I first “started” at the Museum when I was just months old and am one of the privileged few who were raised on the Homesite. Back then, the Historic Patuxet Homesite looked very different from the site I know today. Yet, for myself, the biggest change has been my role on the Homesite. For today, I am the Indigenous Wardrobe Specialist.  Through the years, I've enjoyed finding my place while walking and working in the footsteps of my family.

In a community such as mine, your family tells a person more than just your last name. It is knowledge and craft passed down through determination and the hidden preservation of our ways of life. After all,  that is the core of oral tradition, the connection a person has to their people through generations of resilience and memory. As far back as I can remember, my mother held the position of Indigenous Wardrobe Specialist too. She showed my siblings and me many techniques for the construction of clothing and even how to do the research that I continue. From about 2003 to 2015, she paved a path with her amazing work, setting a high standard for me to take on that same role a decade later. As influential as my mother was in my being here, I was also graced with the expertise of artists like Erin Paul, Komi Wildhorse, Eleanor "Tootie" Coombs, and many more incredibly talented historians that shape our process today.

Over the winter, I spend my days in a space all too familiar to me, an office frozen in time. There are patterns and templates made 20 years ago. Even the newer additions are reminders of the past as the office has collected retired signs and exhibit photos. They act as reminders of why I returned to Plimoth Patuxet, to maintain the oral tradition that built our Homesite. Seeing eras of traditional clothing and interpretations of different period-correct techniques inspires me in my work every day. Yet, the development of the space I use is fairly new in retrospect. This space became a part of our program when my mother and father were here.  Space is important to be able to make and store our reproductions that bring the site to life day after day. It is one of the many points of advocacy that Indigenous staff have exercised for over the 50+ years of the Wampanoag Indigenous Program’s existence and operation. Space dedicated to reproductions allowed us to portray life more completely and as comfortably and accurately as possible while establishing the Historic Patuxet Homesite as a lively and memorable place, as it was during my upbringing.

I wouldn't be the educator or person I have become today without my family. All of my success has to be credited to them, in particular my parents and grandparents, who literally shaped the world I've come to know. My community spaces, as well as the Museum I grew up in. They held this story, it will be told again and again. Just as I am reiterating this story now. This Museum has connected generations of staff and guests to traditional knowledge that we have today thanks to families keeping tradition alive with or without permission.

About Kuwah Deetz