What is an Internship with the Lost Towns Project Like?

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We asked Catonsville High School senior and 2022 intern Abby Shackelford. Here is what she had to say:

I first discovered the Lost Towns Project in a Maryland Archaeology Month pamphlet I picked up while on a college tour at St. Mary’s College of Maryland.  Originally, I had hoped to find something closer to home, but as I looked through the pamphlet, I realized that Anne Arundel County was as close as I was going to get. I applied for the internship because I wanted to make sure that I liked archaeology and got some experience with it before I chose to pursue it in college.

I really enjoyed our field trips to all of the different sites. It was cool to see how they varied in upkeep and the difficulties that the different environments caused while executing field work. I also enjoyed the trip to the Prince George’s County Archaeology Lab because it was interesting to see the difference in collections storage from county to county, and it was cool to see how other people did their processing and cataloging procedures outside of our tiny sphere at the London Town Lab. I liked how we had an equal balance of lab days and field days. It was good to have some variety, and I really enjoyed all of the field trips to all sorts of cool historical sites I wouldn’t otherwise have heard about. Conversely, it was also nice to have the lab days after weeks out in the field, sweating in the heat. Some days you just needed to sit and mindlessly clean some brick with a toothbrush while you soaked up some AC.

Interns outside the Anne Arundel Archaeology Lab (background, right), on the grounds of Historic London Town & Gardens

Altogether, besides miscellaneous lab work, I worked on two major field projects. One was at Kinder Farm, while one was at Arden. Kinder Farm Park, an Anne Arundel County park, was formerly the site of the Kinder family farm. The Kinders were German immigrants and truck farmers, growing produce and transporting it to larger centers of commerce for sale. We dug multiple shovel test pits (STPs) around the locations of two of the major farmhouses and other various outbuildings, finding a variety of artifacts, mostly from the early 20th century.

Kinder Farmhouse

Our other major field project was on a private property—a former plantation known as Arden, built in the 1840s. Arden was home to Dr. James Murray, a slaveholder, who served in the Confederate Army during the Civil War as a surgeon. We excavated in the woods near the main house, around and in the foundation of a former tenant house, where a man we know only by oral retelling as “Uncle Wec,” reportedly a former slave on the plantation, lived up until the 1940s. We collected surface finds, dug STPs around the remains of the foundation, and excavated a unit in the corner of the house. Most of the artifacts we found likely dated to the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

The Arden Tenant House

 A memorable moment would be when I dropped my phone in poison ivy. The worst part was that we weren’t even in the field! I dropped it off of the deck by the waterfront and it managed to land face down on the one patch of poison ivy in the whole garden (but luckily it missed the storm drain which was mere inches away). Before this internship, I had no idea what poison ivy looked like. I knew it had three leaves and it was shiny, but I didn’t know its exact appearance. I can now confidently say I know what it looks like. It just took dropping my phone in it and getting a little bit of it on my hand for me to figure it out.

Poison Ivy (source: Maryland Extension)

I would definitely recommend this internship to other students. For another high school student, I think this internship could also be helpful to help them determine whether or not they want to continue with archaeology as a career path, since it was composed of a wide array of everyday archaeological tasks. My main takeaway from this internship would have to be that I learned methods of archaeology—I gained experience in different techniques used to clean, label, and excavate artifacts, among other things. I think I can also claim to know the layout of the lab pretty well, after all of the cleaning and organizing we did of it. Coming away from this internship, I can now say that I have more of an idea of what I am getting into if I choose to pursue archaeology as a profession. The hands-on experience that this internship has afforded me has been invaluable. I have had opportunities in the archaeology world that I would not have otherwise had if not for this internship, such as the opportunity to observe ground-penetrating radar, help organize and store collections, and go on “behind the scenes” tours of museums like the Mt. Calvert House and the exhibits at London Town. I am also doubly as grateful to have these opportunities as a high schooler who had no prior experience with archaeology coming in to the internship. Having completed this internship has also hopefully given me a leg up in the college application process, which is fast approaching for me, as it is yet another extracurricular to add to my application. This internship has been an experience that not many high schoolers often get.

Abby (C) with 2022 interns Kaitlin (L) and Julia (R)

Overall, this internship was a very great experience for me. I was very lucky to get the opportunity to do it, and I had a lot of fun this summer. This internship has only solidified my desire to continue to do archaeology. I am planning to continue volunteering at the lab every now and then during the upcoming school year. I look forward to being able to expand my knowledge of history and archaeology.

The Arden Tenant House: An Intern Perspective

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Contributed by Lost Towns Project summer intern Tyler Wilson

This summer, I worked on a project to research, excavate, and document 19th-century Black households in Anne Arundel County, Maryland to create a more inclusive history. These households were inhabited by both enslaved and free African Americans before and after emancipation. As an intern on this project, I was tasked with updating the Anne Arundel County cemetery database and completing inventory forms while assisting in both the lab and fieldwork for the project. The data that was gained from this project is significant because it gives historic value and acknowledgment to a community that was often ignored or forgotten about. The central site for the summer took place at the Arden Tenant House (18AN609) where a lot of artifacts and data were collected.

