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| Sami Brown, the field school student speaker, at Media Day. |
Hello everyone, it sure has been
a while since I last wrote, my name again is Sami. Due to the popular demand by the people, I
have decided to write out my Media Day speech for your enjoyment. I hope everyone has had a fun filled summer, because
we sure did. With out further ado. . .
“First of all, I would like to thank everyone for coming out today to
support us. Without the prolonged and continued
support of individuals from the community we would not have the opportunity be
standing here today.
My
name is Samantha Brown, or Sami for short.
I was born and raised in a small farming town in Pennsylvania, called
Munster. Upon completing high school, I
decided to enlist in the United States Air Force. Through my 6-year military career I have
lived in Texas, California and North Dakota.
I spent most of my military career as an Aerospace Service Medical Technician
working on ambulances. When it came time
for me to separate and relocate my husband and I quickly agreed to move to his
home state of Michigan, where I enrolled as a full-time student seeking a biology
major. A few semesters in, I care across
an amazing opportunity to work for the Walt Disney Corporation at the Walt
Disney Resort in Orlando, Florida as a character attendant. So, my husband, two bonus kids, and myself
left Michigan behind to become residents of the sunshine state for 3 ½ years. Eventually the magic of Disney wore off,
believe it or not, and we decided to return home to Michigan once again. Having missed my time as a medic in the Air
Force I decided to go for a degree change and pursue a major in biomedical sciences
and a minor in chemistry at WMU. So how
exactly did the archaeology bug bite me well. . .
My
childhood home was originally an early 1900 saloon, where they would literally
throw any garbage out the kitchen window or take it to a large hill on the
western side of the property, about 10 yards from the establishment. My father would spend many days with me and
my brother digging threw this ruble. We
each got to shovel and dig in our own separate holes, all hoping to find
something. We mostly found glass bottles
intact, Johnson and Johnson metal containers, and a few skeleton keys, all 20th
century items or newer. But the thrill
of the find wasn’t the only exciting moment, you see my Dad would play this
game with us. With every object we found
we would have to create a story to go along with it. We had to give the object and owner, the
owner a name, and take a stab at what the object was used for. Being silly and young we usually picked names
of loved ones and had very crazy and imaginative uses for the items. For example, one time my brother found a blue
glass bottle, he said it belonged to Bruce Wayne who used it to catch fireflies,
so he had a light source all night long.
He was a major Batman fan. I didn’t
realize it then, but my Dad was preparing me in his own way as a junior archaeologist.
Flash
forward to a college student sitting in a lecture hall taking on of her general
education classes, Lost Worlds of Archeology.
It was the first class I ever took that I was actually excited about
going to. The professor was so excited
and into the material it was very difficult not to catch the enthusiasm it was
at this moment I decided to double minor in chemistry and anthropology. With each passing anthropology course, I took
I felt myself wanting to take more and learn as much as I could. That’s when I found out about Intro to
Archeology and ultimately the Fort St. Joseph Project. Memories of me and my Dad spending many days
digging in the dirt all began to resurface.
With each Intro to Archeology lecture Dr. Nassaney liked to challenge us
to think outside of the box, utilize every source we could think of, and when
we were out of ideas he challenged us to think of even more. It was part of the reason I wanted to attend
the Archaeology Field School this summer here in Niles. The other reason stems from my heavy biology
background, the want or need to tangibly touch or work with my subject. What better way is there for an anthropologist
to do this than conduct field work? By getting
the chance to leave the typical classroom setting and gain the experiences of a
hands-on setting. I honestly had no idea
of what exactly I was getting myself into.
I knew for sure that we would not be doing Indiana Jones or Laura Croft
type of work. Instead, I was in for an
experience of a lifetime. Over the last
five weeks I got the opportunity to unearth and touch history, like actually
pick-up., examine, and think about an object, or artifact as we archeologists
call them. These artifacts actually
belonged to someone at some period of time, and to be the first person to see
or even feel them in 200+ years is an exhilarating feeling. I can honestly say I will never forget the feeling
I got when I picked-up and examined my first lead seal. But, I quickly learned that archeology isn’t about
filling museums with artifacts or even about finding artifacts in general, it
goes so much deeper than that and let me tell you the amount of paperwork was
surprising. It’s about discovering
history, giving voices to the voiceless, learning as much as you can about a
topic only to find out there is always more to learn and ultimately, it’s about
being able to work with others and forming bonds with those you work with. Much like the family bonds we have grown to
form with one another and will continue to form with others as we pursue our
own archeological careers.”
Again,
I want to take a few moments and thank everyone from the city of Niles, the WMU
community, and all the surrounding areas for everything you do. From the donations to the amount of time
everyone donates to us, without you we would not be able to accomplish all that
we do. It really does take a village,
and all of you are ours. So here is to
another 20 years, may we continue to strengthen and grow together, FSJ forever.
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