by Marybeth Tomka

One of the many wonders of working at TARL again after so many years, is coming across sites and materials that made impacts in my life during my student years.  Since I am just learning the locations of all the collections, I was surprised when I opened a cabinet to look at one collection and found a familiar one right next to it.  Such was my pleasure December 15, 2014.

In 1981 I was a senior looking forward to graduation in May, field school in New Mexico and graduate school in the fall.  I had been working at TARL on my professor’s project for almost a year and having the time of my life.  One of the TARL staff members mentioned that a phone call had come in from the THC and some burials had been disturbed by trenching for a phone cable near Houston. He and another graduate student were going to meet a representative from THC on Saturday and maybe, with the Houston Archaeological Society’s help, there would be a salvage excavation.  Since it was still early on in the semester, I didn’t need to study (yet!) so I asked to go along.

I was going on my first excavation with two graduate students; I thought I was impressive having finished my osteology class in the fall of 1980.  Boy, did I get a lesson in humility.  But what an experience!  I got to excavate a site, work a transit (for you young folk – the forerunner of a total data station where you actually have to know geometry!), and the best part, work alongside experienced avocational and professional archaeologists.  I worked on the site for several weekends in January and February and then again in August when I got back from field school.

I am sure that in the coming days, weeks, months, years ahead, I will find more that has my present intersecting my past life at TARL.

Introducing TARL’s Head of Collections: Marybeth Tomka

We are pleased to announce that Marybeth Tomka joined the staff of the TARL in July 2014 as the Head of Collections.  Marybeth received her BA and MA from UT-Austin, and feels like she has come home to TARL.  Marybeth has over 30 years of professional experience in the field of cultural resource management. She has experience working in both the private and public sector, has completed analyses of lithic and ceramic materials, made contributions to archaeological reports, participated as the supervisor of archaeological lab and field crews, and served as a project manager while in the private sector.

She spent six years with TRC, six years with TPWD, and as a work study and later employee at TARL’s former contracting arm.  She comes to us from the Center for Archaeological Research (CAR) staff where from July 2000-July 2014, Marybeth served in two major roles as the laboratory director for contract projects and as curator.  She was the driving force to CAR’s 2006 acknowledgement as a THC certified repository coming as only the second institution to be certified.  She also served as the technical lead for outreach field schools work with community volunteers at the National Park Service’s Spanish Colonial site of Rancho de Las Cabras in Wilson County from 2007 through 2012 and taught UTSA’s field in 2008 and 2010. As an undergraduate, and then graduate student, Marybeth was a lab technician for the WS Ranch Project of the Anthropology Department under Jim Neely, and as a teacher’s assistant and area supervisor for the University of Texas (Austin) field school as part of her Master’s thesis research. Her research focused on the great kiva complex.

Marybeth’s interests are focused in the management of archaeological records and collections within the context of state and federal laws and sound museum practice. This interest as well as database administration, led her to pursue additional training and in June 2012, she received her Professional Certification in Collections Management from the University of Victoria (UVic).

Already somewhat versed in TARL’s massive collections, Marybeth is happily pursuing taking TARL into the 21^st century with planned projects in collections care, collections management, and database construction management.  She will also be actively recruiting volunteers as we move forward.

Follow the blog and/or subscribe to the Friends of TARL Newsletter to keep track of Marybeth’s projects, her discoveries in TARL’s collections and her own blog entries as she gathers the reins and guides TARL’s collections along an exciting trajectory into the future.

DID YOU KNOW?

The artifact featured above in this post is made of shell.  Per Susan Dial, Editor and Project Manager of Texas Beyond History, this artifact is an:

“Engraved conch shell gorget with triskele design, ca. AD 1400. Excavated by the University of Texas in 1938 from the Mitchell locality (site 41BW4) in the Upper Nasoni Caddo village on Red River, Bowie County, Texas. Specimen 41BW4 (6-2-56); width 11 cm. To learn more about the Hatchell-Mitchell site, see the Nasoni exhibit at http://www.texasbeyondhistory.net/nasoni/index.html.”