Placecasting battlefields

At it's most basic, I describe placecasting to people as having your own personal park ranger whispering in your ear as you walk around a place.

I found the most literal application of that description so far when I started previewing the audio tour podcasts at CivilWarTraveler.com.  This company has partnered with the National Park Service at Gettysburg, Harpers Ferry, Antietam, Appomattox Court House and other sites in and near Virginia to make audio tours of certain important parts of the vast battlefields (think the Peach Orchard at Gettysburg or the Burnside Bridge at Antietam).


The free podcasts on this site feature on-site recordings of real rangers and historians talking about the very spot where you are standing.  They point out features if the land around you, and off in the distance.  They describe how the battle progressed around this point and then they tell you (roughly) how to get to the next tour stop.  A printable map is available -- and essential -- for each tour.    


I love that these are real rangers steeped in the history of the place, and I really love the way they point out the physical features around you.  The ranger at Gettysburg's Peach orchard talks about this peach trees the National Park Service just planted there, and then he directs your eyes to the important Little Round Top hill off in the distance.  If you visited here and only had interpretive signs to read, you would miss so much. 

Civil War buffs will love these podcasts for the specific value they add to each location they cover.  People NOT already into battle history, however, could have a hard time listening to a whole tour (they range from 20 to 60 minutes, though most run about half an hour).  This is because compelling storytelling is not necessarily the strength of rangers and historians.  In the couple of tours I previewed, the tour guides throw a LOT of facts about distances, geography, casualties and regiment numbers at the listener without necessarily couching them in an immersive narrative about how the battle progressed.  But being live and off-the-cuff helps keep the energy up (as opposed to scripted podcasts read in a studio).


The audio production is also only so-so.  They're recorded outdoors on-site, where wind noise is always a problem.  Some of the tour guides also pop a lot of p's as they talk into the microphone.  Both of these things can be hard on listeners after a while, especially when listening in headphones.  The rangers also sometimes gloss right past the instructions for getting to the next location, so the printed map is a must. 

Next week marks the anniversary of the Battle of Antietam (Sept. 17, 1862), and there will be a lot of rangers, historians and other interpreters on the battlefield.  There's no substitute for that kind of personal contact.  But if you have to walk the hallowed ground on your own, these are some of the most effective place-centered audio tours I have found yet.  

(Photos from National Park Service)