Folk Life Festival

(Quadrille Dancers)

Hello, everyone! And welcome to the Virgin Islands National Park Cultural Resources Team blog spot. This week we have been in the Cinnamon Bay lab every day, and it’s been great—talking to the public, finishing some much-needed cataloguing of artifacts, and of course, taking a swim at day’s end to conduct survey work. The Annaberg Folk Life Festival took place on Tuesday and Wednesday, February 27 and 28th at the Annaberg sugar mill ruins. Susanna and I visited on Tuesday and we had an opportunity to meet local craftsmen like the basket weaver Mr. Dell and Ital, who carves local coconuts. We also tasted home-baked bread with butter and cheese—YUMMY! It is a local tradition to offer the bread and cheese as a greeting whenever a guest enters your home. Quadrille dancers both young and old performed as well as several musicians. I thoroughly enjoyed myself and left hoping that more events like this would happen soon.

(Mr. Dell, Master Basketmaker)




(1988 Tradewinds Newspaper about Folk Life Festival)

(Local Crafts)
This Wednesday, Kourtney Donohue arrived on St. John. Kourtney is an ex-intern and recently graduated with a Master’s in osteoarchaeology from the University College, Cork in Ireland. She agreed to help us out down here with our collection of human remains recovered from Cinnamon Bay. She will be differentiating between human and animal remains in preparation for burial and she will identify the specific human bones we have on hand. We are all excited to have Kourtney here sharing her expertise on this subject.
Last Friday Ken, Susanna, the acting superintendent, Catherine Light and our chief ranger went over to Hassel Island. They met up with the island’s Delegate to Congress and the St. Thomas Historical Trust to review and discuss the preservation of the island’s rich maritime history. That night, Ken gave a boat tour for the Friends to help raise funds for the museum at Cinnamon, and on Saturday finished with a five-hour tour on Low Key Watersport’s dive boat that raised about $1400 for new interns.
Until next time, everyone and thanks for keeping up!



(Ken Wild and Delegate Christenson talking over plans for Hassel Island)