by Erin Holaday Ziegler
A former chemistry student digs with small tools, the size of those a dentist might use, next to an aspiring business titan from another life, who lightly brushes away dirt clods with almost maternal care.
"Sometimes I'll be working, and three or four hours will fly by," the former business student says. "It's absorbing."
Both are part of a team working to record and analyze the remains of over 125 patients buried on the historic grounds of Eastern State Hospital, the second-oldest psychiatric hospital in the United States.
David Pollack, director of the Kentucky Archaeological Survey (KAS) and adjunct professor of anthropology at the University of Kentucky, has brought together professional archaeologists and anthropology graduate and undergraduate students for the project.