On Friday, Feb. 13, the Pensacola Museum of History opened a new exhibit entitled “Dressing History: Fabric of War,” located in the Textile Gallery on the second floor of the museum. Through the examination of uniforms and functional textiles, the exhibit focuses on fabric as a central component of military innovation, while also revealing how changing realities of war have direct consequences to chosen fabric material.

The military textiles that are displayed at the exhibit explore how fabrics have shaped the American military experience, from clothing soldiers wore, to materials that protected, concealed and supported them during war efforts. As the articles on display move from the mid-1800s to the modern day, guests can learn how fabrics directly evolved alongside changes in technology, the environment and global conflicts. Up-close looks at uniforms, functional textiles and accompanying accoutrements allow guests to discover the ingenuity behind designs of iconic military pieces.

“This exhibition highlights military textiles from the UWF Historic Trust Collection, many of which are rarely displayed,” said Jessie Cragg, curator of exhibits. “As a military town, Pensacola has a deep connection to this history, and the exhibit invites visitors to take a closer look at the uniforms and materials that shaped military life.”

Highlighted pieces displayed at the exhibit include a Union Army shell jacket, WWI uniform jacket, WWII U.S. Army “Eisenhower” jacket, WWII U.S Marine Corps Dress Blues uniform, 1940s Women Accepted for Voluntary Emergency Service jacket, and U.S. Navy cadet uniform dated 1950. Modern pieces include a U.S. Navy uniform from the 1980s and U.S. Navy Blue Angels flight suit from 2015.

“It is amazing to see how our military uniforms have evolved over the years,” said Rob Overton, executive director for the UWF Historic Trust. “However, we should never forget that they all were once worn by men and women who served our country.”

The Pensacola Museum of History is part of the UWF Historic Trust properties and sites. Located at 330 South Jefferson Street in downtown Pensacola, the Pensacola Museum of History is open Tuesday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. and on Sundays from noon to 4 p.m.

For more information about the UWF Historic Trust, visit historicpensacola.org.

When Maggie Brown appeared on the trivia competition game show “Jeopardy!” as a Tate High School student in 2018, it was a thrill she thought she’d only experience once. But for the UWF sophomore, the once in a lifetime opportunity recently turned out to be a twice in a lifetime opportunity.

“About a year and a half ago, they started emailing all of us who were in the high school ‘Jeopardy!’ tournament some questions like what’s your college major, what year are you, where do you go to college now,” Maggie said. 

She admits she didn’t think too much about it until October 2022 when she received an email that read ‘Confidential’ with invitation details to reappear on “Jeopardy!” for the high school reunion tournament. 

“At first I wasn’t sure if it was real,” Maggie said. “After being on the show once for the high school tournament, we all thought we’d never go back together.”

She and her fellow contestants started talking and realized they had all received the same email. The 27 of them sent texts sharing their excitement in a group chat. 

“It was so hard because I couldn’t tell anyone else about it for a couple of months,” she said. 

Maggie was flown out to Los Angeles in January where she stayed for six days while filming at Sony Picture Studios in Culver City, California.

“My second experience on the show was even better for me because I was going into it knowing most of the contestants and I was able to get closer to them,” Maggie said. 

Maggie, who is double majoring in international studies and art history and is a member of the Kugelman Honors Program, shares her days were mostly filled with filming but she was able to take in an experiential learning opportunity while in California.

“I was actually so lucky to be there at the same time that there was an exhibition featuring East Asian Art at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art,” she said. “I’ve loved art history since middle school.”

Maggie says she has always enjoyed Korean pop music and other aspects of Korean culture. When she graduates she hopes to get a job that allows her to travel or live abroad and possibly become a museum curator.

Maggie’s “Jeopardy!” episode aired on March 2. While she did not advance, she did receive a $5,000 scholarship, free trip to California and an unforgettable experience. 

“It takes a lot of skill, chance and luck,” she said. “Any one of us could have won. The best part is we are all so close. We all root for each other. We were all friends before contestants.”

Dr. Jamin Wells grew up in Rhode Island immersed in the maritime world. Alongside his father, who established one of the area’s first police dive teams and later opened a dive shop, Wells began diving at age 10 in the cold, murky New England water and spent his youth spearfishing, racing sailboats and diving on shipwrecks. He worked as a dive instructor as an undergraduate and then paid for graduate school by dredging marinas and building docks.

“I was on a tugboat at 2 a.m., reading about maritime history and cultural theory, while building marinas and doing really physical work,” said Wells, UWF Digital Humanities Lab director and assistant professor of history. “These two worlds I loved collided on that tug.”

Wells completed his undergraduate and graduate studies at the University of Rhode Island and expected to return to his hometown and work alongside his father, who by then had sold the dive shop and opened a mooring business.

“The job market is incredibly competitive in history,” Wells said. “I always felt I could go work for the family business or do other maritime careers. I didn’t go into my graduate programs thinking I had to get an academic job. I always thought I would be a really educated mooring guy back in Rhode Island.”

Instead, Wells headed to Cape Cod where he landed a position as an adjunct professor at Sea Education Association, a private, nonprofit educational organization that operates two sailing ships traveling throughout both the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. He served as an adjunct while earning his doctorate at the University of Delaware as a fellow in the Hagley Program in Capitalism, Technology and Culture.

Wells learned about maritime history through his education and experience teaching at SEA and working in the family business, but he mastered how to actually apply that knowledge in the classroom when he taught at two high schools in New Orleans from 2013-15. Wells taught at schools on the opposite ends of the charter school spectrum—Miller-McCoy Academy, a struggling school where over 95% of the students qualified for free or reduced lunch that has since closed, and then New Orleans Military and Maritime Academy, a diverse and well-supported school.

“I was not really trained how to be a teacher in graduate school,” Wells said. “Becoming a certified teacher and then working in high-needs schools, I learned a lot of teaching techniques and strategies that I brought with me to UWF and use in my classrooms every day.”

In January, Wells celebrated his fifth anniversary at UWF. He teaches courses in local, oral, digital and public history, along with overseeing the Digital Humanities Lab and the graduate program in Public History. He is just as proficient at motivating his students as teaching them.

“I’ve never met a student who didn’t like and respect Dr. Wells as a person and a professor,” said Melissa Williams, a history graduate student. “He takes the time to give detailed, specific feedback and goes above and beyond expectations to help his students be the best they can be. He recognizes the potential in everyone, and although they may hate him for it in the moment, he never lets them settle for anything less than their best, which students appreciate in the end.”

Geoffrey Ramirez, a history graduate student, said Wells blends traditional academic knowledge with real-world examples and experiences. He teaches beyond the textbook, using video games, music and guided tours as teaching tools.

“He designs his courses to maximize each student’s learning potential,” Ramirez said. “He ensures his students experience how classroom learning translates into the public sector. He understands our issues, our skills, our backgrounds and works his students at their level while still pushing them to improve.”

