Anyone ever worked with their local historical society?

smugglersbluez

Full Member
Jan 10, 2013
150
185
central Georgia
Detector(s) used
Garrett At Pro , Bounty Hunter IV
Primary Interest:
Metal Detecting
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Nope, I'm not a "member" of our Historical Society. . . one of the members that knew I metal detected as a hobby contacted me. Yep, I was surprised.

The premise of this program was not what could be found, but rather what could be learned from what was found. I met with our HS met and suggested a course outline that included basic research, conservation and basic artifact recovery techniques. Remember, these are "kids" that need instant gratification. . . even a rusty nail or a coin from the 1940's will peak their interest. . . it so happened that the property I secured was built in the 1890's (old for my neck of the woods). The excitement these kids felt with their finds blew me away. And after their "finds" were conserved (cleaned up), it was well worth my time.

Ah, so THEY contacted YOU to do that. That is: an active member who had sway and say-so, looped you in. Then this is still the same concept: A far cry from a non-member walking in off the street, and saying "Hi, I'd like to lead a workshop about metal detecting". In your case, as you can see, it was someone there in-the-position to do such a thing, and also their own idea to conjur up "topics" to have someone talk about.

Example: At a museum/society where I docent at, after a few years of being a fly-on-the-wall docent, I noticed that at each of the docents quarterly meetings (where all 30 or 40 docents get together for a members meeting-of-sorts), that at each of those quarterly meetings, would be a particular topic. Eg.: someone brought in to talk about something historical. Like one meeting they might have an indian expert person. Another meeting might be an historical architecture expert, and so forth. When it became apparent to me that they look to see what the "topic of the night" would be, I approached the lead curator, to volunteer to talk about and show some local dug relics, (fitting the time period of this particular attraction to which I volunteered at). They agreed, and I got to speak to the group about some artifacts found, etc...

But no, if I'd just walked in and said "I'd like to address your group about such & such", then no, it wouldn't have happened.
 

At the height of my detecting years I had met the County Historian and after a few talks at fairs and whatnot he invited me to join a group " HB Smith Industrial Village Conservancy" to help raise funds for the place outside the mansion walls where there was once a small 1800's industry making woodworking machinery and big wheeled bikes amongst other things. Anywho I eventually became Vice President and actually had the Historian tour local towns suggesting places to detect. As crap happens just at this time my wife pushed out the first kid and my free time disappeared, finally now 8 years later the bug is coming back to get out there again a swinging, if I can find an hour to get out there..
 

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