Hello,
My name is Debra M. Jones, and I am originally from Providence R.I. I am a graduate of the Community College of R.I. where I earned an A.A. in Arts Degree with a concentration in History. I have also done some courses at Eastern Connecticut State University in Willimantic. which included: Methods of Ethno-history with emphasis on New England Peoples, an Archeological Field School at Fort Shantock and a Cultural Anthropology course. I moved to Connecticut 17 years ago and now live in Stonington.
I am a Tribal Elder in the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation and I have worked at the Mashantucket Museum & Research Center for 18 years. I started out in Career Development and was given the opportunity to spend one year, working several months each in key departments: Collections Management, Conservation, Archeology, and Historical Research. I was then given the choice of working full time in one of these deptartments.
Given my love of history my whole life, I naturally chose Historical Research. Under the Direction of Kevin McBride, Tobias Glaza, and Jason Mancini, this became my career, and, over the years, I have been a part of many exciting projects including being a member of project teams for three IMLS-funded projects (2007-2011): developing new exhibits and programs on Pequot tribal history, creating an in-house doll exhibit of the many dolls in our collection and some from throughout the world, and assembling a Mashantucket Oral History collection. I have also been a part of the creation of several databases including People of Color and the Mashantucket Pequot Genealogy Project where I have helped many tribal family members trace their genealogy beyond Mashantucket.
I retired in 2019, but when I was contacted by Paul Grant-Costa and asked to be a part of the National Endowment for the Humanities historical research project “On Our Own Ground, Pequot Papers”, I was honored to a part of the project.
My name is Debra M. Jones, and I am originally from Providence R.I. I am a graduate of the Community College of R.I. where I earned an A.A. in Arts Degree with a concentration in History. I have also done some courses at Eastern Connecticut State University in Willimantic. which included: Methods of Ethno-history with emphasis on New England Peoples, an Archeological Field School at Fort Shantock and a Cultural Anthropology course. I moved to Connecticut 17 years ago and now live in Stonington.
I am a Tribal Elder in the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation and I have worked at the Mashantucket Museum & Research Center for 18 years. I started out in Career Development and was given the opportunity to spend one year, working several months each in key departments: Collections Management, Conservation, Archeology, and Historical Research. I was then given the choice of working full time in one of these deptartments.
Given my love of history my whole life, I naturally chose Historical Research. Under the Direction of Kevin McBride, Tobias Glaza, and Jason Mancini, this became my career, and, over the years, I have been a part of many exciting projects including being a member of project teams for three IMLS-funded projects (2007-2011): developing new exhibits and programs on Pequot tribal history, creating an in-house doll exhibit of the many dolls in our collection and some from throughout the world, and assembling a Mashantucket Oral History collection. I have also been a part of the creation of several databases including People of Color and the Mashantucket Pequot Genealogy Project where I have helped many tribal family members trace their genealogy beyond Mashantucket.
I retired in 2019, but when I was contacted by Paul Grant-Costa and asked to be a part of the National Endowment for the Humanities historical research project “On Our Own Ground, Pequot Papers”, I was honored to a part of the project.
