June 7, 2017

My name is Natalie Van Dam. I am a student at the University of Wisconsin- La Crosse working towards a European History major and an International Studies minor. My main interests lie mainly in the studying early history of Europe but I am also interested in the history of the world in general. I have recently returned to Wisconsin from a semester spent abroad in Glasgow, Scotland,studying the history of the UK, to begin an internship here at the La Crosse County Historical Society.

I am very excited to begin my internship here as it is an awesome opportunity for me to learn all kinds of new information and procedures that will be very useful in my future work. I am also excited to learn more about the local history of La Crosse as this is where I live and go to school. Today I was introduced to our cataloging system and began to work on cataloging Sterling Silver souvenir spoons. It's very interesting to see all the different kinds of decoration and detail these spoons contain and all the different places they have come from.

I am very excited to see all the different artifacts we will work with over the course of the summer and to learn more about each of them.