Faced with the same challenges as other professors of transitioning to remote instruction in 2020, Wells still managed to balance his teaching load with publishing his first book, “Shipwrecked,” launching the Gulf Coast Digital History Project and lending his expertise to a local nonprofit, Achieve Escambia, on an intensive ongoing study of Brownsville and West Pensacola.

“Shipwrecked: Coastal Disasters and the Making of the American Beach” delves into the history of beaches as they developed from isolated frontiers into thriving recreational spaces. Wells said shipwrecks changed how people thought about and experienced the beach during the nineteenth century in a way similar to how hurricanes and sea level rise are reshaping our experience with beaches today.

“The beach used to be feared,” Wells said. “It was seen as a hot, isolated, unproductive space, where you couldn’t grow anything—a really harsh environment. To make matters worse, every couple of years a big storm would inevitably come and do damage. People saving people from shipwrecks were the very foundation of the modern beaches we know today.”

While the book focuses on the northeast, exploration of the maritime history and heritage of the Gulf Coast is now readily available through the digital history project that Wells has overseen for the last three years. The collaborative project features an online portal hosted by UWF where one touch of a screen or click of a mouse allows users to explore thousands of digitized photographs, maps and other historic documents, along with a curated list of books and articles.

“This collection is a one-stop shop for students, scholars and researchers to delve into the rich maritime history of the Gulf Coast,” Wells said. “The collection is robust and we are working to further expand this resource.”

Some days Wells feels as if he is racing against the clock to complete his research and instruction while still spending quality time with his family. Yet, he manages to carve out a few hours each month for the Achieve Escambia partnership, where students are working on place-based projects to understand the intersection of race, policy and regional inequity.

His extraordinary work ethic resonates from those formative years performing backbreaking labor on the tugboat with blue-collar men who embraced the future professor as one of their own.

“I met a lot of interesting folks and heard some colorful language, but I learned a lot about honest work and making an honest living,” Wells said. “Those were some of the best years of my life…so far.”

The book, published in 2020, examines how shipwrecks laid the groundwork for the beach tourism industry that transformed the American beach from coastal frontier to oceanfront play space, spurred substantial state and private investment alongshore, reshaped popular ideas about the coast and turned the beach into a touchstone of the American experience. The book is based on extensive archival material including logbooks, court cases, personal papers, government records and cultural ephemera.

“This book sits in several fields of history—environmental history, cultural history and the emerging field of new coastal history—and it is the first to tell the broader story of one of the most iconic spaces on the American landscape—the beach,” Wells said.

Wells said the book began as a master’s research project in 2008 during his time at the University of Rhode Island. He developed the project as a dissertation, which he completed at the University of Delaware in 2013. He said he took a brief break to teach high school in New Orleans, then spent the last four years at UWF revising and extending the dissertation into a full manuscript.

“I’m proud that this book speaks to multiple disciplines including history, archaeology and American studies, and that it offers a provocative argument about the formative role disasters played in the development of the modern American beach,” Wells said. “I hope it spurs discussion and future research. I’m also proud that this is a book that will appeal to an audience beyond scholars and university classrooms. I worked hard to remove academic jargon and tell compelling stories so this research reaches people interested in reading about shipwrecks and the beach.”

To learn more about the Department of History, visit uwf.edu/history.

Exploration of the maritime history and heritage of the Gulf Coast is now readily available through the Gulf Coast Digital History Project, featuring a digital portal established by the University of West Florida and various partners. One touch of a screen or click of a mouse allows users to explore thousands of digitized photographs, maps and other historic documents, along with a curated list of books and articles.

The digital history project seeks to foster research, teaching and learning about the northern Gulf of Mexico by creating an accessible clearinghouse of history and heritage resources. Featured collections include articles on Harold J. Brow, a commander in the U.S. Navy who earned the title of the fastest flyer in the world in 1923, images of the Port of Pensacola from the 1970s and letters Navy officer Mark X. Benson sent from the Pacific Theater to his wife in Gulf Breeze during World War II.

“This collection is a one-stop shop for students, scholars and researchers to delve into the rich maritime history of the Gulf Coast,” said Dr. Jamin Wells, UWF Digital Humanities Lab director and assistant professor of history. “The collection is robust and we are working to further expand this resource.”

The project will launch the portal with a virtual event from 11 a.m. to noon on Thursday, Dec. 10. Registration is open to the public and the event will showcase the portal along with a panel discussion and live Q&A session.

“High school teachers often are given a very basic or bland curriculum as the foundation for history courses, and many of them spend hours upon hours searching for and piecing together resources to supplement their curriculum and enrich their students’ academic experience,” said Williams, a Pace High School teacher and UWF history graduate student who will serve as a panelist for the virtual event. “This database provides an easily accessible and searchable tool that teachers can use to pull primary sources relevant to their coursework and to their students’ lives as residents of the Gulf Coast area. These primary sources can make a world of difference in engaging students in the work of a historian.”

The National Park Service provided funding for the project through the 2017 National Maritime Heritage Grant Program. The research team includes representatives from the UWF Digital Humanities Lab, Department of History, UWF Libraries and the Florida Public Archaeology Network. Other partners include Gulf Breeze Area Historical Society; Destin History and Fishing Museum; Pensacola Lighthouse and Museum; National Naval Aviation Museum; West Florida History Center; UWF Archives; and UWF Historic Trust.

“The Destin History and Fishing Museum is very fortunate to be a part of the Gulf Coast Digital History Project,” said Kathy Marler Blue, executive director of the Destin History and Fishing Museum and a panelist for the virtual event. “Our museum is a caretaker of the local culture and heritage and has acquired many artifacts and documents from the families of our early pioneer families of Destin. Our ultimate goal is to have our whole collection digitized in-house. This project is a wonderful venue and first step in sharing that heritage for research and information.”

To access the Portal, visit uwf.edu/gulfhistoryproject.

Throughout their lives, Valmae and Ron Besser were ardent advocates for the University of West Florida, supporters of the arts and committed to community improvements in Pensacola. Their longstanding history of generosity led to the establishment of three endowed scholarships at UWF.

After a 27-year career with the U.S. Navy, Ron Besser enrolled at UWF, graduating in 1992. From the 1990s until his passing in 2010, he took photos for the UWF student newspaper, The Voyager, as well as UWF Athletics, the Department of Theatre and other campus organizations and departments, earning the nickname “Papa Paparazzi.”

In 1999, the Bessers established two endowed scholarships—one for the Department of English and another for the Department of History. At the time, Val Besser explained their choice in departments saying, “Without English or history, you’re lost in the world. Without English, you can’t communicate and without history, you will continue to make the same mistakes.”

In 2010, Val Besser established a third scholarship endowment, created specifically for students working in theatre design and technical theatre programs. It was also at this time that they indicated that they would like to include the University in their estate plans. Following Val’s passing in summer 2019, the University learned it will receive a gift of approximately $2 million in support of their scholarship endowments.

