In a city with a large supply of local historians, Tom Dodd stood out as one of the most respected.

When the Ypsilanti Heritage Festival began to evolve throughout the past two years, Dodd helped ensure the “Heritage” and history components of the festival remained intact.

His project, Chautauqua at the Riverside, launched last year, and injected a large dose of Ypsilanti history through an educational program dating back to the late 1800s.

Chautauqua started out as a Methodist summer camp for church school teachers but evolved into a traveling general education show on the arts, history and philosophy among other subjects. Ypsilanti was once a hot spot and home for several of the traveling shows.

When Dodd suddenly passed away from a heart attack on May 12, a group of local citizens, including historian James Mann; Haab’s co-owner Val Kabat; former Council Member and historian Barry LaRue; Rick Katon and Brian Filipiak decided they would carry on Chautauqua where Dodd left off.

He already had began preparation’s for this year’s festival, which runs Aug. 16 to 18 in Ypsilanti, and Kabat said the group discussed after Dodd’s passing whether or not they should keep the program going.

“On the one hand, it was really his baby and we didn’t know if we could do it without him,” she said. “But he had put a lot of work into the presentation and we felt we owed it to him and would pay tribute to him by doing it.”

The line-up for this year’s events includes a dozen acts, including a lantern slideshow assembled by Dodd at 2 p.m. called “Woodward’s Dream: the Man, the Avenue, and the Cars from Ypsilanti Collectors” about Augustus Woodward, who Kabat said spent time in Ypsilanti before moving to Detroit and having an important avenue named after him.

Woodward Avenue is now home to the Woodward Dream Cruise, and Dodd planned to tie in Ypsilanti’s classic car scene to the history of Woodward Avenue with a slideshow of the area’s classic autos.

Val Kabat is one of several community members who will organize this year's Chautauqua at the Riverside in honor of Tom Dodd.

Tom Perkins | For AnnArbor.com

Ellen Oliver Smith will reflect on the letters the youngest nurse at Annapolis sent home to her family during the Civil War.

The Fiddlers ReStrung will provide 19th century music, and The Ypsilanti Town Band will present music from the turn of the century.

Local historians Erin Dion, Les Heddle, Steven Kerr and LaRue will offer a parody of National Public Radio’s “Wait, Wait! Don’t Tell Me!” called “Wait, Wait! Don’t Demolish Me!” It focuses on Ypsilanti's historic and notable buildings.

Janet Rich and PLT productions will present a civil war reenactment while Yankee Air Museum Board Member Randy Hotton will highlight the Willow Run Plant’s importance in producing the Liberator during World War II.

A panel will discuss the nation’s newest national park - Monroe County's The River Raisin National Battlefield Park. Halac said U.S. Rep John Dingell, who was instrumental in making the effort to make the area a national park, will likely join.

The Ypsilanti Community Choir will perform a new piece inspired by the Liberator’s contribution to WWII.

Kathleen Chamberlain, a professor of history and philosophy at Eastern Michigan University, will discuss Native American's involvement in fur trading, and there will be a celebration of the 200-year anniversary of the Battle of Lake Eerie.

Ypsilanti Heritage Festival Director Andrew Clock said Dodd was one of the driving forces behind the Heritage Festival’s history programs last year and almost single-handedly created the Chautauqua at the Riverside programs.

He said there is so much love and respect for Dodd in the community there wasn’t much of a question as to whether Chautauqua would carry on this year.

“Before I really even had time to react to the news of Tom's passing, our history chair, James Mann, assured me that all of the programs Tom had been working on would be continued in his honor,” Clock said.

Kabat said the group is excited to be taking on the effort in Dodd’s honor and is realizing just how much work he put into it.

But she added, “Nobody will replace Tom Dodd.”