Amelia Island Museum of History – Summer Interns

Submitted by Deborah Lavery Powers

Staff Reporter

Summer Interns — before starting their first days wherever they find themselves   — undoubtedly have already heard horror stories about the possibility of  spending their entire unpaid internships standing in front of a  copying machine.  Ah, but that isn’t  ever the case if an intern comes to the Amelia Island Museum of History!

Carli on her first day, found herself helping set up  a Smithsonian road show exhibit in Baker Hall.  Almost before getting a cup of coffee.   In her linen shirt.  Amanda, who is particularly interested in genealogy,  was sitting at a table with a  pile of pictures “this high,”  accessioning them on her first morning.  After her coffee, maybe?    Todd, on the other hand, actually got to sit for a couple hours and read some general history of our island before being given his first assignment of the day… and summer.  All three had, just prior to arriving at the museum,  finished their university studies.  Todd, his Master’s, and Carli and Amanda, their Bachelor’s.  Let’s hear their stories:

I recently graduated from the Master’s Program in Public History at the University of Wisconsin in Eau Claire and had been looking for a way to get more experience for my resume.  In the history field, you are expected to do a couple of unpaid internships to get the experience you need for somebody to seriously consider hiring you. So, when this opportunity came up – and it fit into my schedule – I decided to come down and help out.  I have spent most of my time in the Archives, but have also been helping with other projects– such as preparing. researching, and writing portions of the “My Feet, Our Path” exhibit we have up right now.  And helping plan the next one, “Viva Florida 500.”  For the new one, I’ve been working on trying to establish what Fort St. Carlos looked like.  I’ve also been coordinating the Museum’s Facebook posts.

Carli Slappey, from Jacksonville, told us:

I’m from Jacksonville; I was born and raised there.  I just graduated from the University of Mississippi with a degree in Southern Studies.  With the benefit of my degree, working at the museum has proven to be the perfect internship for me. I wanted to be close to home, so I commute every day.  It’s great. I’ve mostly been writing and researching.  Researching for some of the current  panels and for some that will be included in the Viva Florida exhibit. I’ve also been writing part of the walking tours, painting, and  we all even served as bartenders one opening night.    We literally have done it all!

I recently graduated from the University of Florida with a BA in History and a minor in English.    For as long as I have known  that I wanted to major in history, I’ve also known I wanted to work in museums,  so it  was really  a no-brainer for me to apply for museum internships once I had graduated.   I looked at this museum because my family comes from a small town and I have always been interested in small town history and small town culture. It is really fascinating how little, out of the way, places tend to develop their own  identities.  I wanted to work in the Archives because a few years ago, I became really interested in genealogy — which  entails looking up a lot of pictures and old records.     I knew that archiving was something I could do and something that I would be good at.  And that I would have a lot of fun doing it!    So, for the  most part, I have been working with accessioning photographs and documents into our Past Perfect program, and also going through a lot of the old newspapers we have collected.  Some date back to the 1800’s.  I found a fascinating collection of papers  from the 1940’s that were all about World War II. They were all local papers, so it was particularly interesting  to see the local perspective on that global event.

Moving back to Todd and and asking which part of his internship he enjoyed the most, he said:

I did what is called post-blogging on McGregor’s invasion for our Facebook page, so I was able to go back to  copies of the original sources  we had — and use those rather than some of the work other historians have done.  I was able to see some of the differences – and then was able to use some of the newer sources other historians weren’t able to use – and fix some of errors they had put into the story.  McGregor was a very interesting man.

As for Carli’s favorite part of her summer:

I really enjoy researching and writing.  That’s what I have been doing recently.  It is cool to grab one of the library books and grab the matching file and research that way instead of just googling the topic. I think our generation has gotten a little lazy, myself included, so it is nice to do things the old fashioned way, by going back to original source.   It is interesting to see how far things go back, and the museum really  has an amazing collection.  Just about anything and everything.

When it came to what surprised them the most:

Todd:

I wasn’t really aware of how just how rich and interesting the history of the island  is.  I was familiar enough with museums and archives so that I knew what to expect in that regard.  But what I didn’t know  was the actual history of the area, and  just  exactly how good the archives are here.

Carli added:

I also didn’t realize the rich history Todd just mentioned.  I grew up in Jacksonville, and St. Augustine has always been given all the credit.  In school, we never learned anything  about Fernandina so, since I have been here,  I have gained an entire new and  different perspective. I appreciate Fernandina a lot more! 

