IMPART: Institute for Museum, Preservation & Archaeology Research and Training

St. John's Freehold Exhibit Material Culture and Images

• Partner: Historic St. Mary's City
• Student: Maggie Dimock

The objective of the assistantship at Historic St. Mary's City was to provide support for the development of a museum at St. John's Freehold which would be centered around the archaeological investigations and historical research of the site. Extensive archaeological excavations at St. John's have generated a collection in excess of one million artifacts that reflect important exhibit themes. Specifically, the intern was to assist in identifying visual images and their current location and availability for use in the exhibit. The images would support the artifacts and themes and would be selected from Dutch genre paintings, period illustrations and maps, and other appropriate resources.

The intern, Maggie Dimock, St. Mary's College of Maryland senior and recent graduate (07), successfully identified and located a variety of images and was responsible for adding them into a tracking system to be used by the exhibit's fabricators. She also secured contact, reproduction rights, and cost information from museums and libraries in the United States and Europe who are holders of the images. Using a pre-defined system, she assigned tracking numbers to all scheduled image spaces and to all scheduled text spaces for the exhibit. There will be more than 200 images in the exhibit and at least three times that many text spaces. This time-consuming task was invaluable to the HSMC staff team who are working on the exhibit.

Maggie also assisted the HSMC curator in removing artifacts found at the St. John's site from the current Visitor Center exhibit for eventual use in the new exhibit. She assisted in the preparation of labels for the replacement artifacts.

Processing and Analysis of Materials from ST1-23

• Partner: Historic St. Mary's City
• Student: Gina Truitt and Ian Semmler

The objective of this Assistantship was to impart skills in archaeological laboratory procedures and quantitative assessment of artifacts. Materials used were recovered from the site of St. John's (ST1-23). The St. Johns site was initially investigated between 1972 and 1976 and constituted the first 17th century site investigated by the museum. This site contained a wealth of 17th-century British Colonial material and provided excellent experience with an unusually wide range of archaeological materials. The museum has recently conducted additional excavations at this site as part of the joint St. Mary's College/Historic St. Mary's City exhibit development. Construction of a museum incorporating the archaeological site and its remains is under way. Results of the assistantship have helped in planning of the in site interpretation activities to create a new museum exhibit on this most important site. Work included artifact processing from the most recent excavations and re-examination of previously excavated materials to assist in landscape reconstruction. The work was undertaken by Gina Truitt, a now graduated senior at St. Mary's College of Maryland who majored in Sociology and Anthropology, and Ian Semmler . This assistantship was directed by Silas Hurry, Director of the archaeological laboratory at HSMC.

Conservation of Archaeological Glass

• Partner: Historic St. Mary's City
• Student: Anna Brown, Christina Goldzwig, and Hilary Barstow

This Assistantship was designed to impart skills in archaeological laboratory procedures and introduce the student to the conservation of archaeologically recovered glass artifacts. The student learned how to document and stabilize the glass as part of a major conservation project being undertaken by Historic St. Mary's City with grant support from the Institute of Museum and Library Services, the lead federal agency which supports development of museum programs. Part of the training involved working directly with Ms. Lisa Young of Alexandria Conservation Services, Ltd., the HSMC consultant conservator. In all, three different students worked on this project because of the demands of the academic schedules. Anna Brown, Christina Goldzwig, and Hilary Barstow all worked on this project. Glass treated included materials from the St. John's site, the Van Sweringen site, and Chancellor's Point. This assistantship was directed by Silas Hurry, Director of the archaeological laboratory at HSMC.

Processing and Analysis of Materials from ST1-19

• Partner: Historic St. Mary's City
• Student: Jason Dorick

The objective of this Assistantship was to impart skills in archaeological laboratory procedures and quantitative assessment of artifacts. Materials used were recovered from the 2006 joint HSMC/SMCM Field School in Historical Archaeology. The materials were recovered from the Van Sweringen site, a ca. 1660 to 1740 occupation in St. Mary's City which served as the private lodging house maintained by Garrett Van Sweringen, a Dutch entrepreneur who operated the most luxurious inn in 17th century St. Mary's City. Excavations were originally undertaken here in the 1970s and the site is now the focus of an interpretive effort to create an exhibit with financial support from a grant for the National Endowment for the Humanities. This site contained a wealth of 17th-century British Colonial material and provided excellent experience with an unusually wide range of archaeological materials. Results of the assistantship assisted in developing site interpretation and planning. This assistantship was undertaken by Jason Dorick of St. Mary's College of Maryland who subsequently graduated with a degree in History. This assistantship was directed by Silas Hurry, Director of the archaeological laboratory at HSMC.

Curatorial Assistant and Research Aid

• Partner: Historic St. Mary's City
• Student: Laura Wienand and Emily Hoban

The objective of this Assistantship was to impart skills in archaeological laboratory procedures and quantitative assessment of artifacts. Materials used were recovered from the possible site of the late 17th-century William Nuthead printing house. This site contains a wealth of American Indian, 17th-century British Colonial and post-1840 African American remains and provides an excellent experience with an unusually wide range of archaeological materials. The museum has conducted excavations at this site as part of the joint St. Mary's College/Historic St. Mary's City field school since 1998. Results of the assistantship directly assisted in site interpretation and planning of reconstruction activities to create a new museum exhibit on the beginnings of printing in Maryland. This assistantship was directed by Silas Hurry, Director of the archaeological laboratory at HSMC. During the time the intern was present she assisted with the processing and analysis of architectural material which will assist in the reconstruction plans for the Printhouse interpretive exhibit.

