New Guest Post from our Mayor’s Youth

My Time Working as a Mayor’s Youth for the Commission

Hello, I’m Raimi. I am interning at the Cambridge Historical Commission for half of the summer of 2018, through the Mayor’s Summer Youth Employment Program. I started to be interested in history during 6th grade, because that was the first year we had a real dedicated history class. That year we learned mostly about geography, pre-civilization humans, and the bronze age. Eventually my gaze fell upon history in the last 200 years or so, especially the Cold War, and very ancient history.

(This could be either of the two things I just mentioned)
(This could be either of the two things I just mentioned)

History is what I want to do with my life, and I’m glad I got this chance to work in an actual historical workplace. I deal with mostly filing and photocopying. One of the coolest projects was when I made a spreadsheet of almost 400 photo negatives, which took a little over 3 days to complete.

What I like best about interning here is that there is usually something new to do every day. To be specific, one day I might be photocopying entire books, and the next I could be filing away slides. My favorite artifact here at the CHC is this long petition for a new water source with over 2000 signatures, including one Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.

A few facts about myself is that I have a cat named Moonlight, and a dog named Lola, but my favorite animal is the Venezuela Poodle Moth.

I enjoy reading, and my favorite book is Lirael by Garth Nix, but I would say the most well written book I’ve ever read is Lord of the Flies by William Golding.

Last thing I want to say is that if you’re in high school you can get job experience right now. It doesn’t even have to be a MYSEP job, it could just be volunteering at your school library. So don’t wait and start early.

Notes On Discovery: Brief Archival Thoughts From A Recent Intern

As a Simmons student, one of the requirements for the Library & Information Sciences program, regardless of where you fall on the dual-major spectrum, is a minimum 60-hour internship at an archival institution located either in or around Boston, Mass.  I honestly didn’t know what to expect when I was assigned a post at the Cambridge Historical Commission: although I’ve been living in the Cambridge area for a little over a year, I have to admit that I don’t necessarily know much about the actual history of it beyond some superficial knowledge. I’m from Western New York! Cambridge, to me, was where Harvard and MIT had their campuses, the backdrop of The Handmaid’s Tale, and literally nothing beyond that. What could Cambridge possibly have in their local history archives that could interest me at all?

The answer? A whole lot.

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