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Historical role players add to Fort Wilkins visitor experience
By Karin Emond
for Keweenaw Today
8/25/00
COPPER HARBOR -- It is a cold, gloomy Sunday morning in mid-July at Fort Wilkins State Park in Copper Harbor. Carefully whittling a design into a walking staff, a soldier dressed in the heavy woolen navy
blue uniform of the Federal Army leans against the post of the porch running along the front of the barracks. Meanwhile, across the compound, the wife of an officer sits sewing near the window of
their parlor trying to see the precise stitches of the quilt she is making in the weak light of an overcast day. The grounds of the fort are eerily quiet and deserted except for these two. As one looks
around the complex, it's easy to imagine it's 1869, not 2000.
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Pvt. John Holmes, played by Michael Maata, spends his free time whittling on a walking stick. Life at isolated Fort Wilkins often had an air of monotony.
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But the illusion is shattered when a couple - he dressed in a polo shirt and shorts, she in a T-shirt and cotton khaki pants - walk into view. The soldier straightens up and puts away his whittling
knife. As the two approach, he says "Good morning, Ma'am. Are you finding everything in order at the fort today?"
"Yes" she answers. She and her husband take time from their wanderings to ask questions of the
soldier about his life at the fort. He answers as if it were 1869 - with a polite "Sir" or "Ma'am" ending the sentence.
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Recent visitors Nancy and Steve Taylor of Holland, Mich., talk with Pvt. John Holmes (Michael Maata) about life at Fort Wilkins in 1869.
Historic interpreters like Maata help the more than 170,000 annual visitors to Fort Wilkins have a better understanding of history.
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The woman holds up a shiny new tin flute. She asks the soldier if some of the men play this instrument. "Well, yes ma'am." comes the answer. Then she asks if she could play a tune for the
soldier, adding that she just bought the pipe and had just taught herself to play a song or two. As
she haltingly plays "Amazing Grace," the soldier and her husband continue to talk about life at the fort. The song completed, the couple say their good-byes and continue on their way.
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Nancy Taylor of Holland, Mich., plays a period tin whistle purchased at the gift shop as she tours Ft. Wilkins.
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Since 1976, visitors to historic Fort Wilkins State Park in Copper Harbor, like Nancy and Steve Taylor of Holland, Mich., have been able to observe, talk with and ask questions of some of the
soldiers and civilians who inhabited the fort in 1869.
Well, almost.
Obviously, the people who lived in the fort in 1869 have been dead for some time. However, visitors can travel back in time and catch a first-hand glimpse of the lives people led here, thanks to
a lot of meticulous historical researching by park historians and a group of college students from Northern Michigan University. These same students spend their days re-enacting the lives of folks
at the fort in 1869.
The historical interpreters tell the history of the fort from a first-person perspective and remain in character even if the questions come from a 21st-century perspective. The characters they portray
are based on the lives of actual people who lived at the fort during this time, although the names have been changed out of respect to any living relations to the people being portrayed.
The students portray a cross-section of people in the fort. Representing various 19th-century social
classes, the interpreters tell about life at the fort from both the male and the female perspective.
The characters include a private and his wife, a laundress at the fort, a quartermaster sergeant and an officer and his wife. Visitors have the chance to hear all sides of the story.
In order to prepare for their jobs, the students study as much as they can about their characters. They complete a two-week training class and a required reading list. They pay for and receive two
credits for their efforts. Every morning, before heading into the compound at 10 a.m., the group
meets to read, research their roles further or find the answer to a question they couldn't answer the day before.
Michael Maata, a history major and political science minor from Jacobsville, is in his second summer of portraying Private John Holmes. The fact that Ft. Wilkins was a military installation
means information is available, he noted.
"There are records of how life was here," Maata said.
These records determined, in part, how the characters were originally chosen, according to Wil Shapton, history specialist for the fort the past three years and the on-site supervisor for the
historical interpreters.
"We chose people who had more information on them and were interesting but average," Shapton said.
Although there were controversial characters at the fort and gossip about them was prevalent at the time, the intent of the interpretersí characters is to give a good view of the everyday, average
personís life. The interpreters incorporate in their portrayal the information and stories about the more colorful peopleís exploits
For the interpreters, getting into character isnít hard. Most have an interest in history. Thatís one of the reasons Michelle Metro of Mt. Pleasant, Mich.- a Michigan State University graduate in history
and museum studies - took the job.
"I enjoy history," Metro said. "Iíd much rather work outside talking to people than in an office being a curator. There are not too many jobs where deer walk through." she added.
Some interpreters - like Kate Samuelson, who portrays Juliette Mueller, the wife of Second Lieutenant Richard Mueller - also have an interest in theater. While Samuelson likes to act and has
been involved in community theater, she noted the acting involved in this job is different from stage acting.
"Itís more focused on history," she said, "and itís all ad-libbing."
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Kate Samuelson, portraying Juliette Mueller, the wife of Second Lieutenant Richard Mueller, takes a break from sewing in her parlor to
watch activities in the Ft. Wilkins compound.