Processing and Analysis of Materials from ST1-23

• Partner: Historic St. Mary's City
• Student: Margaret Randall and Tiffany Deutscher

The objective of this Assistantship was to impart skills in archaeological laboratory procedures and quantitative assessment of artifacts. Materials used were recovered from the site of the 17th-century St. John's site, built in 1638 and abandoned ca. 1720. This site contains a wealth of 17th-century British Colonial remains and provided excellent experience with an unusually wide range of archaeological materials. The museum conducted excavations at this site as part of the joint St. Mary's College/Historic St. Mary's City effort to develop an exhibit complex at this site. Results of the assistantship are assisting with site interpretation. This assistantship was directed by Silas Hurry, Director of the archaeological laboratory at HSMC. During the time the intern was present she assisted with the processing and analysis of a varied a wide range of material from the ongoing excavations at the St. John's site. These have included materials from sealed contexts and plow disturbed horizons.

Artifact Curation and Documentation

• Partner: Historic St. Mary's City
• Student: Caroline Jeffra and Tenley Martin

Three different students worked with previously excavated ceramics and non-ceramic artifacts (glass, metal, worked bone, etc.) from the St. John's archaeological sites located on the campus of St. Mary's College in St. Mary's City. This activity inventoried materials in the Study Collection and computerized the previously defined ceramic vessels and other artifacts and correlated them with the actual catalog entries. This activity “recaptured” the information on the fragment level which will assist in computer cataloging of this collection. Additionally, the students repackaged these items in archivally stable materials. Three different students worked on this project. Caroline Jeffra undertook the work with the ceramics while Tenley Martin examined the metal, bone, and glass artifacts. Ms. Jeffra worked with 5469 fragments of pottery which had previously been sorted into vessels and created a database of these materials. Ms. Martin examined over 1700 metal, glass and bone artifacts. As a result of this effort, all the materials from the St. John's site that were stored with the comparative collections was rehoused in archivally stable containers and computerized lists of all material involved were created. Results of the assistantship will aid site research and interpretation, and planning of new museum exhibits. This assistantship was supervised by Silas Hurry, Archaeological Laboratory Director at HSMC.

Artifact processing of the Print House Site

• Partner: Historic St. Mary's City
• Student: Laura Wienand

This Research Assistantship was designed to impart skills in archaeological laboratory procedures and quantitative assessment of artifacts. Materials used were recovered from the possible site of the late 17th-century William Nuthead printing house. This site contains a wealth of American Indian, 17th-century British Colonial and post-1840 African American material remains and provided excellent experience with an unusually wide range of archaeological materials. The museum has conducted excavations at this site as part of the joint St. Mary's College/Historic St. Mary's City field school since 1998. Results of the assistantships have assisted in site interpretation and planning of reconstruction activities to create a new museum exhibit on the beginnings of printing in Maryland. Laura C. Wienand filled this position for the academic year 2002-2003. Over the course of the project numerous archaeological contexts were processed. The processing included cleaning, labeling and cataloging of the specimens within each of the contexts. The student learned to rapidly identify the material so as to choose the correct cleaning method which would provide the best information without negatively impacting the integrity and stability of the objects. Labeling required learning about archivally stable inks and “best practice” in terms of label overcoating with stable acryloid compounds plus attention to detail in creating clear, readable labels. Cataloging was the most intellectually rigorous step in the standard artifact processing sequence. The student learned in depth identification skills to properly describe the objects in the permanent archaeological catalog. This assistantship was supervised by Silas Hurry, Archaeological Laboratory Director at HSMC.

The Print House Site

• Partner: St. Mary's College of Maryland and Historic St. Mary's City
• Student: Efland, Willoughby, and Rovielleo

These three Assistantships were designed to impart skills in archaeological laboratory procedures and quantitative assessment of artifacts. Materials used were recovered from the possible site of the late 17th-century William Nuthead printing house. This site contains a wealth of American Indian, 17th-century British Colonial and post-1840 African American material remains and provided excellent experience with an unusually wide range of archaeological materials. The museum has conducted excavations at this site as part of the joint St. Mary's College/Historic St. Mary's City field school since 1998. Results of the assistantships assisted in site interpretation and planning of reconstruction activities to create a new museum exhibit on the beginnings of printing in Maryland. Silas Hurry, Director of the archaeological laboratory at HSMC, directed these assistantships.

Over the course of the project 85 distinct archaeological contexts were processed. The processing included cleaning, labeling and cataloging of the specimens within each of the contexts. The students learned to rapidly identify the material so as to choose the correct cleaning method which would provide the best information without negatively impacting the integrity and stability of the objects. Labeling required learning about archivally stable inks and “best practice” in terms of label overcoating with stable acryloid compounds plus attention to detail in creating clear, readable labels. Cataloging was the most intellectually rigorous step in the standard artifact processing sequence. The students had to learn in depth identification skills to properly describe the objects in the permanent archaeological catalog.

These Research Assistantships have provided essential information for or ongoing research into the range of human activity, which occurred at 18ST1-14, the Print House Site. One of the priorities in the processing was to complete the cataloging of the random sample of excavation units which had been chosen to typify the site occupation. Ninety percent of the random sample was successfully processed so that they will shortly be able to begin a distributional analysis to assist in landscape reconstruction and interpretation of the site to the public. Additionally, on an individual level the students learned skills of budgeting their time so that they could participate in the program while maintaining full academic work loads. This experience helped impart to the students the need for good workplace habits in terms of reliability and maturity. The students also benefited from working in a professional setting where they could see the results of their work help begin to answer important questions.