Jim Draeger is an architectural historian and Deputy State Historic Preservation Officer at the Wisconsin Historical Society with more than twenty-five years of historic preservation experience. From roadside architecture to Northwoods resorts, Draeger celebrates the importance of ordinary buildings to our daily lives through his research, writing, and lectures. He has celebrated the history and lore of Wisconsin taverns since his childhood. He shares a historic 1936 International-style house in Monona with his wife, Cindy.

Mark Speltz is a senior historian at American Girl and recently completed a master’s degree in public history at the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee. He previously worked as an independent researcher on exhibits for museums, including the Ellis Island Immigration Museum, and has authored several articles for the Wisconsin Magazine of History. He lives in Madison with his wife, Kari, and daughter, Marie.

Mark Fay of Eau Claire has completed six book projects for the Wisconsin Historical Society Press, photographing historic gas stations, opera houses, cemeteries, dairy farmers, and murals for a children’s book on the Great Peshtigo Fire. He has worked as an aerial photographer, a staff photographer for a postcard and calendar printing company, and has been in business as Faystrom Photo since 1996.