Amanda followed with:

I was always interested in doing museum work, but the thing that probably surprised me the most was not just how interesting the local history was, but how much that  is still known about  that history. A lot of times history, if you don’t  keep up with it, ends up getting lost.  You, therefore,  find out things by going through old records to discover things that people never knew or had forgotten over time. But this island has done a really, really good job of keeping track of  its history, its culture and even the people who were important in every given era. We can look at pictures and say, “Oh, that’s Mr. Swann,” or “That’s Elizabeth Swann Carroll” —  and so on.  And we know what they meant to the island during their lifetimes.    So, it makes it really interesting to be able to look at photographs.  With each photograph comes a story, and for the most part, we know what the story is.  And, if we don’t know it off the top of our heads, we can find it here, in the museum, somewhere.

Carli spoke about not realizing, until she became an intern,  the strong commitment the community has to the museum, or how many volunteers we have.  She additionally remarked on how well everybody works together.

Todd spoke to the individual scripts written by each of our docents: 

Some museums don’t have as much of a history to tell so it is easier [for them] to have a set script for their volunteers to follow…    Here, there is so much history that you just can’t  fit it all into an appropriate amount of time for vacationing visitors,  so it is best for the docents to have flexibility in addressing the interests of the individual groups.

The interns went on to talk about the staff size:

Todd:

It’s a standard size staff for a small museum, but most of the museums I have worked with have had a couple more history people on the staff than we do here… but that’s just the way it is. Here there are 4 full-timers, 4 or 5 part-timers.  It is a small museum so we have a small staff, and everybody has to learn to do everything.

Amanda:

I think that one of the benefits of the staff being relatively small is that pretty much everybody knows everybody else so we can all kind of mesh. We know that we can bounce an idea off So-and-So  and he or she  won’t laugh at us… or.. if they do laugh, we also know that they are taking our idea seriously.

Carli:

Yes, we do laugh together. 

When I first came I didn’t know what to expect, but I love it.  I’m going to try and stay as long as I can.

All three particularly enjoyed the  recent Florida Folklore Forum.

As Carli said:

Billy Burbank did a presentation of his family history with the net-making, and there were two rappers from Jacksonville who went into the history and evolution of hip hop music in an entirely different way than I ever even imagined.  I thought it was the most interesting thing; it was such a positive experience.  There was a minister from a church in Nassauville, who performed  a 45 minute long song and prayer experience.   Being Catholic, I had expected something more in the line of a prayer and song in Latin!    This was a whole new experience for me and I loved it.  Something I have never   expected.

The consensus of the group was that the museum has used each of them as a true resource, a true member of the staff — and joined in lots of laughter with them.  And as a group, during this interview, we all had one of those laugh-out-loud moments ourselves when Carli said that, yes, she had known in advance that she would be setting up exhibits, but she had no idea that she really was gong to be [said with hands raised high] “setting UP exhibits.”  In her linen shirt.  On her first day.

A side note about interns:

Though Carli is living at home, both Amanda and Todd had to find a place to live while volunteering their intern time at the Museum.  Todd chose a RV park on Highway 17, and Amanda chose an apartment in St. Mary’s, Georgia, because,  as she says, “of the bed tax in Florida.”   [11% tax is charged on all rentals of less than 6 months duration.]

Carli will not be leaving until after the Viva Florida 500, Amanda on 30 September — the very last day of September – because that’s the day her apartment in St. Mary’s “expires.”  So that will be the end of  her internship.

Todd leaves today, Friday, September 6th.   But not before, as stated on the museum’s Facebook page:

“The museum welcomes Todd Theiste to Baker Hall on Friday, September 6 at 6 pm. Mr. Theiste, one of the museum’s interns this summer, will be presenting “How the Fifty-second Illinois Spent the Civil War.” This program features the unknown story of the Fifty-second Illinois Veteran Volunteer Infantry Regiment during the Civil War; and highlights many of their war-time experiences. This program is based upon Todd’s award nominated master’s thesis at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire.”

Perhaps we will see you there?

And to end with a quote by Carli:

Maybe knowing that we are all fresh out of college and  reading about us will give everyone a fresh look at how many of us really care and want to learn and know about history. We want to preserve our past. 

Editor’s Note: After a career in adult education, where writing, course design and development were her “beat”, Deborah now enjoys the world of freelancing, and volunteering.  Deborah covers the police beat for the Fernandina Observer writing weekly “Police blotter blasts . . .”   We thank Deborah for her many contributions.