Mara Cherkasky is a DC-based historian and writer. In 2014 she co-founded, with Sarah Shoenfeld, both the historical research firm Prologue DC, LLC, and the digital public history project Mapping Segregation in Washington DC. This ongoing endeavor, which reveals the profound impact of racially restricted housing and other forms of segregation, has spurred much-needed conversation around race, wealth, and gentrification in the nation’s capital. She is also an experienced oral history interviewer and walking tour guide; the archivist at the nearly 200-year-old All Souls Unitarian Church; and a founding officer of the now 16-year-old Washington Metropolitan Accordion Society. Mara holds a Bachelor’s degree in Scandinavian Studies from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and a Master’s degree in American Studies from the George Washington University. She is a long-time resident of Washington, DC.