“Val and Ron Besser provided a transformational gift for students in the departments of theatre, history and English,” said Howard J. Reddy, vice president for the Division of University Advancement. “Their commitment to higher education and the advancement of UWF students will live on as their legacy.”

For more information about giving to UWF, visit uwf.edu/give.

Audio stories and documentaries created by undergraduate students were highlighted at the first annual University of West Florida Digital Humanities Lab Spring Showcase held April 26 at the University Commons.

“The Digital Humanities Lab, which opened in August 2017, is housed in the Department of History and is funded by the Office of the Provost,” said Dr. Jamin Wells, assistant professor and director of the public history master’s program. “The facility is used for small group and individual digital projects.”

“We have the tools and technology to create all types of digital projects,” said Wells, who oversees the lab.

The showcase featured two documentaries made by students in an upper-level Latin American history course on the Andes mountains taught by Dr. Erin Stone, an assistant professor in the Department of History.

One of the documentaries detailed the Nazi war criminals who were able to flee to Argentina after World War II and assimilate in the German middle-class community that had already been established there.

The other documentary showcased the rise and fall of Colombian drug trafficker and narcoterrorist Pablo Escobar.

The showcase also featured audio stories and podcasts made by students in Wells’ oral and community history course.

Those students interviewed residents of Century, Florida, about the effect an F-3 tornado that swept through the town in February 2016 had on the community, as well as the steps the town has taken to recover. Included in those interviews were Century Mayor Henry Hawkins, as well as members of the Alger Sullivan Historical Society. The students conducted about 15 interviews and compiled a total of 14 hours of audio recording.

“They took those hour, half hour, and 90-minute interviews and turned them into a short five to 10-minute audio story,” Wells said. “They learned to use a lot of new technology and software. They really dove in.”

For more information on the Department of History, visit uwf.edu/history.

The University of West Florida Historic Trust and Polimbatree will host “Griots Comin!” a celebration of African art, poetry, dance and song at Voices of Pensacola tomorrow from 7-9 p.m. The performance will showcase traditional Afrocentric art and music as well as provide a debut for the Polimbatree presentation at the Florida Folk Festival held May 25-27 at the Stephen Foster Folk Culture State Park in White Springs, Florida.

The event will utilize traditional African musical instruments like the kora, akonting, ballaphone, mbira and djembe to give an uncommon dimension and distinctly Afrocentric flavor to poetry, dance and song. The performance will feature talented performers like classically trained pianist and vocalist Angie West, poet and author Abena Isake and poet, musician and producer of the Griots Comin CD Lepoleon Williams. Theola Bright, radio personality, recording artist and fashion designer, will highlight colorful African fashions.

A griot or jali is a West African historian, storyteller, praise singer, poet and/or musician. The griot served as a repository of oral tradition and was often seen as a societal leader due to his or her traditional position as an advisor to royal personages.

Voices of Pensacola, located at 115 East Government St., highlights Pensacola’s multicultural history as well as provides community groups the opportunity to utilize the space for programs and performances.

For more information, contact UWF Historic Trust Director of Education Sheyna Marcey at 850.595.5985 ext. 105 or visit historicpensacola.org.

The University of West Florida Historic Trust, in conjunction with Pensacola Cinema Art, will host a screening of “Freaks and Errors,” a feature-length documentary about postage stamps, collectors and the lifelong quest for the obscure. The screening and presentation will be held on Feb. 8 at 5:30 p.m. at the Voices of Pensacola, 117 East Government Street. The event is free and open to the public.

The screening of the film, which includes interviews with columnist and author Neil Steinberg, footwear guru Stuart Weitzman, “bond king” Bill Gross and an enthusiastic collection of lifelong stamp hobbyists, is a commentary on how people search for ways to make order out of chaos, connect with one another and express their passions.

The screening will be followed by a presentation by Calvin Mitchell, assistant curator of philately at the Smithsonian National Postal Museum. Mitchell is a past recipient of the Smithsonian Institution’s distinguished secretary’s award for the philatelic exhibition “Freedom Just Around the Corner: Black America from Civil War to Civil Rights.” He is a member of several philatelic organizations, including the American First Day Cover Society, American Ceremony Program Society, Military Postal History Society, Ebony Society of Philatelic Events and Reflections and  American Philatelic Society.

The screening and presentation complement the exhibit “Philately & Friendship: The Art of ACE” on view at the T.T. Wentworth, Jr. Museum through Feb. 27. The exhibit features 50 illustrated envelopes, as well as pages of personal correspondence, created by members of the Art Cover Exchange, also known as ACE. The postal art included in the exhibition was sent by ACE members around the work to fellow member and local artist Manuel Runyan during the 1930s and 1940s.

For more information, visit historicpenscola.org or 850.595.5985.

For more information on the “Freaks and Errors” film, visit www.freaksanderrorsfilm.com.

Pensacola — University of West Florida students spent two months researching primary source documents in local archives to create a more complete picture of a person interred in St. Michael’s, a historic cemetery in downtown Pensacola.

Members of Dr. Jamin Wells’ “Local History” Summer course, which includes graduate and undergraduate students, recently presented research results at a symposium at the Voices of Pensacola Museum.

“We covered a lot of ground,” Wells said. “We showed that history is powerful and useful by making community connections between Pensacola history and broader topics such as changing notions of marriage or women’s education.”

Papers that the 11 students wrote for the UWF history class will be available to the public as part of St. Michael’s research archive. Students will also give graveside presentations at the cemetery’s “Spirit of the Sea Public Day,” from 9 a.m. to noon Saturday, Sept. 30.

The cemetery is located at 6 N. Alcaniz St.

St. Michael’s comprises eight acres in downtown Pensacola and has been in use since the mid to late 18th century.

“A cemetery like St. Michael’s provides a vital link to the history and heritage of a community,” said Margo Stringfield, an archaeologist at the University of West Florida Archaeology Institute.

Stringfield, who has worked on the conservation and preservation of cemeteries for the institute since 2000, helped some members of Wells’ class with their research.

“Projects like these help prepare students for their professional lives,” Stringfield said. “It’s important to tell these stories as they add greatly to our understanding of the community as a whole. And they link people and events to a broader world stage.”

Wells’ class started the project about eight weeks ago.

“We kicked off with what we called a boot camp,” Wells said. “It was designed to teach students about available local resources.”

Besides the initial two-hour guided tour of St. Michael’s cemetery, the students visited the genealogical library at Pensacola State College, the Voices of Pensacola Museum, and the UWF University Archives and West Florida History Center.

Students ultimately used State of Florida digital resources, newspaper articles, private family papers such as diaries and personal letters, census reports, marriage licenses, death certificates, land transfer records and various other business records to unearth information about the people they were researching.

