Mary Ann Levine

Heritage Tourism and Community Outreach: Public Archaeology at the Thaddeus Stevens and Lydia Hamilton Smith Site in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, USA

Historic sites serve as windows into the past that rely on material culture to narrate the past to the public. This narration serves as a dialogue between archaeologists and the public, creating a relationship that shapes community and individual awareness of heritage. However, heritage is a mediated and constructed concept that expresses particular histories to support specific agendas, ranging from scholarly archaeological research to urban renewal and redevelopment. The Thaddeus Stevens and Lydia Hamilton Smith Historic Site in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, USA, provides an opportunity to examine how the creation and interpretation of a heritage tourism destination combine to create a form of public archaeology.

Remembering the Women of Vine Street: Archaeology and Historic Preservation of an Urban Landscape in Lancaster, Pennsylvania

This chapter analyzes a gendered landscape in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, based on our excavation of a property once owned by a free African-American woman, Lydia Hamilton Smith, who was the housekeeper of Thaddeus Stevens, an abolitionist and leading congressman during the Civil War and the Reconstruction Era. Stevens and Smith were only the most famous residents of the property; in this chapter we examine this property as an example of a microcosmic landscape through which we interpret changes in the social and physical landscape of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, over time. Our focus is on an urban houselot, located at the corner of Queen and Vine Streets in Lancaster, known locally as Lot 134.

Archaeology, Intangible Heritage, and the Negotiation of Urban Identity in Lancaster, Pennsylvania

Lancaster, Pennsylvania, has recently experienced a heritage crisis and renewal precipitated by the closing of the Bon Ton, the last downtown department store, and the shuttering of the landmark Watt and Shand Building. Having been the anchor of Penn Square, the city’s physical and social center, the Watt and Shand was perceived by many as a central component of local identity formation, reflecting not only its importance as a manifestation of tangible heritage, but its importance as an arena for the negotiation of the intangible heritage of ritualized consumerism. This article examines the processes of heritage creation and urban renewal by exploring the closing of the Watt and Shand Building, how and why alternative uses of the building were negotiated, and how an alternative heritage narrative emerged through an archaeological investigation of the homes of a radical congressman, Thaddeus Stevens, and his African American associate, Lydia Hamilton Smith.