Telia Alilio, a student at Goucher College's Historic Preservation Program, was the 2005 recipient of the Vernacular Architecture Forum's fieldwork scholarship.  The award covered her tuition at the Poplar Forest Restoration Field School.  After completing the two week program, Telia wrote this brief essay about her experiences.

The Poplar Forest Restoration Field School took place in Lynchburg, Virginia, at Thomas Jefferson's home, Poplar Forest.  The program was based upon the techniques, problems, and solutions that can occur when working with a historic property.  The Field School provided an overview of preservation planning, conservation techniques, interpretation of houses, the operation of historic house museums, paint chip analysis, archaeology, hands-on restoration, and practice with writing a Historic Structure Report.  Being exposed to these different fields enabled me to gain a deeper understanding of what Historic Preservation has to offer as well as which field would fit me best.

My greatest directional focus came when our class was required to evaluate and report on Otterburn, a decades-long abandoned Greek Revival style house.  Prior to attending the Field School I had decided that even though I enjoy being a hands-on worker, I did not want to be dependent on just my physical capabilities.  Thus I concluded that the best way for me to pursue a career in Historic Preservation was to gain the knowledge I needed to make intelligent decisions and to find a career that would suit those abilities.  But our work at Otterburn changed my plans.

When I returned from the Field School, I described our investigation work at Otterburn as C.S.I. for houses.  We had to investigate, problem solve, and discover evidence that was waiting to be found.  For example, deciding whether doorways were original or were added later, determining the original paint color of rooms through paint chip analysis, and locating nailing blocks to support the idea that a chair rail existed.  It was while I was atop a ladder, covered in plaster dust, steadily knocking away old plaster in search of nailing block holes, that is occurred to me that I could never be happy working behind a desk.

My experience at Otterburn taught me that I could no longer deny that I was meant to be working with older houses, understanding the work that has gone into them, and helping to restore them.  The knowledge that I have gained through the Restoration Field School has helped me immensely in developing my skills for the fieldwork that I know I was meant to be doing.  After I graduate from Goucher College in 2006, I will be pursuing a career that follows my passion of restoring historic houses.  

I would urge any preservation student or person interested in preservation to attend the Poplar Forest Restoration Field School.  The staff at Poplar Forest as well as the guides at the locations that we visited were always eager to help us learn and understand how to best apply the techniques that we were learning.  The examples that I was shown and the literature that I was given at the Field School have and will continue to help me in my field.  The Poplar Forest Restoration Field School has given me the confidence and understanding I needed to pursue my dream of restoring historic houses.