It’s January. The days are long but short. The outlook for spring is still many months away. But there is a certain energy and light at the Ridgefield Historical Society. And we know where it came from — Antonia Ten Holder, an intern at our university. Please take a moment to meet her.
Where will you study at Ridgefield Historical Society, what will you focus on and what do you want to learn?
I’m at Smith College in Massachusetts, class of 2023. I’m a history major with a focus on the medieval world. I majored in art and devoted myself to museum studies. The main goal of this internship is to learn as much as possible about various aspects of museum maintenance, preservation and life. I would like to know how the museum’s undercurrent works and how best to help with issues such as grants, volunteerism and affiliation.
I don’t live in Ridgefield, but I live nearby! I had heard of the Ridgefield Historical Society prior to my internship, but had never been involved with you until now. This is my foray into the deep end!
what are you doing this month What’s been fun so far?
I’m helping with the archive this month. I am working on digitizing most of the records so that I can add information collected by researchers, access the vast collection and anyone can view them from the website! We also volunteer in other places that need extra hands, such as researching pensioners and helping with catalog items. All of them have been very valuable and very interesting to me, but I have to say that understanding the past perfect system is my favorite thing so far!
At school, I majored in medieval history and art. attractive! What do you like most about these research areas?
What I love about my research is that it is very different from what we imagined at the time. Don’t get me wrong, many of our more general concepts involve water (ideas had to come from somewhere after all). Much more subtle than high school classes can give them credit for! I love discovering new depths in areas that have been researched back and forth by all accounts, and there’s still so much more to discover! It’s a great example of how valuable a modern perspective can be in extracting new information.
Majoring in art also helps me in this way. Because I can look behind the scenes of the final product and imagine how the artist created it (along with my own experience with the context). It enables new perspectives on artifacts. something I’m obsessed with.
What do you think you will do after graduation?
It’s cheesy, but I want to work in a museum after I graduate. It’s OK to just sell tickets at the window!
What else do you do in your spare time?
In my spare time, I like to pretend to be balanced, but most of the time I read books, play board games, and sketch characters from my favorite books.
Visit RHS online https://ridgefieldhistoricalsociety.org/