“This was not a class where you read a book and turned in a paper,” said senior Dominick Limle, who is a history major. “We were sweating at the cemetery and getting help from and talking to experts that handle archives and doing a ton of digging into primary documents.”

Limle’s researched Louis Maestre, who was born in Valencia, Spain, around 1778. Limle used property records, wills, and the census to determine that Maestre moved to Pensacola between 1810 and 1816. Maestre purchased land and opened a market in downtown. He then became involved in the local business and political communities.

Limle presented first at the Voices of Pensacola symposium and said he is looking forward to participating in the cemetery’s public day in September. His presentation is titled “Louis Maestre: Spaniard, American, Entrepreneur.”

“We learned a lot, and it was very entertaining as well as educational,” Limle said.

Here is a complete list of titles of presentations from Wells’ history class.

“The Life of Samuel R. Overton” by Erin McCarthy.

“Mary Jane Axtell: Pioneer of Women’s Education” by Jordan Wells.

“The Robinsons: A History Carved in Stone” by Elayne Hinsch.

“Stephen and Angela: A Love That Saved Our City” by Zachary Laczko.

“A Lone Grave: The Life and Times of Dario Giuseppe Piaggio” by Cathy Dewey.

“Mrs. Emma Hulse Taylor” by Ginger Meyers.

“The Tale of an Immigrant: Gaitano Giardina” by Caleb Pascoe.

“Stanger than Fiction: The Life of Abraham and Fannie Daniels” by Dylan White.

“Captain John Stokes: An Irish Immigrant and the American Dream” by James New.

“Sturgeon John” by Cassie Brown.

Pensacola – A painted canvas replica of the labyrinth design from the stone floor of the Cathedral of Notre Dame de Chartres was installed in the Commons Auditorium at the University of West Florida from March 27 through 30.

The Chartres labyrinth design symbolizes the pilgrimage to Jerusalem and is based on earlier spiral designs from prehistory. Such labyrinths have been discovered on every continent.

“Completing the labyrinth is a form of meditation,” said Patrick Dickson, a UWF senior. “It’s a good chance for people to focus on nothing more than walking.”

Dickson was one of dozens of volunteer guides to the labyrinth from Dr. Marie-Therese Champagne’s 3000-level history class called “The High Middle Ages.”

“Today many healthcare institutions as well as churches are installing indoor or outdoor labyrinths as tools for personal reflection and meditation,” Champagne said. “It’s a chance to disconnect from the world, and we all need to do that sometimes.”

Students and community members who took a break from their days to walk the labyrinth while it was in the Commons Auditorium experienced an atmosphere similar to that of a Gothic cathedral circa 1200 A.D.

Everyone remained silent. Incense burned, and authentic musical compositions from the period played through speakers.

At four separate times during the installation of the labyrinth, The UWF Chamber Choir, under the direction of Dr. Peter Steenblik, UWF director of choral activities, sang Gregorian chant. They wore authentic habits as they chanted in Latin.

“Doing the labyrinth in this atmosphere was an inspiring and peaceful process,” Cody Sutton, a UWF senior said. Sutton stopped by the Commons Monday morning to walk. “I wasn’t sure what to expect, but with the music in the background you can definitely feel a presence.”

Champagne said that not only is walking the labyrinth a relaxation tool, it’s a chance to put aside 21^st century perspectives and understand the concepts of another time.

Having the labyrinth available is an example of high impact learning, Champagne said.

High impact learning is an immersive approach designed to engage students directly with material rather than relying on traditional lectures by the professor.

Champagne has organized the labyrinth project numerous times since 2009.

“People can really get into it and experience it,” Champagne said. “They are walking around in a darkened interior. They are hearing music. They are smelling incense. The only thing we are missing is the kind of stone ceiling that would have been in the cathedral around 1200.”

The University of West Florida Historic Trust hosted a groundbreaking ceremony today for Museum Plaza, a historic preservation and education project that will help tell the story of Pensacola’s rich history.

“The UWF Historic Trust is committed to providing both visitors and neighbors of this city an authentic interpretation of history that is unique to Pensacola,” said UWF President Martha Saunders. “This is a groundbreaking both literally and figuratively – we will actually be moving dirt today, while celebrating through this symbolic gesture the evolution of new things to come, new assets for the region, and a new cultural activity center for the enjoyment of the public.”

The multi-purpose, cultural activity plaza will serve as a central connection point between the T.T. Wentworth Jr. Florida State Museum, Pensacola Children’s Museum, Voices of Pensacola multicultural center and the Historic Pensacola Village, while doubling as an outdoor classroom that helps the public better understand the historic landscape.

“Museum Plaza represents a gathering space for our community members, serving as a connector in the heart of our great city,” said Dr. Brendan Kelly, vice president for university advancement at UWF. “It will develop minds in a creative way by bringing to life key historical events, highlighting Pensacola’s archaeological treasures, and making history relevant and fun for people of all ages.”

Featuring a covered pavilion, children’s play area and outdoor historical exhibits, the plaza is the next phase of development included in the UWF Historic Trust Interpretive Master Plan. The plan, which was launched in Fall 2015, details the transformational vision for Historic Pensacola through a series of appropriate and achievable enhancements to provide balance between resource protection, historical education, visitor and recreational use and enjoyment of the 8.5 acre, 28-property complex. 

A focal point of Museum Plaza will be an outdoor education center featuring a covered stage and seating area ideal for presentations, performances, lectures and other educational activities focusing on history, archaeology and architecture, as well as an exploration playground that will provide fun, affordable and family-centered activities in a vibrant and engaging environment.

Two key donors for the outdoor education center and exploration playground were recognized during the groundbreaking ceremony. Quint and Rishy Studer also gave $150,000 to the project in support of its alignment with the Studer Community Institute’s efforts to make Pensacola the country’s first Early Learning City. David and Emily Walby gave $100,000 to support the creation and construction of the Linda Evans Memorial Education Pavilion in memory of Linda Carol Evans, a UWF alumna and charter class member who devoted her life to teaching elementary school students.

For more information about the UWF Historic Trust, visit historicpensacola.org.

The University of West Florida Historic Trust is introducing “Florida Stories,” a new walking-tour mobile app to enhance the visitor experience in historic Pensacola. A launch event will be held in front of the T.T. Wentworth Jr. Florida State Museum on Wednesday, Nov. 30 at 10 a.m.

The app, which features a 12-stop, self-guided, illustrated audio tour, was produced by the Florida Humanities Council and is now available for free download to mobile phones. Visitors can download the app directly onto their Apple or Android mobile phones or via a QR code shown on rack cards in participating venues and the Visit Pensacola Visitors Center. The tours are also available online at floridahumanities.org.

“We are excited to be part of this convenient way for residents and visitors to hear the fascinating stories and rich history of Pensacola,” said Robert Overton Jr., executive director of the UWF Historic Trust. “This new walking tour app provides us with another opportunity to connect with our visitors at their leisure.”

