In addition to using libraries and visiting museums, historic site visitation is another common form of public engagement with the humanities. The percentage of people reporting at least one such visit in the previous year fell by more than a third from 1982 to 2012, with declines across most age groups.
Findings and Trends - In 2012, 24% of Americans age 18 or older had visited a historic site in the previous year. This was 13 percentage points lower than in 1982, with the bulk of the decline occurring from 2002 to 2012 (Indicator V-13a).
- The decline in historic site visitation from 1982 to 2012 was largest in the 25-to-44-year-old population, an age group that includes many parents of young and adolescent children. However, because no reliable national data on children’s visits to historic sites currently exist, establishing whether a corresponding decline occurred in the percentage of children who visited historic sites is not possible.
- Over the 30-year period studied here, the differences among age groups with respect to rates of historic site visitation substantially decreased. For example, in 1982, the rate of visitation among 25-to-34-year-olds (the group most likely to visit a historic site in that survey) was approximately 11 percentage points higher than that of the youngest age group (18-to-24-year-olds), and more than 17 points higher than that of people ages 65–74. By 2012, however, the visitation rates of 25-to-34-year-olds had dropped to within five percentage points of the younger cohort and fell slightly behind the rate for the older cohort. In 2012, the age group most likely to have visited a historic site was 55-to-64-year-olds, but their visitation rate was only six percentage points higher than that of 18-to-24-year-olds, the group least likely to visit.
- The data reveal generational differences with respect to Americans’ tendency to visit historic sites (Indicator V-13b). With each birth cohort, Americans of all ages have been less likely to visit historic sites. For example, those born from 1938 to 1947 had a 45% likelihood of having visited a historic site in the previous 12 months when they were ages 35–44, while those who were born in the 1968–1977 period had only a 23% likelihood of having visited a historic site when they were the same age.
- As people aged they were less likely to visit a historic site. In each of the three cohorts for which the most complete data are available, the drop-off in historic site visitation over the life course is at least 25%.
V-13a: Percentage of Americans Who Visited a Historic Park or Monument* in the Previous 12 Months, by Age, 1982–2012 |  | * Or toured a building or neighborhood for its historic or design value.
Source: National Endowment for the Arts, Survey of Public Participation in the Arts (1982, 1992, 2002, 2008, 2012). Estimates generated using the National Archive of Data on Arts and Culture online data analysis system. |
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V-13b: Rates of Historic Park and Monument Visitation,* by Birth Cohort |  | * Includes touring a building or neighborhood for its historic or design value.
Source: National Endowment for the Arts, Survey of Public Participation in the Arts (1982, 1992, 2002, 2008, 2012). Estimates generated using the National Archive of Data on Arts and Culture online data analysis system. |
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About the Data| Data for this indicator are drawn from the following question in the Survey of Public Participation in the Arts: “Did you [in the past year] visit an historic park or monument, or tour buildings or neighborhoods for their historic or design value?” Measuring historic site visitation based on such a question is one of two possible means of gauging the extent to which Americans make use of the nation’s historical resources. Another approach is to seek visitation data not from individuals but from the sites they visit. No organization or individual researcher has yet produced a reliable estimate of total visitation for U.S. historic sites, but information on levels of visitation to National Park Service (NPS) historic sites and monuments are available for years 1975–present.
The NPS reports that visitation to its historic sites (including battlefields, memorials, and military parks) rose from approximately 89.5 million in 2002 to 105.6 million in 2012.* These counts are of visits to historic sites, not the people who visited them. Because a single person can make multiple visits to a historical destination, site visitation levels usually exceed the number of individuals who visited the site in any given year. Also, such data capture visits made by people from other nations and do not take into account the growth of the U.S. population over the 10-year period. As a result of these two sets of issues, site visitation data tell only a partial story about Americans’ embrace of their historical resources, although they do speak to the demands made of such sites’ physical infrastructure and staff.
* Calculated using the online data tools available at https://irma.nps.gov/Stats/. Included in the NPS visitation counts provided here are visits to what NPS terms “national historic sites,” “national historical parks,” “national battlefields,” “national battlefield parks,” “national military parks,” “national monuments,” and “national memorials.” About the Data| The relationship between age and historic site visitation can be thought of as a combination of two distinct phenomena. The first of these, known as the “cohort” effect, refers to the effect of people’s generation on their tendency to visit historic sites. The other effect is that of a person’s age on his or her visitation (the “age” effect). Indicator V-13b presents the historic site visitation data in a way that makes the relative influence of these phenomena more apparent.
Data for this indicator are drawn from the following question in the Survey of Public Participation in the Arts: “Did you [in the past year] visit an historic park or monument, or tour buildings or neighborhoods for their historic or design value?” Measuring historic site visitation based on such a question is one of two possible means of gauging the extent to which Americans make use of the nation’s historical resources. Another approach is to seek visitation data not from individuals but from the sites they visit. No organization or individual researcher has yet produced a reliable estimate of total visitation for U.S. historic sites, but information on levels of visitation to National Park Service (NPS) historic sites and monuments are available for years 1975–present.
The NPS reports that visitation to its historic sites (including battlefields, memorials, and military parks) rose from approximately 89.5 million in 2002 to 105.6 million in 2012.* These counts are of visits to historic sites, not the people who visited them. Because a single person can make multiple visits to a historical destination, site visitation levels usually exceed the number of individuals who visited the site in any given year. Also, such data capture visits made by people from other nations and do not take into account the growth of the U.S. population over the 10-year period. As a result of these two sets of issues, site visitation data tell only a partial story about Americans’ embrace of their historical resources, although they do speak to the demands made of such sites’ physical infrastructure and staff.
* Calculated using the online data tools available at https://irma.nps.gov/Stats/. Included in the NPS visitation counts provided here are visits to what NPS terms “national historic sites,” “national historical parks,” “national battlefields,” “national battlefield parks,” “national military parks,” “national monuments,” and “national memorials.”
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