Students Unearth History at Smithsonian Environmental Research Center

"It helped me understand how archaeology worked in real life. I learned how to use a screen, and I learned how to dig carefully."-ANTH 240 student

The Woodlawn House and its surroundings in Edgewater, Maryland, conceal nearly 300 years of historical secrets and archaeological puzzles. Last week, MC students contributed to solving some of the mysteries of this site, where Native Americans, enslaved Africans, indentured servants, Scottish tobacco farmers, tenant farmers, and generations of families lived while relying on the resources of the Chesapeake Bay. The site is part of the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center (SERC), where scientists research both the region's history and the ecological processes shaped by centuries of human occupation.

MC's Anthropology Professor Dr. Melissa Powell led the field trip, a highlight of Introduction to Archaeology (ANTH 240). In addition to taking a guided tour of the original house, built in 1735, and its surrounding archaeological sites, students gained hands-on experience excavating an archaeological site using shovels, trowels, screens, and measuring tapes.

ANTH 240 students have been taking field trips to SERC since 2019, when MC's Anthropology Professor Dr. Barb Wolff initiated the partnership with Smithsonian archaeologist James Gibb. The tours and excavations allow students to learn by doing. For one student, the experience led to a volunteer position as a citizen scientist at the site and later to a job at President Lincoln's Cottage, the Washington, D.C., historic site where Abraham Lincoln developed the Emancipation Proclamation.