At History Detectives, the Grand Rapids Public Library’s day-long offering of local history programming, Julia Bouwkamp and Jo Ellyn Clarey will report on how the charting of 19th-century local women’s candidacy for public office is upending conventional wisdom and offering surprises about dates, the numbers of races, and the identities of losers. This unique historical accounting hopes to inspire cities across the nation to create their own comprehensive elective histories. And now a national crowdsourcing project, Her Hat Was in the Ring, has invited local researchers to share their data with the world, to help others complete and complicate American women’s history by seeking out every woman who ran before 1920.