I N D I A N A S TAT E M U S E U M A N D H I S T O R I C S I T E S
CROSSROADS EMPLOYEE NEWSLETTER JUNE 2022
Eight to 10 hours a week, when they could be doing anything they want to, Deborah Patrick (seated) and Susan Brutkiewicz (standing) can be found in the Indiana State Museum’s Ronald L. Richards Natural Sciences Lab identifying microscopic bones excavated from Megenity Cave in southern Indiana. Both retirees – Patrick was a family doctor; Brutkiewicz a research scientist with a doctorate in molecular and cell biology – are volunteers at the museum. For them, that means taking small, clear plastic boxes containing microfauna, putting the contents under a stereo microscope, determining what they’re looking at and then sorting the contents into one of 26 designations. They’re looking at the skeletal remains of snakes and lizards, birds, mice and voles, fish, woodrats and other creatures that ended up in the cave southwest of Corydon for one reason or another 11,000 or more years ago during the Ice Age. “It’s fun,” Brutkiewicz says. “At first, I found it almost intimidating – there was so much more to it than I thought. When I came here, I thought I was going to be cleaning mastodon bones or something.” For 30 years, Senior Research Curator of Paleobiology Ron Richards led
archaeologists, paleontologists and others on digs at Megenity Cave. (Richards died in March 2021.) They dug up hundreds of thousands of fossils and animal bones – some large, some medium and many, many tiny ones. All need to be cataloged to help scientists determine how Indiana’s climate and habitat has changed. Brutkiewicz got involved in the cataloging process four years ago when someone in a rock club that she belonged to suggested she talk to Richards. Patrick was a structural biology teaching assistant as an undergraduate and always enjoyed working with the microscope and making discoveries in the lab. Her husband, Randy, another of the 10 volunteers who work in the lab regularly, had worked with Richards for years. After Patrick retired in early 2020, she joined him as a volunteer. “There’s no sick people here,” she said. “I’m not going to make anybody cry today” with bad news. “In medicine, there’s always a degree of uncertainty. What I liked about coming here when Ron was alive was that he would sit down with us at the end of the day for an hour or hour and a half and go over every bone. I felt I knew what it was. And if Ron didn’t know what it was, there wasn’t anybody in the Midwest who knew what it was. I like that level of knowledge, that assurance.” Both Patrick and Brutkiewicz say it took about a year to be able to tell the bones apart. “The more you learn, the more fun it
becomes because you’re not overwhelmed when you look in the box,” Brutkiewicz says. “You know what 90 percent of the things are.” “A lot of it is pattern recognition,” Patrick says. That said, there are always mysteries. Always new finds too. One day in May, Brutkiewicz found a molar from a marten, a weasel-like mammal that now are found in the far-northern United States, Canada and Alaska. “I knew it was a carnivore of some kind and I knew roughly the size of the animal,” she said. “We have a huge reference collection of every Indiana animal that there is, so I compared it and matched it up.” “I look at it like every box is a puzzle,” Brutkiewicz says. “There are going to be some obvious ones and then there are going to be some tough ones.” Whatever the situation, both say they enjoy working in the lab and learning more about how Indiana has evolved over the ages. “I think this is a beautiful lab,” Patrick says. “I love this room and being able to sit and look out over the canal.” “And look at our surroundings,” Brutkiewicz says. “We have this petrified chunk of wood here with a geode inclusion. We have this Bryozoa fossil. There’s always this neat stuff that’s interesting to learn about that we never would have seen or known about otherwise. It’s always fun.”
STAFF SPOTLIGHT: MARNIE LEIST Marnie Leist is the site manager of the Lanier Mansion State Historic Site. She began working for the museum system in January 2022. In her role, Marnie collaborates with staff and volunteers to provide a welcoming and engaging experience for visitors through tours, programs, social media and events. A site manager wears many different hats, so she also can be found doing other tasks from cleaning the mansion and visitors center to working with team members to ensure the mansion is preserved and shared for many generations to come. Marnie lives in Madison. Her family includes husband Troy Lindstrand, son, Aaron Brown, age 14, a good dog named Tripp and too many cats.