The app was developed using funds from the State of Florida and the National Endowment for the Humanities. The Pensacola walking tour was made possible by a grant from the Florida Humanities Council and collaborating partners UWF Historic Trust, UWF Archaeology Institute, Florida Public Archaeology Network and Visit Pensacola.

To learn more about the UWF Historic Trust, visit historicpensacola.org.

The University of West Florida Historic Trust presents “The Power of Children: Making a Difference,” a new exhibition opening Nov. 10 at the T.T. Wentworth Jr. Florida State Museum. Explore the lives of Anne Frank, Ruby Bridges and Ryan White—three children whose lives offer lessons about overcoming obstacles to make a positive difference in the world. The exhibit will run until Jan. 7, 2017.

The Power of Children encourages children and families to explore issues of isolation, fear and prejudice by giving a personal face to three major issues of the 20th century: the Holocaust, the Civil Rights Movement and the AIDS epidemic. Through audio-visual presentations, original artifacts and hands-on interactive displays, visitors will get to know each child’s story and experience where each child felt safe through immersive environments.

The exhibit aspires to show the power in which words, actions and voice can have when people are faced with hatred, racism and discrimination. At the exhibition’s end, visitors are challenged to find ways that they can make a difference.

Organized by The Children’s Museum of Indianapolis, The Power of Children has been made possible through NEH on the Road, a special initiative of the National Endowment for the Humanities. It has been adapted and toured nationally by Mid-America Arts Alliance.

The material in the exhibit is serious in nature and recommended for children 8 and older. For more information, visit historicpensacola.org or contact Wanda Edwards at wedwards@uwf.edu or 850.595.5840 ext. 105.

Pensacola — University of West Florida students dressed in authentic Roman garb delivered research presentations as part of the “Daily Life in Ancient Rome” symposium Oct. 27 in the John C. Pace Library.

“You walk away from this really feeling like you know the material,” said Montana Delagarza, a junior majoring in art history. She gave a report on mealtime fare from the period and provided examples for peers and spectators to taste during her 10-minute presentation. Among the many dishes she prepared was “dulciaria,” a combination of dates, pine nuts and pepper.

Delagarza was one of 25 presenters from Dr. Marie-Therese Champagne’s 3000-level history class called “Rome and the Mediterranean World” who participated in the forum which lasted from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Each of the 25 students was assigned a topic on which to speak, and their speech had to be based on research from primary sources, Champagne said.  Everyone dressed in the wardrobe of the period to make their presentations. UWF professor Glenn Avery Breed and his students in the costume shop of the theatre department created all the clothing the presenters wore.

“Once I started with the research, it was a blast,” said Mitchell Leon-Baez, a senior majoring in history. “It was interesting to learn about the different roles the ‘Pontifex Maximus’ played in society. It turns out he wasn’t just like a priest overseeing all the religious matters of ancient Rome. He was a bureaucrat, and it was a prestigious office. It’s fun to find out something from the primary sources that you didn’t already know.”

Students’ topics fell into the wide-ranging category of “From the Public Arena to Private Life.” Besides midwifery, food, and military tactics, there were presentations on the lives of the Vestal Virgins, charioteers, long-distance traders, religious officials, gladiators, galley and house slaves, and augers. Other students portrayed specific people from history including the poet Ovid and the writer Juvenal.

“Doing the research was enlightening,” said Dillon Maddox, a senior majoring in history, who portrayed Julius Caesar for his presentation. “I discovered the complexities surrounding the politics of Caesar’s ascension. The level of corruption in all facets of the system and the government surprised me.”

Champagne used a $5,000 Quality Enhancement Plan grant from the University to fund the high-impact learning event, which concentrated on life in Rome from about 300 BC to 300 AD.  High impact learning is an immersive approach designed to engage students directly with material rather than relying on traditional lectures by the professor.

“I think it was a tremendous success,” Champagne said. “You can tell from the presentations and the way they answered questions that the students worked hard to use primary sources in their research, and the information they presented certainly proves that truth is stranger than fiction.”

Champagne, who said she plans to do the event again next fall, emphasized the importance of the oral presentations at the event.

“This is a real-life tool,” she said. “No matter what you go on to do, it’s important to be able to communicate clearly with people.”

“The Daily Life in Ancient Rome” event closed with a guest lecture called “From Simplicity to Sumptuous: The Dinner Party in Ancient Rome.” Dr. Kara Burns, a classical art historian from the University of South Alabama, gave the talk. She said the ancient Romans used the dining experience as a way to impress their friends and business associates, to elevate their social status, execute political maneuvers and illustrate their power.

The University of West Florida archaeology program announced today the discovery of a third shipwreck from the Spanish fleet linked to Tristán de Luna y Arellano’s 16th century expedition to modern-day Pensacola. The discovery comes less than one year after UWF archaeologists identified the terrestrial site of Luna’s colony in a developed neighborhood in Pensacola, marking the earliest multi-year European settlement in the U.S.

The third shipwreck was found in Pensacola Bay near Emanuel Point I and II, the first two shipwrecks linked to the Luna expedition. Emanuel Point I was found by archaeologists from the Florida Bureau of Archaeological Research in 1992 and was later investigated by BAR and UWF. Emanuel Point II was discovered by UWF during a summer field school in 2006.

The third ship, Emanuel Point III, was discovered by UWF archaeologists and students during the Combined Archaeological Field Methods course on June 20, 2016. After identifying the land settlement in 2015, the UWF team was able to narrow the field of search for the remaining shipwrecks during the summer field school in 2016.

“We chose a shallow spot with a sandy bottom to dive to give the students a break after we’d been in another part of the bay where it was deeper and darker,” said Dr. Greg Cook, assistant professor of anthropology and principal investigator of the Emanuel Point II shipwreck. “We thought there probably wasn’t anything there, but had found an anomaly when we surveyed and decided to let the students have fun investigating it. Within two minutes, the divers came up and said they felt stones with their probes. Later that afternoon, the first artifacts were found. I said that day, ‘You know, it shouldn’t be this easy.’”

The UWF team has discovered ballast stones, iron concretions and articulated hull of the ship, including frames and hull planking, as well as remnants of ceramics once carried on it. They received a joint permit from the Florida Department of Environmental Protection and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to conduct test excavations through March 2017 to determine the extent of the shipwreck and the type of wood used to make the ship, which will indicate if it was among the earliest ships to be built in the New World.

“We stand a good chance that this is a different type of ship from Emanuel Point I and Emanuel Point II,” said Dr. John Bratten, chair and associate professor of anthropology and co-principal investigator of Emanuel Point II. “Because it was found in shallower water than the others, it might be smaller, possibly what they called a barca. This discovery is significant in understanding 16th century ship construction.”

