Mariado, Thayer, Johnathan, Wallach, Lori. (2023). “Good for Everyone: Developing Student Projects for Long-Term Benefits.” Paper presented at the Oral History Association conference, Baltimore, MD.

Thayer, Johnathan (2023). “Merchant Seamen and the Parameters of Involuntary Servitude.” Paper presented at the Canadian Nautical Research Society conference, St. John’s, Newfoundland.

Thayer, Johnathan (2023). “The Specter of “Alien Seamen” in the U.S. Maritime Imagination.” Paper presented at the North American Society for Oceanic History conference, San Diego, CA.

Thayer, Johnathan (2022). “Oral History as Platform for Rhizomatic Documentation of Cultural Heritage: The Olde Towne of Flushing Burial Ground." Paper presented at the Archival Education and Research Institute (AERI) conference, digital.

Thayer, Johnathan and Dreisbach-Williams, Stefan (2021). “Early Innovations in Maritime Telemedical Services: The Seamen’s Church Institute of New York’s KDKF Radio Medico Station.” Paper presented at the McMullen Naval History Symposium conference, Annapolis, MD.

Thayer, Johnathan (2021). “Deserters, Stowaways, and Malafide Seamen: The Records Life-Cycle of the 1930 Merchant Seamen Census." Paper presented at the Archival Education and Research Institute (AERI) conference, digital.

Thayer, Johnathan (2021). “Towards a Digital Coastal History of New York City.” Paper presented at the Institute of Historical Research Coastal Connections “Digital Coasts” seminar, digital.

Litvin, Sarah and Thayer, Johnathan. (2019). "Problems in Partnerships: Addressing Institutional Difference in a Collaborative World.” Paper presented at the American Association for State and Local History and International Coalition of Sites of Conscience conference, Philadelphia PA.

Thayer, Johnathan and Tummino, Annie. (2019). "A Community-Centered Model for Archival Education: A Proposal-in-Progress for an Embedded Fellowship Program for Archival Studies Students." Paper presented at the Archival Education and Research Institute (AERI) conference, Liverpool, UK.

Thayer, Johnathan. (2019) "Sailors Ashore: Sailortowns as Portals to National and Global Reckonings." Paper presented at the North American Society for Oceanic History, “Connecting the Global and the Local: The Sea and Maritime Cities,” New Bedford, MA.

Thayer, Johnathan. (2019). "Andrew Furuseth, the International Seamen's Union, and the Political Ideology of Maritime Masculinity." Paper presented at the Global Maritime History conference “Maritime Toxic Masculinity,” digital.

Thayer, Johnathan. (2019)."A 101-Introduction to Digitization of (Maritime) Cultural Materials." Paper presented at the Floating Conference on Digital Maritime Heritage, Brooklyn, NY.

Thayer, Johnathan and Cirasella, Jill. (co-Moderators). (2017). "Preparing Graduate Students for Careers in Academic Librarianship." Panel at the LACUNY Institute, Queens, NY.

Thayer, Johnathan. (2016). "Mapping Masculinites in New York City’s Sailortown." Paper presented at the “Maritime Masculinities” conference, Oxford, UK.

Thayer, Johnathan, Wallach, Lori, Hartmann, Rudy, Garrison, Robbie, Fontánez Rodriguez, Cristina, Delgado, Jeffrey, and Carra, Regina. (2016). "Resurrecting Local Public History at the Olde Towne of Flushing Burial Ground." Paper presented at the CUNY Public History Conference, “Afterlives: Place, Memory, Story,” NY, NY.

Thayer, Johnathan. (Chair). (2016). "Reaching New Audiences, Repurposing Old Materials." Panel at the CUNY Public History Collective Conference, “Afterlives: Place, Memory, Story,” NY, NY.

Thayer, Johnathan. (2016). "Text Mining, Data Visualization, and Archival Theory and Practice." Paper presented at the Mid-Atlantic Regional Archives Conference, PIttsburgh, PA.

Thayer, Johnathan. (2016). "Merchant Seamen, Masculinity, and the Philanthropic Encounter in New York City’s Sailortown." Paper presented at the “Firths and Fjords: A Coastal History Conference,” University of the Highlands and Islands, Dornoch, Scotland.

Breir, Stephen., Vazquez, Andrea., Battistella, Marcos, and Thayer. Johnathan. (2015) "Technical and Conceptual Challenges of Developing the CUNY Digital History Archive (CDHA)". Paper presented at the CUNY IT Conference, NY, NY.

Thayer, Johnathan. (Moderator). (2015). "Alternative Career Paths for Archivists." Panel at the Mid-Atlantic Regional Archives Conference, Roanoke, VA.

Litvin, Sarah and Thayer, Johnathan. (2015). "Oral History as Living History: Archives, Documentaries, Advocacy, Historical Interpretation, and Tours of Historical Sites." Paper presented at the New England Regional Conference of the Association for Living History, Farm, and Agricultural Museums, Mystic, CT.

Thayer, Johnathan. (2015). "The Haystack: Who Controls the Archive in the Age of Big Data?" Paper presented at the CUNY Graduate History Conference, “Identities, Ideologies, and Interactions: Conceptualizing New Histories,” NY, NY.

Thayer, Johnathan. (2015). "The Seamen’s Church Institute’s American Merchant Marine Veterans Oral History Project: An Archival Intervention." Paper presented at the American Historical Association Annual Meeting, NY, NY.

Thayer, Johnathan. (2014). "Shore Leave Denial in Historical Context: A Timeline of Restricted Mobility and Unfree Labor at Sea and in Port." Paper presented at the “Health and Welfare of Seafarers Conference.” Paper presented at "The Health and Welfare of Seafarers" conference at the Maritime Historical Studies Centre, University of Hull, UK.

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