“AI-Enabled Experiments in American History”
Project Title: Ghaist
Team Members: Na Chen, Shiwei Hong, Yuhuai Huang, Agnes Zhang, Jerry Zheng
Faculty Advisors: Mike Christel, Scott Stevens
The Idea
Most people have never heard of Joseph Priestley, the Revolutionary War-era scientist who discovered oxygen and invented carbonation. The Priestley-Forsyth Memorial Library in Northumberland, Pennsylvania, was built by Priestley’s great-grandson and honors his legacy by providing free, accessible educational resources to the community. But the library had a question: how could they make their namesake relevant to middle school-age children?
Enter Team Ghaist. The team was tasked with creating an installation for the library where guests could interact with Priestley and learn about his life and work.
“It’s every historian’s dream to make history come alive for future generations. Set design, beautiful art, accurate historical context, careful historical research, and brilliant creative insights make our Priestley game and chatbot an ETC gift to us and our small, Appalachian community.”
Harry D. Lewis
Former Vice President of the Joseph Priestley House Museum
The Process
After some initial iteration, the team decided on an AI-powered experience where guests could learn about Priestley by playing a game with props to recreate his invention of carbonated water and asking him questions. Inspired by Tom Riddle’s diary in the “Harry Potter” series, the experience allows players to reawaken Priestley’s memories as they get to know him, allowing him to share key moments from his life.
The experience is structured so that guests only ask Priestley yes or no questions, putting them in a detective-like position of trying to solve a mystery. But there’s a practical reason for this too: it keeps user inputs narrow, allowing the system to run on an offline, open-source LLM so the experience remains stable regardless of connectivity issues.
Ensuring that no point of failure could kill the experience after handoff was important for the team. They made sure to provide the client with documentation for everything that might go wrong, from the touch screen to the physical props. They also created a spreadsheet that allows library staff to expand Priestley’s knowledge by adding question-and-answer pairs to a CSV file with no coding required, making it easy to update the experience with new knowledge.
“Rather than start with AI and an ‘ask any question’ approach — which might have led to a shallow, perhaps boring exchange — the students offered users the opportunity to ‘ask more’ of the Priestley chatbot they built based on his papers and his known connections to Benjamin Franklin and other American patriots.”
Mike Christel
Ghaist Advisor
The Impact
After the semester ended, the experience was installed in the Priestley-Forsyth Memorial Library where its unique design has ensured continued engagement. For example, the physical props — like the bizarre-looking bladder Priestley used for his carbonated water experiment — pique interest and attracts young guests who might otherwise just walk by. Once they start playing, the game compels guests to learn more and discover their meaning.
The team worked closely with the clients from the start to understand their needs, paying close attention not just to Priestley himself but also to the physical space. The final installation allows guests to meet Priestley and learn more about him organically by playing a game, balancing historical accuracy and technological innovation.
“When you’re thinking about teenagers at an old museum and library, they’re not going through every book. Having a conversation resonates with people. I think the team could show this to any museum and have it be a calling card.”
Bernard Yee
CEO of Windup Minds and Final Presentation Guest