Internships Blog

Good Morning it is indeed cold here in the Shenandoah Mountains of Virginia and it is day two for me interning at the National D Day Museum–if it’s too cold for tours today I will be teaching about the lady in the picture above as one of those hidden stories about the D-Day landing that very few people know about. Many Americans have watched movies like “The Longest Day” ,”Saving Private Ryan” or the HBO series Band of Brothers–what these movies do well is portray the role that men played in the initial D-Day landing on June 6, 1944. One of the hidden stories I will be discussing while at the museum involves Martha Gellhorn also the wife of the famous author Ernest Hemingway. Women during World War 2 were not permitted to go into a combat zone an issue until the election of Bill Clinton to the presidency in 1993—even at the height of the first Gulf War in which I was a participant in 1991 the role of women as front line military personnel was limited. Martha Gellhorn was an accomplished writer and also a journalist long before she became Ernest Hemingway’s 3rd wife. In fact it’s his jealousy of her writing skills and world wide notice for those writing skills that will cause her to take on such a daring feat. Martha using her journalist credentials did sneak aboard one of the landing craft leaving England for the beaches of Normandy, France–in fact she hid in one of bathrooms of a landing craft the entire trip over from England to France–and the only reason she was able to get even close to the landing crafts was because she pretended to be covering a story about the invasion to be later printed in English newspapers.

Once the landing craft had arrived on the beach she quickly made her way ashore and began to record and take some of the 1st pictures of the D-Day invasion that would eventually find its way into American and British newspapers. Once she was discovered by American Forces in the combat zone–she was captured and held prisoner by Allied Forces returned to England and stripped of her journalist credentials for the remainder of the war….. Yet this daring lady isn’t mentioned in any of the movies that I listed above and her story would still be lost if I had not located its while doing research on “Hidden Secrets of the D-Day Landings”. Stay tune to my blog fellow historians and military vets I have many more of these to tell and again for those in the local area of Bedford or Lynchburg stop by on a Saturday or Sunday take a tour with me or attend one of my classes I think you will leave with a better understanding of the military and also the sacrifices of these brave young people many between the age of 18-21 made. For this reason alone they will always be known as America’s greatest generation.

Being at the National D-Day Museum is a humbling experience even if today was orientation and training attached you will find pictures of artifacts each with a story behind it. The above medic arm band belonged to Dr. Robert Ware he was supposed to serve as a battalion surgeon on D-Day setting up a field hospital as soon as possible post landing to treat the wounded. Unfortunately, Ware age 29 never got the chance to save lives, he lost his own when he was hit and killed by enemy fire immediately after exiting his landing craft. Weeks later the medic armband Ware wore that day was returned to his family who subsequently donated it to the museum. The Quonset Hut used for housing and hospitals during both WWII and the Korean War houses the classroom where I will be teaching lessons on D-Day to visitors over the next coming months. It also houses the artifacts room which host a treasure trove of German and American artifacts brought home by returning American servicemen that were eventually donated to the museum. Finally, the most sobering item I worked with today were actual Western Union telegrams used to inform loved ones of service personnel who made the ultimate sacrifice on D-Day. I did have to spend two hrs. out in subzero temperatures conducting D-Day tours with my trainer this afternoon the fortunate part–I have been to Normandy France several times during my time in the Air Force and was able to share personal stories that all the visitors really enjoyed and give advice to a couple planning to visit Normandy and Berlin next year on the 80th anniversary of the D-Day Landing. For those in the local area come out to the museum over the next several months to one of my classes or tours but wait until the weather warms up that wind coming off Peaks of Otter Mountain is unforgiving, I don’t care how much winter gear you have on as a couple from North Carolina discovered this afternoon–I will post more pictures and eventually a Pod-Cast I will be working on to go with my dissertation. which covers ” The Unknown Stories of D-Day—I will be talking about the only woman who landed on Omaha Beach on D. Day as well as the 330th Signal Balloon Company the only African American Unit to participate in the D-Day landing and a host of other stories like Dr. Ware mentioned above. My mission at the museum as my trainer stated clearly is to re-tell this important American History Story as the 80th Anniversary of the D-Day Landing approaches in June 2024…

As I wrap things up here, I would like to say that this was a wonderful experience that gave me so much that I can take into the future with me. I hope to carry the skills I gained with me after graduation as I transition into my new life outside of school. I was given opportunities to learn new things every day, and it was extremely enlightening and fulfilling to do work in the field I hope to enter.