18AN609: The Arden Tenant House

Arden Tenant House, located on old Harwood Road in Harwood, Maryland, was a property owned by Dr. James Murray. The main house on the property is a rare Louisiana-style plantation house, and this is where Dr. Murray would have lived. After emancipation, black tenant farmers lived in the tenant house a short distance away. At the tenant house, most artifacts were found through shovel test pits dug by the interns, and through surface finds. The surface finds and shovel test pits were organized and flagged on a digital grid system. Due to the property being occupied for decades, there were countless pieces of ceramics, glass bottles, and other artifacts found everywhere, mostly on the surface. Along with this, two professional archeologists excavated the floor within the house where countless more artifacts such as stockings, ceramics, and even animal bone were found. If we had more time, the site would have garnered much more data.

Tyler excavating at the Arden Tenant House

The two weeks spent at Arden were memorable to me because it was the first time I was able to do fieldwork in the United States. The only time I had ever worked in the field was at my field school which took place in Hertfordshire, England. So, being able to do archeology in the state I’m from while also finding countless artifacts was very memorable. Arden was also such an amazing site due to the sheer number of artifacts that could be found on the property.

Tyler Wilson is one of our two funded interns this year! Your support can help us provide internships to the next generation of archaeology and historic preservation professionals. If you are able, please consider making a tax-deductible internship donation to the Lost Towns Project today. Every contribution, no matter the size, makes a big difference in preserving local history. Thank you!

Dr. Emily Wilson: A Pioneering Country Doctor

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Dr. Emily Hammond Wilson was a pioneer in the medical profession and accomplished a lot of firsts in her life, including practicing outside racial norms during the era of segregation.  Over her 53 year career, she garnered a lot of respect and endearment among her peers, friends, and the local community. 

Emily Wilson, 1930s

Born on July 8, 1904 in Beech Island, South Carolina, Emily graduated in 1927 from the Medical College of Georgia. She was the only woman in her class and only the second woman to graduate from the school. She would end up researching at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore before becoming the first female doctor in South Anne Arundel County.  In 1929, Emily borrowed money from her uncle and set up her practice in Lothian, MD.  She had to prove herself from the start, as many residents were wary of her capabilities as a female doctor.  In 2004, she was quoted in The Capital as saying “One woman told me she sent for me just to see what I looked like.  People weren’t real sure I knew what I was doing.”  Her first office was in a summer kitchen with no water and electricity.  She was very much a country doctor, making house calls by horseback or buggy when the local roads were too muddy to traverse by car. When patients did not have the cash money to pay her ($1 for office visits and $15 for at-home baby deliveries), they would often pay her with a bushel of oysters, chickens, or farm labor work. 

In 1932, she married her first husband, John Fletcher Wilson.  Together, they purchased the historic “Obligation” property in the 1940s.  Listed in the National Register of Historic Places, the dwelling was built in 1743 for the locally prominent Stockett family.  Unfortunately, when the Wilsons purchased the property, it was in a deteriorated state, but they worked hard to restore it and it is where Dr. Wilson lived the remainder of her life.  Around the same time, she moved her office to the small building at the corner of Solomon’s Island Rd and Owensville Rd (Rt. 255) which was formerly a tea house that was owned and operated by local resident, Anne Cheston. Anne was the daughter of Dr. Caspar Morris Cheston and Sally Murray Cheston and was a  long time resident of Owensville.  She built the tea house when the State Road was built around 1910. 

Anne Cheston’s Tea House, c. 1920s

In early 20th century America, tea houses were women-owned and operated businesses and became a “third place” for other women to gather and socialize.  This was a huge milestone in the social and commercial history of women in this country, as most businesses and social clubs were male dominated. Many of Anne Cheston’s male forbearers, in fact, were members of the prominent Old South River Club (the longest surviving men’s club in America) that still stands today on South River Clubhouse Road.  Unfortunately, the tea house was not a successful venture and closed after a few years and then became a dwelling for many years prior to it becoming the office of Dr. Wilson.  The building still stands today as a commercial business.

Dr. Emily Wilson makes a house call, 1950s

Unlike many doctors’ offices in America that were segregated, Emily Wilson did not abide by those same constraints.  Her patients, both white and black, sat in the same waiting room and she showed no preference in the order that they were seen.  It was always on a first-come first-served basis and depended on the seriousness of the ailment.  She also made herself available to any sick person needing medical care, no matter who they were or what time of day it was.  She continued her groundbreaking career by becoming the president of the Anne Arundel Medical Society in 1951 and the Chief of Staff of Anne Arundel Hospital, now Anne Arundel Medical Center.  As Chief of Staff, she established clinics for pre-natal care and to treat syphilis.  Dr. Wilson gave up practicing at the age of 78 and is said to have delivered over 1,000 babies during her long career.  She remained living at Obligation in Harwood and was active in the community until her death on July 10, 2007 at 103 years old. 

Contributed by Darian Beverungen, Historic Sites Planner, Anne Arundel County Cultural Resources Section.  

References: 

Magnotti, Therese. Doc: The Life of Emily Hammond Wilson. Published by the Shady Side Rural Heritage Society.

“Emily Hammond Wilson Walker MD (1994-2007).” MSA SC 3520-14731.  Archives of Maryland (Biographical Series).