The UWF archaeology program’s exploration of the Luna fleet has been funded in part by a Special Category Grant totaling more than $290,000 from the Florida Division of Historical Resources. The matching grant, awarded to UWF in 2014, provided funding for faculty, staff and students from UWF to conduct fieldwork, laboratory analysis, artifact conservation and curation, archival research in Spain and public outreach in all seasons for two years.

“This is an extremely exciting and timely discovery following the recent investigations at the nearby terrestrial Luna site,” said Dr. Timothy Parsons, director of the Florida Division of Historical Resources. “I’m very pleased that the Division can support this work through our Special Category Grants Program.”

Maritime field investigations by UWF, including continuing survey and excavations, have mainly focused on the six ships that were lost during a hurricane that hit Pensacola Bay in September 1559. The Luna expedition included 1,500 soldiers, colonists, slaves and Aztec Indians who traveled in 11 ships from Veracruz, Mexico, to Pensacola to begin the Spanish colonization of the northern Gulf Coast. The hurricane hit Pensacola one month after they arrived, sinking many of their ships and devastating their food supplies. After two years, the remnants of the colony were rescued by Spanish ships and returned to Mexico.

The Luna settlement in Pensacola lasted from 1559 to 1561, which predates the Spanish settlement in St. Augustine, Florida, by six years, and the English settlement in Jamestown, Virginia, by 48 years.

“Finding the third ship is highly significant because it confirms we have the whole fleet in Pensacola Bay,” added Dr. John Worth, associate professor of anthropology and principal investigator of the Luna land settlement. “The historical documents say that two ships were loaded, ready to go back to Spain. As long as we had just two shipwrecks, it could mean that the rest of the fleet was somewhere else. Now we know we really do have the fleet, not just two ships that happened to be from the fleet.”

   

The Luna land settlement was identified in October 2015 when Pensacola native Tom Garner discovered Spanish colonial and Native American artifacts at a privately owned residential lot within view of the two uncovered shipwrecks in Pensacola Bay. UWF has continued investigations at the settlement site since it discovery, including offering a land-based field school during Summer 2016. Together, the shipwrecks and land settlement provide a unique insight into the earliest multi-year European colonial settlement to be archaeologically identified in the United States.

“They found the third ship closer to land while we were working on a lower part of the settlement site,” said Dr. Elizabeth Benchley, director of the Division of Anthropology and Archaeology and the Archaeology Institute. “Watching the survey boat over Emanuel Point III, seeing how close it was to land and imagining this was where the people came and stepped ashore; it gives me goosebumps. It’s very powerful to put yourself in a location where you can envision what the landscape was like in 1559.”

UWF’s research related to the Luna expedition is sponsored in part by the Department of State, Division of Historical Resources, and the State of Florida. Other sponsors include the UWF Archaeology Institute and the Florida Public Archaeology Network.

To learn more about the Emanuel Point shipwrecks and the Luna land settlement, visit uwf.edu/luna.

WHAT: The University of West Florida archaeology program will host a press conference to announce an archaeological discovery in Pensacola.

WHEN: Friday, Oct. 21

TIME: 10 a.m.

WHERE: T.T. Wentworth Jr. Florida State Museum
330 S. Jefferson St.
Pensacola, Florida 32502

Pensacola — Alan Manning grew up loving history, which he learned first-hand from his grandfather who used to regale him with stories of World War I.

When he was 8, his grandparents gave him a book about American presidents. He read it over and over. He started to collect campaign buttons, and he continued to read about the presidents. When he was in college, he read “The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt” by Edmund Morris.

“It was the first history book I ever read that felt as though someone was just telling a good story,” Manning said. “I told myself then, maybe you can write a book about a president some day.”

Some day came earlier this summer when Manning published “Father Lincoln: The Untold Story of Abraham Lincoln and His Boys—Robert, Eddy, Willie and Tad” from Lyons Press.

As the title and subtitle indicate, the book offers a look at Lincoln as Dad. Here is an excerpt from the book’s epilogue that sums up Lincoln’s paternal experiences.

The story of Lincoln the father reveals a side of Lincoln that helps complete the picture of the sixteenth president and demonstrates what most people instinctively suspect but find difficult to reconcile with the larger than life image that has been created around him: that Lincoln was, in many ways, just an ordinary man. He loved his career and found meaning in his work, but he also knew that he had to fulfill his obligations as a father. His frequent absences from home, especially early in his career, often brought work and family into conflict. Yet he persisted in carrying out his fatherhood roles. Along the way, he experienced the typical joys and challenges of fatherhood: playing with his children, mediating sibling disputes, seeing a son off to college, giving career guidance, forging emotional bonds, worrying about family finances, offering religious training, and leading by example. 

Using primary sources as well as Lincoln’s papers, many of  which have been digitized by the Library of Congress, Manning put together a timeline for the book.

“I love doing research,” Manning said.

The book started off as the basis for his master’s thesis in history, which he earned from the University of West Florida.

“I was looking to tell a story not yet told about somebody a lot of people are interested in, and I wanted to write a book that was a respected work of historical research that academia and the public could both enjoy.”

Manning, who is an adjunct professor of history at UWF, is a retired lawyer who teaches U.S. history at Pensacola Catholic High School. He lives with his wife and four daughters in Perdido Key.

The timeline Manning created for his book and the primary sources he quotes show that despite what is widely believed, Lincoln’s oldest son, Robert, and Lincoln did not have a strained or distant relationship. That belief has been based on some of Robert’s own statements suggesting that they rarely spent time together.  They, in fact, spent a lot of time discussing Robert’s future after college and enjoying time together during family vacations.

So why would Robert want to paint a picture that seemed to create distance between him and his father, or at least give that impression to biographers that he spent so little time with him?

Manning goes on to answer that question based on the research he did for the book.

Robert made statements minimizing his interaction with his father at a time when he was fending off requests for intimate details of his late father’s life. By suggesting to others that he spent so little time with his father that he did not know much about him, he was able to curtail further inquiry by curious biographers.

Since its publication earlier this summer, Manning has been interviewed on regional radio and television programs, and the book garnered reviews in the Florida Bar Journal and the Wall Street Journal. The book also climbed into the top 20 books on Amazon’s best-sellers list in the category of Civil War era topics.

“It’s been a very gratifying experience,” Manning said about the attention the book has received. “I think it has appeal because it is not just a book about Lincoln, it is a book about fatherhood that a lot of modern day parents can relate to.”

Manning continues to explore his personal fascination with presidential history and pursue his career as an author.

He is working on a book about personal virtues that were passed from Teddy Roosevelt’s father, Theodore Roosevelt Sr., down to Teddy Roosevelt’s son, Quentin.  He hopes to have it finished by next summer in time to publish in the summer of 2018.

