Talbot Historical Society

After two attempts to gain a summer internship, I hand wrote a letter to the Talbot Historical Society, located in the town of Easton in Talbot County on the Eastern Shore. So far, this internship has been great for me. It's a five minute drive from my house, I have met so many influential and knowledgeable community members, and have learned so much about the small town I have grown up in, as well as the surrounding areas, and how the Historical Society operates.

What I find so unique about the Historical Society is that it is located in downtown Easton in an antique store. I have passed this place numerous times before but I never knew that Tharpe's Antiques and some neighboring buildings were home to the Talbot Historical Society. I work in the basement of the antique store. They have a massive vault with smaller vaults within the vault, that stores furniture, clothing, paintings, photographs, glasses and dishware, and other artifacts. Since the building is pretty old, I've heard a handful of ghost stories about the the basement and third floor.

I work closely with the Collections Manager and another committee member to catalogue a collection of donated photographs of various people and places of Talbot County. We use the PastPerfect database, which was pretty easy to get the hang of.

The first major task that I took on was dismantling an exhibit, while helping assemble a new one for the 150th anniversary of  Unionville. Unionville was essentially created by Quakers in the mid 1800s, Ezekiel and his son James M. Cowgill, for African American ex-slaves and free blacks. The other Cowgill son, John, served as Captain in Company A, 108th Regiment U.S. Colored Infantry. The Cowgill's offered the 18 veterans their own plot of land for serving the Union. While dismantling the previous exhibit, which showcased the historic homes of Talbot County, I met the many volunteers that work with the Historical Society and learned how to put things away in the vault, by looking at the accession number and the home location of the artifact. It took about four hours to get all of the artifacts in their right spot. For the set-up of the Unionville exhibit, I assembled a soldier's uniform on a mannequin, and also put up a good portion of the exhibit myself. 


The second major task so far is planning for a new exhibit that will go up at the beginning of August. I have been able to sit in on two committee meetings to discuss the logistics of this new exhibit and what photos and artifacts would best represent the material. I assembled two displays for the committee to approve, which they did!

That was all in my first month of my Internship, and I can't wait to see what July has in store for me.