Introduction
You are standing in front of the exhibition’s introduction panel, titled “One Place, Many Stories.” To your left is a graphic panel and artifact case titled “Shell Middens.” To your right is a doorway leading to the rest of the exhibition.
This panel includes text and four images.
The main text reads:
You are standing in front of the exhibition’s introduction panel, titled “One Place, Many Stories.” To your left is a graphic panel and artifact case titled “Shell Middens.” To your right is a doorway leading to the rest of the exhibition.
The panel in front of you includes text and four images.
The main text reads:
ONE PLACE,
Many Stories
The Smithsonian Environmental Research Center occupies 2,650 acres along the Rhode River. Many people have called this place home.
The area’s first residents were Native Americans, who subsisted on the Chesapeake Bay’s rich natural resources.
European settlers arrived in the 1600s. They occupied the land used by Native Americans and imported enslaved Africans to work it.
The constant cultivation of tobacco and other cash crops drained the land of its nutrients and silted up once pristine waterways.
The legacies of this history remain with us today. They are buried in the ground, revealed in the landscape, and present in the descendants who still live in this area.
Today, SERC scientists, including archaeologists and ecologists, are working to uncover the traces of the past and conserve and restore the natural and cultural resources of this site.
Join us as we explore the stories of the people who lived and worked here and discover how we can build a more resilient future.
Think About It . . .
As you explore the exhibition, consider how you are leaving your own mark—intentionally or unintentionally—on the places you live and work.
The four images on this panel include:
A photo of rippling water with trees in the background. The caption reads: SERC’s campus is situated on the Rhode River, an embayment of the Chesapeake Bay. An embayment is an indentation in the coastline.
A photo of six men and one woman wearing traditional Native American ceremonial dress. The caption reads: Powhatan tribal leaders attend a ceremony in Richmond, Virginia, in 2007. Descendants of the Powhatan, Piscataway, and Nanticoke peoples continue to live in this region today.
A black-and-white photo of four men standing in front of agricultural buildings. The caption reads: Workers pose in front of the Java Dairy Farm, 1939.
A black-and-white photo of an elderly African American man walking through a field touching plants. The caption reads: Farmer Sam Neal tends his tobacco crop, 1976.