The Palafox Historic District, spanning from Chase to Zaragoza streets and Spring to Tarragona streets in downtown Pensacola, is now listed on the National Register of Historic Places thanks to the organizing efforts of University of West Florida public history alumna Cynthia Catellier.

The National Register of Historic Places, administered through the National Park Service, is the official list of historic places in the United States deemed worthy of preservation. Authorized by the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966, it is part of a national program to coordinate and support public and private efforts to identify, evaluate and protect America’s historic and archaeological resources.

“As the first multi-year European settlement in the United States, it’s important that we share our history with the public,” Pensacola Mayor Ashton Hayward said. “We are extremely proud of Cynthia Catellier and the University of West Florida for continuing to put Pensacola on the map.”

Catellier began the nomination process for the district in 2011 as a student in the UWF public history master’s program. The program focuses on the “applied side of history,” according to Dr. Patrick Moore, associate professor and program director. Students develop a skillset tailored for professional settings outside of traditional academia, such as museums, cultural resource management, historic preservation, film and technology.

“It’s an exceptional accomplishment for somebody to take the time and cover such a broad scope of criteria – identifying places, demonstrating their value and providing evidence. The nomination process is unbelievably complex,” said Moore.

Catellier connected with Donald Kelly, the senior urban planner for the Pensacola Community Redevelopment Agency at the time, to begin her work in 2011. “I started researching local history, buildings, infrastructure and development in order to develop a submission that met the Register’s standards,” she explained. Additionally, Catellier spent weeks walking the Palafox properties, surveying the buildings and gathering information.

After receiving her degree in 2012, she continued her pursuit, collaborating with Robert Overton Jr., executive director of the UWF Historic Trust, and Desiree Estabrook, historic preservationist with the Florida Division of Historical Resources.

“Drafting the nomination was only the first step,” said Catellier, now the assistant director of institutional effectiveness at UWF. “I had to work with our state historic preservation office to convince the Florida National Review Board, then the National Park Service, that the Palafox Historic District was truly a historic place.”

The resulting nomination, a document totaling more than 100 pages, was finally approved in April 2016 and appeared on the register in May.

“This is an excellent demonstration of the kind of project that public historians out of our program do, and it’s clear evidence of how valuable those skills can be in the professional world,” said Moore. “The fact that Cindie was able to do something of this caliber, and really reach the national pinnacle, is remarkable. It’s a wonderful feeling to see that happen to somebody who’s such a skilled historian.”

The Palafox Historic District includes 129 properties, and its addition brings the total of National Register properties in downtown Pensacola to nearly 600. Other areas include the Pensacola Historic District, more commonly known as Seville, and the North Hill Historic District. National Register inclusion offers a variety of benefits, including tax credits, real estate and tourism support, and grant opportunities.

“It has an exponential economic effect for the area,” said Catellier. “The district was an asset that we already had, and now we can better leverage it for the community.”

Catellier believes that all historic preservation is local and essential to the human narrative. “We as Americans, we’re a variety of races and cultures and religions, but the thing that we have in common is our shared history. If we throw that away, what do we have? This is tangible evidence of our cultural and historic identity.”

For more information about the National Register of Historic Places, visit nps.gov/nr. For information about the UWF Department of History, visit uwf.edu/history.

Pensacola – History can’t be changed. But, Next Exit History, an app that catalogs important moments in time around the world is changing for the better through a new upgrade.

“We’re launching our beta version now,” said Dr. Patrick Moore, associate professor of history at the University of West Florida. “We’re just tweaking those last minute things that pop up.”

The app, conceived in 2006 by Moore and UWF Associate Vice Provost for Academic Programs Jay Clune, gives mobile-device users background information on historical sites around the world. Working with Historical Research Associates, a company that catalogs historic sites, the app has been licensed for use by entities around the world.

“This newest version of NEH is a complete reimagining of the user interface and an overhaul of the entire infrastructure,” said Tim Roberts, historian and NEH project manager. “The focus of this update was to create an extremely user-friendly experience, based on years of feedback, and ensure that the software was designed for speed and reliability.”

The new version will change the interface to a more streamlined, tile-based look.

“It’s a completely new design,” Moore said. “It’s now tile-based, which moves away from Yelp (restaurant locater app) model we previously had.”

While the app has always been GPS- and map-based, the update’s focus is on creating a visual experience that complements that functionality.

“We also are placing a higher premium on the visual nature of the app in terms of both basic aesthetics and how we present users with information,” Roberts said. “In past versions of the app, the primary focus was on the map. And, while the mapping component is still there and better than ever, we have also included easier ways for people to search and see the historic sites around them.”

Another idea that is more fully fleshed out in the new version is the gaming component.

“We’ve improved our ‘History Hunters’ function of the app,” Moore said. “It’s a completely new graphical experience.”

The “Backpacks,” which give users preset tours of nearby sites, are also getting improvements.

“We have also vastly improved the design of our gaming component and the tour feature within the app,” Roberts said. “In essence, this version of the app is what we originally envisioned years ago when the project first started.”

NEH is already in use around the world. In the U.S., both regional historical societies and national museums have collaborated with and used the app to improve visitor experiences.

“It’s being used in places like Mineral County, Montana, and Colonial National Historical Park in Virginia,” Moore said. “It’s gratifying to see it being adopted across the country by entities of all sizes.”

Recently, NEH has been working with one of America’s most prestigious historical institutions on an extended project.

“We are currently working with the Smithsonian Museum of African-American History and Culture on a project aimed at connecting objects in their collection back to the historic landscape,” Roberts said. “This is a multi-year project that we hope will lead to new opportunities working with other museums and cultural institutions.”

While the information in NEH is presented in an entertaining way, education is ultimately what the app is about.

“We’ve begun to create educational modules designed for classroom use that incorporate NEH,” Moore said. “We’re looking at templates and curriculum to see how they fit the standards of things like the Florida Virtual School.”

Moving into the classroom is a natural progression, Roberts said.

“The new version of the app is easily adapted for a variety of new features, and we are actively working with educational groups within the state of Florida and beyond to explore ways of integrating curriculum standards and learning metrics into NEH,” Roberts said.

The ultimate goal of NEH is to create what Moore calls a “museum outside the walls.”

“NEH has listings for artifacts that bring them to life for people,” Moore said. “People won’t just see Harriet Tubman’s scarf or a Nat Turner bible or Muhammad Ali’s headgear. They will have the context that will make those items real.”

Pensacola – A trail that documents Pensacola’s rich maritime history is slated for the downtown area later this year.

The “Pensacola Maritime Heritage Trail” is the brainchild of Dr. Amy Mitchell-Cook, chair of the Department of History at the University of West Florida, and Dr. Della Scott-Ireton, associate director of the Florida Public Archaeology Network.

Mitchell-Cook and Scott-Ireton had long talked about trying to bring a walking history tour to downtown, but they finally received funding for the project in 2015 through a $25,000 National Maritime Heritage Grant from the National Parks Service. The UWF Historic Trust is also a partner in the project and is administering the grant.