WHAT IS YOUR PROUDEST ACCOMPLISHMENT? My proudest accomplishment is earning a masters degree in World War II studies program from Arizona State University with the National World War II Museum with straight As. In the program, we were asked a lot of hard questions with no easy answers. The questions challenged me academically and personally. For example, we often think of Nazis in uniforms as perpetrators of the Holocaust. In reality, ordinary citizens – often victims’ own neighbors and friends – actively or passively supported mass genocide. Knowing this, I can see how just one person can make a difference in the world by understanding the mechanisms of violence, by challenging personal prejudices, and by actively promoting kindness towards others. WHERE IS THE MOST INTERESTING PLACE YOU'VE TRAVELED? I am fortunate to have some amazing experiences working and living on the remote island of Kodiak, Alaska. For the Wild Foods project, three of us travelled with an Elder to Ouzinkie to interview and film him about subsistence foods. We spent the day learning about making smoked salmon, the best (and only) way
to can salmon roe, how and when to use the dangerous pushki or cow parsnip plant, and how environmental changes affect subsistence lifeways. It was remarkably not raining, and we filmed on a sandy beach next to an ancient Alutiiq village. The Elder has passed away, but his stories live on. WHAT IS YOUR MOST PRIZED POSSESSION? I have learned over the past few months, my most prized possession is time with my family. Relocating to Madison has been challenging, and I have been separated from my family for six months. I look forward to the day when we are all together again. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE RANDOM FACT? Woodrow Wilson grazed sheep on the White House lawn during World War I. The wool was auctioned and proceeds benefitted the Red Cross war fund. The sheep helped save manpower and contributed to the first family’s image as a contributing and rationing American family.
JULY
ANNIVERSARIES
ADAM DEKEMPER Experience – 16 years
REBECCAH SWANSON Education – 4 years
DAVIS ELLIOTT
Culbertson Mansion – 3 years
WTIU’s locally produced documentary Singing Winds: The Life & Works of T.C. Steele has been awarded regional Emmys for best writing in long-form content and best musical composition/arrangement. The Central Great Lakes Emmy Awards recognize excellence in television among its members in Indiana, Ohio and Pennsylvania.
ISMHS staff past and present had a big hand in helping the production, including Mark Ruschman, Cate Whetzel and Curator Emeritus Rachel Perry, who were interviewed in the film, and Traci Cromwell, Meredith McGovern, Jessica Stephens, Katherine Gould and Jake Sheff.
SECURITY UPDATE WHAT IS A SAFETY TEAM LEADER? WHY SHOULD YOU BECOME ONE?
CURRENT SAFETY TEAM LEADERS INCLUDE:
A safety team leader is an Indiana State Museum and Historic Sites staff member who will confidently disseminate information, enforce safety policies and procedures, and initiate preparedness, response and recovery activities as directed by the ISMHS security control office and public safety officials. It is important that we have more staff members who are properly trained and understand the importance of safety, emergency protocols and how to help during an emergency. We are looking to add eight new members to our current team of safety team leaders. Our goal is to have two or more individuals per floor. New safety team leaders will need to take the two-hour safety preparedness class and emergency safety walkthrough.
Matt Anderson John Baugh Brian Benson Melissa Bowlby Dustin Chavez Joe Denning (WRSP) Tyriee Love Meredith McGovern Erica Montgomery Elizabeth Scott Charlie Shock Eric Todd Brad Winters
coverage CBS News came to the Indiana State Museum on June 17 to interview Curator of Social History Kisha Tandy about the Major Taylor exhibit. New York-based correspondent Elise Preston, accompanied by a producer from Chicago and a cameraman and soundman from Detroit, put together the story, which aired in an abbreviated form on June 20 and a longer version on June 25.
If you or anyone you know would be a good fit for this team, please contact Dustin Chavez via email at dchavez@ indianamuseum.org. I look forward to welcoming you to the safety team leader team!
COLOR CODES The Indiana State Museum and Historic Sites uses an emergency color code system to characterize appropriate levels of vigilance, preparedness and readiness in a series of graduated threat conditions. The protective measures that correspond to each threat condition will help museum staff and safety team leaders decide what action to take to help counter and respond to an emergency. This chart should be placed in all staff office areas to ensure employees are aware of specific emergencies when code announcements are made. Download the Emergency Color Codes and Definitions sheet here.
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More than 60 people visited the T.C. Steele State Historic Site on June 18 for Painting Selma’s Garden, an event where artists from Indiana Heritage Arts painted during the day and sold their work later that evening. Three paintings sold that night; the remainder are for sale through July 9. You can see the paintings on the T.C. Steele State Historic Site Facebook page.
SHARE YOUR STORY IDEAS! Renee Bruck, manager of communication | 317.260.3506 | rbruck@indianamuseum.org