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Learning to dig history
With field school at Menokin, a host of different kinds of students learn basic archaeology
Date published: 6/22/2010 By Rob Hedelt WARSAW --The sun was starting to cook everything below it, making Tom Karow thankful that his painstaking digging in a test pit at Menokin was happening under the shade of a work tent.On this 500-acre parcel that was once the home of patriot Francis Lightfoot Lee, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, Karow and a throng of others were at the historic home Friday in an archaeological field school with several different sorts of students. Some, like Karow--a real estate appraiser who lives in Matthews on the Middle Peninsula--were there as members of the Archaeological Society of Virginia, getting hours toward their certification by that organization. Others, such as Eileen Smith of Urbanna, a teacher in a private academy in Essex County, were students who had signed up through Rappahannock Community College to take the field school as a class, obtaining continuing education credit. Still others, such as Amy Hilton of Los Angeles and Rachael Davis of Long Island, were interns working with the archaeologists conducting the school. John Hoffman, who lives in Westmoreland just a mile or two from the historic home between Montross and Warsaw, was simply a volunteer who wanted to get the chance to do some real-world archaeology. "I heard about the chance to do this and just came over to see what it was like," said Hoffman, who like the others in the school, dug, sifted, troweled and collected artifacts that ranged from nails to bits of pottery dating from the late 18th century to the mid-19th. Sarah Pope, Menokin's executive director, said the field school was conducted for several reasons. "From work done here before, we have reason to believe that the area where these test pits are being dug might have been in the area where slave quarters once existed," she said Friday. "We're hoping some of this week's work will shed light on that." Beyond that real detective work, she said giving people the chance to learn about archaeology and the history of Menokin fulfills a key mission of the historic attraction: education. Thane Harpole and David Brown, the archaeologists who ran the field school, said they were pleased that so many different types of students took part.
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