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Shapton explained that even though the roles have been researched and there is a biographical script of sorts, there are no word-for-word scripts for the roles.
Said Metro, "For role playing, you really have to immerse yourself in 1870 . . .You have to understand basic living, the music and literature of the era and how they did things, or you'd never
be convincing as the character."
Metro portrays Kate Holmes, Pvt. Holmes' wife and a laundress at the fort, and has also worked at historic Williamsburg in West Virginia. She noted once a good historical understanding is
achieved, that knowledge must be taken and scaled down to what the character would know. For example, an illiterate laundress would probably not know about the literature of the time.
"I have difficulty with this sometimes," Metro added, " but I have to keep in mind who I am and what I know (as that person)."
Both Maata and Metro agreed a good background in Civil War era American history also comes in handy, since folks will often ask about places other than Fort Wilkins or how historical events of
the time impacted fort life. The biggest misconception people have is that the fort was built and manned to protect miners and settlers from the Indians. This is not true, Maata said. There was
never any threat from or problem with Native Americans in the area.
The fear that labor unrest and strikes being experienced in Detroit at the time would spread to miners in the Keweenaw Peninsula prompted the building of the fort in 1844. The anticipated labor
problems never materialized. Consequently, the soldiers stationed at the fort from 1844-46 spent most of their time breaking up bar fights rather than quelling labor riots.
The fort was re-commissioned in 1869 to help alleviate a military housing shortage caused by the large numbers of soldiers waiting to muster out of the army following the end of the Civil War. The
situation was so critical that soldiers were literally camped in tents outside the walls of Ft. Wayne, Mich., near Detroit.
Even though over 170,000 tourists visit Fort Wilkins State Park annually, there are times when visitors are sparse and the interpreters are faced with the same problems of boredom as the men
and women they portray.
And they alleviate their boredom much as their predecessors did. To stay in character, Metro said, they have to pass their slow times engaged in activities of the day. For example, Metro likes to
sew. Sewing is something a laundress would do, since darning was also part of her job; therefore, during slow times "on duty," it is acceptable for Metro to sew. She sews many of her own
costumes.
She has also taken up whittling and is currently working on a toy canoe for her "son." Sometimes she smokes a pipe, relaxing on the wall overlooking Lake Fanny Hooe. She said both whittling and
pipe smoking are pastimes Maata taught her.
Maata spends a lot of his free time whittling, carving intricate designs on his staff. He is also teaching himself to play the harmonica. Sometimes, when stationed at the guardhouse, he uses the
harmonica to draw attention and visitors to the somewhat out-of-the-way building. He feels the music also lends color to the fort.
Samuelson has been able to stitch together an entire quilt during her 10 weeks at the fort.
According to Shapton, the interpreters are only one part of the experience at the fort.
"Role-playing is not the only history at the Fort. There are also exhibits and audio-visual displays. To get the full story visitors have to combine (those displays) with the enactments."
For the fort's visitors, the interpretive players add to the experience. "It was great. It made a lot of
difference to make the history come alive," said Lee Wilcox, a self-described Civil War buff from
Kalamazoo, Mich. "They (the actors) don't glorify it. They tell it as it was. It was a hard life. You canít really know what it was like, but it gives you an idea."
Lee and his wife, Donna, have visited lots of forts and Civil War battlefields throughout the eastern United States. He noted the historical interpretation at Fort Wilkins was as good, if not better, than
that at many of the forts heís visited.
"And," he quipped, "I didnít have to pay $10 to get in."
Greg and Kim Vetter of Eagle River, Wis., agreed with Wilcox that meeting and talking with Pvt. Holmes definitely added to their experience because he made them feel they were "right there at
the time."
If visitors miss the display (near the gates of the fort) explaining the fact that the interpreters are acting as if it is 1869, they may be confused at first by the charactersí archaic language. Maata
noted that saying something like "When I got here in 1869..." usually helps them catch on. Other
than the addition of characters, the interpretive program at the fort has remained essentially the
same since its inception 24 years ago. But repeat visitors to the fort shouldnít adopt a "been there,
done that" attitude. Every year new displays are added to the buildings of the fort and, although the characters remain the same, each yearís interpreters infuse them with a slightly different
personality.
As the 2000 season draws to a close, the voices of history again fall silent. The students return to school in the 21st century, and the fort returns to the quiet solitude it knew for the many years
before it was restored and re-inhabited by the state park system. But itís not too early to plan taking a trip back in time next summer when the characters of 1869 Ft. Wilkins - brought to life
by a fresh group of students - populate the compound once more.
Perhaps the best endorsement for the visit is from visitor Lee Wilcox, who said, "If people come to Copper Harbor, they should see this."
Photos courtesy Karin Emond.
Editorís note: Karin Emond, of Green Bay, Wis., is a guest writer for Keweenaw Today. A former writer and photographer for The Daily Mining Gazette, Karin enjoys returning to the
Copper Country to visit her old haunts.
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