In the end, I would highly recommend it to anyone doing a history internship in the future. If you like archival work and getting hands-on with history, this is the place for you.

My internship at the Salem Museum has come to an end and I have learned so much! I have enjoyed this experience and I am grateful to have had this experience as well. I was able to learn all the ins and outs of what goes on behind the scenes in a museum. This knowledge will be helpful as I go on into my future career. I hope to work in a museum after I graduate, so everything I learned will help me to excel at a future job. Being able to create my own exhibit was one of the highlights of the internship. The small exhibit goes over some music history of Salem and has some really cool objects in it. The exhibit was a nice way to combine all the skills I have learned over the semester and see them in action!

It’s cool because of fun stuff happening, and it’s crunchy because of leaves on the ground 🙂

I have been doing a lot of stuff over the past couple of weeks as I am trying to get my hands on anything I can before the internship comes to an end. Something unexpected happened right before fall break, though – I got to start working on my own exhibit!

A display case near the entrance was cleared for me, and I was given the task of putting together a small exhibit on holiday postcards. This involved everything from research to picking out the cards to creating labels to be put on the wall above the case. It has been such an awesome experience, and it was so fulfilling to see my days of work come together.

For my remaining time at the museum, I will finalize everything in my exhibit and make sure that I understand everything I want to about museum work.

November has been full of wonderful new experiences at my internship.

I have learned how to do a number of things from hanging a picture at proper eye-level to packing historic clothing for safe storage. Packing clothing has quickly become my favorite; I am very into fashion in general, so it is super cool to be able to see and handle some beautiful old pieces in the collection. Ranging from the 1880s to the 1980s, I was able to see a very wide range of clothing that allowed me to understand period styles as well as admire how clothes were put together across different decades.

My favorite piece from the clothing I packaged was a very pretty floral-patterned dress from the 1950s. Normally the 1980s would be more my style, but something about this dress was so pretty and light that I had to get a good picture of it to admire 🙂

Over the past week at my internship, I have started to put together my exhibit. This will be a small exhibit in a display case near the entrance of the museum. To make this exhibit I will get to use all the skills I have learned over my time at the Salem Museum. I got to pick my theme for the exhibit and I chose an overview of local music history. Using objects from their archives I will be able to show some examples of music that was made here in Salem and how technologies have changed in recording technology. The first step was to search through the archives and look for objects I could use in the exhibit and what stories I could tell with them. The next step I have done was to start to write captions to pair with the objects. Over the next few weeks of wrapping up my internship, I will finish up and get to put up my display! I hope to show pictures of it in my next blog post!

During the first week of October the Salem Museum held their annual Ghost Walk Event! During the Ghost Walk, guests are taken on a tour through the cemetery across the street and get to meet the ghosts of important people in Salem’s history. During this years Ghost Walk, I was able to lead one tour and also work a hands on history table inside the museum that had objects relating to the ghosts. Leading the tour went well and it was a lot of fun getting to experience the Ghost Walk for myself as well! The hands on table is what I did for most of the weekend and it gave guests and opportunity to learn some history about the ghosts before going on the tour. Each item was pulled from the museums collection and was able to relate back to one of the ghosts and their story of Salem. Guests were allowed to touch and hold small objects while wearing gloves while I explained the significance of the object to them. It was a lot of fun and I also got to learn a lot about Salem from this experience!

I have been interning at the Historical Society of Western Virginia for about a month now, and I am definitely learning a lot of new things!

I began my time cataloging photographs from the Korean War into PastPerfect before moving on to transcribing letters that were sent over 100 years ago. The photographs gave me a lot of residual nostalgia for things that happened in the 1950s, and the letters really put my cursive reading ability to the test. Both types of objects let me see and somewhat feel the emotions of people at those time periods, so it has been a really enlightening experience.

Nowadays I have been promoted to cataloging three-dimensional objects like bottles and belt buckles. These get more complex due to the need to measure dimensions as well and take photos of the objects from every possible angle. Next, I will be learning how to archive clothing from the 1800s, and the fashionista within me is very excited 🙂

In the weeks since my last blog post I have learned a lot more at my internship! I have been helping do some research and find objects in the archives for a new exhibit. I have been searching through the archives to find small objects that will go with some of the displays in the exhibit. I have also helped to write some captions for images, and got to practice writing a short biography for a person as well. It can be difficult to keep the word count down of the captions and also make sure you include all the important information. I think learning to write these concise captions will help to benefit my writing skills in the end. I am looking forward to participating in the museums Ghost Walk this coming weekend as well!