CAUTION: Pro Rangers at Work!
This week we were with maintenance. We had a briefing in the
morning with Cas who is chief of maintenance and then went to a meeting with
all the maintenance workers for a couple hours. These meetings occur every
Monday morning and last a couple hours. The purpose of the meetings is to
ensure that there is a line of communication between the divisions. The meeting
entailed discussions of upcoming plans, what was successful and unsuccessful
from the prior week, and any safety precautions that need to be brought to
attention. After the meeting we went with Linda Hamilton who taught us about Facility
Management Software System (FMSS). In the afternoon we spent an hour each with
Larry, Denny and Merle for a short briefing of what we could expect when we
worked with them during the week. Tuesday we started working with Merle, the
supervisor for custodial. We cleaned the museums by vacuuming, cleaning glass,
getting rid of cobwebs, took out trash, among other important tasks to make the
exhibits enjoyable for all the tourists. 
Wednesday we worked for Denny who is
the supervisor for Grounds, Roads, and Trails. We started in the morning by
washing the buses that transport the visitors. Later we worked with Tick to
weed out vines that were coming down historic walls. Thursday we worked with Larry
who is the supervisor for Buildings and Utilities. He had to move lumber so we
helped him with that, as well as moving stones that needed to be moved as well.
It was hard work but it needed to be done so we were glad we could help.
Friday
we worked with Peter who does project management. He taught us lots about the
upcoming projects in Harpers Ferry, and took us on a tour of the Lockwood
House. It is a historic house in rundown condition where you can see where
samples have been taken for studying. It was very interesting to see constructional
differences of a house that old, as well as seeing some civil war graffiti that
still remains. Peter explained how a house like this goes through studying and
then repair to make it into an exhibit, or perhaps how it can be left as
untouched as possible, and other ways one can go about preserving the house. It
was a great learning experience and understanding of historic buildings. We
learned a lot about maintenance and the upkeep of the park this week, which is
one of the most important parts of the park service.
-Jackie Innella and Renee Benson
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