“We really sat down and just thought about what is maritime history in Pensacola,” Mitchell-Cook said. “There’s just so much to do, and so we felt, ‘Here’s kind of a quick walk-through history as you walk through downtown.’”

The heritage trail will feature 10 panels full of historical information that will be erected along Main Street/Bayfront Parkway. The panels will be installed by the city of Pensacola, Scott-Ireton said.

“It will be talking about the prehistoric uses of Pensacola Bay and waterways and marine resources, right on up through Spanish exploration and colonization, and up to the modern times,” Scott-Ireton said.

One of the panels will detail the once booming commercial fishing industry in Pensacola. By the 1870s, some 5 million red snapper – then the local industry’s most-exported fish – were caught each year by local fishing outfits. The fishing industry in Pensacola waned in the mid-20th century.

Another of the panels will document the military conflict that was prevalent in Pensacola during the 18th century, including in 1781 when Spain attacked the city to oust British forces and regain control of Pensacola.

The plan is for the Maritime Heritage Trail to stretch from about the Hawkshaw Lagoon

Memorial Park to the area near Joe Patti’s Seafood, Scott-Ireton said.

“We’re hoping by fall that everything will be in place,” Mitchell-Cook said.

Graduate students in the Department of History helped gather some of the historical information that will be on the panels, Mitchell-Cook said.

“We gave them a general sense of, here is what the grant is, here are the topics that we want, and so they put together some basic texts and then started to pull images together,” Mitchell-Cook said. “Then we took all of that, and we tweaked it and worked with it.”

Some of the panels will include maps and other graphics, Scott-Ireton said.

The Maritime Heritage Trail will tie in with the Historic Trust’s interpretative master plan, Mitchell-Cook said. The trail will also complement the downtown Colonial Archaeological Trail, which is a project of the Historic Trust, the city of Pensacola and the UWF Archaeology

Institute, Scott-Ireton said.

“We have in mind that between the maritime trail and the Colonial Archaeological Trail, there may be some possibilities for additional heritage trails in those communities,” Scott-Ireton said. “And so we have kind of our long vision.”

Pensacola Assistant City Administrator Keith Wilkins said city officials are working with FPAN to determine the locations where the panels will be installed. He said the trail will be a “huge enhancement” to the area that fits with the city’s vision of having a more walkable, pedestrian- friendly downtown.

The University of West Florida Historic Trust will host two volunteer fairs during National Volunteer Week for individuals interested in joining its Historic Pensacola Ambassador team. Volunteers are needed to help the non-profit organization fulfill its mission to collect, preserve, interpret and share the history of Northwest Florida.

Each session will cover an overview of the organization and volunteer opportunities, which include museum store attendants, living history re-enactors, tour guides, exhibit assistants and curatorial staff assistants, caring for artifacts. The first session will be held Wednesday, April 13 at 10:30 a.m. at the Voices of Pensacola presented by Gulf Power, 117 E. Government St. The second will be held on Thursday, April 14 at 5:30 p.m. in the T.T. Wentworth, Jr. Florida Museum, 330 S. Jefferson St. Both sessions are free and refreshments will be served.

Volunteers must be 14 years of age or older. Volunteer time commitments are flexible and based on volunteer availability. Students, retirees and working professionals welcomed. For more information about volunteering or to make a reservation, contact Wendi Davis at 850.595.5985 ext. 111 or wdavis4@uwf.edu.

Archaeologists, historians and the casually curious can all find gold in a rare and distinctive collection of maritime books recently donated to the University of West Florida’s library.

Whether the subject of interest is a legal document, a personal diary or notes about shipwreck remains, researchers are likely to find something in the hundreds of volumes gathered during three decades by Savannah, Georgia-based U.S. Army Corps of Engineers archaeologist Judy Linn Wood.

“The breadth of the collection is its strength,” said Amy Mitchell-Cook, chair of the UWF Department of History. “It’s not just compendiums of shipwrecks and maritime artifacts, and it’s not just Georgia-based. It’s much broader, and some books tie into culture, ceramics, stoneware – even gender issues.”

The range of subjects is evident by a quick inventory of the numerous titles, including “Vikings and America,” “America and the Sea: A Maritime History,” “She Captains,” “Ghost Fleet: The Sunken Ships Of Bikini Atoll,” “Merchant Steam Vessels of the U.S. 1790-1868,” “A Sketch of the History of Key West,” “Uniform Buttons of the U.S. 1776- 1865,” and “Shipbuilding in Colonial America.”

Wood, who retired in 2011 and died last year, was recognized by the Historic Preservation Division of the Georgia Department of Natural Resources for “decades of tireless promotion of maritime heritage, submerged cultural resource identification, investigation and preservation.”

Colleagues praised Wood for her depth of knowledge of Southern maritime history and underwater archaeology. Her impressive personal library will significantly add to maritime research at UWF, said Mitchell-Cook.

Donor recognizes relationship with Bense as significant factor

The University of West Florida received the largest gift from a living donor in its history today. Long-time supporter Harold E. ‘Hal’ Marcus allocated $5 million to the College of Science and Engineering. The College will be named the Hal Marcus College of Science and Engineering in his honor, marking it the University’s first named college.

“This is a significant moment in the University’s history,” said Dr. Brendan Kelly, vice president for University Advancement and chief philanthropic officer. “Not only is this the largest gift by a living donor, this support marks a turning point in UWF’s capacity in STEM education. We are grateful to Hal for enlacing his legacy with UWF’s future.”

Marcus has given to several University programs over the past 20 years, to which he credits his relationship with UWF President Judith Bense. His first investment helped fund the archaeology program, established when Bense was its chair.

Having had the pleasure of watching her career unfold, Marcus wanted to make his major gift while Bense still presides over the University.

“Over the years, Hal has been a wonderful partner of the University,” said Bense. “I look forward to seeing the opportunities this gift will provide for our students today and for years to come.”

“I have made numerous investments over the years, but this investment in education is the best one I have ever made,” said Marcus. “Thank you Dr. Bense for your commitment to UWF and to higher education.”

The gift will serve to enhance the student experience and raise the profile of science and engineering programs at the University. Dr. Michael Huggins, dean of the College of Science and Engineering, says the gift will create new opportunities for students in the STEM disciplines, making them more competitive for the best available jobs in the state or for acceptance into the highest quality graduate programs in the nation. Such experiences may include field research abroad, expanded student competition teams and exposure to nationally and internationally recognized visiting lecturers as well as many more exciting opportunities.

“This is reinforcement for our vision of the College of Science and Engineering, which is focused on our students being successful in their future careers,” said Huggins.

“All of the work I have done in my life has provided me the opportunity to make a significant investment in the education of others,” Marcus said. “When I think about my legacy in this community, I want to make certain it is marked by investments in the education of others.”