Heritage Park is hosting a speaker series on World War I this fall. The Keep the Home Fires Burning series will run through December and feature WWI topics from air power to archeology.
In the December presentation, USS Massachusetts, Dr. Della Scott-Ireton will present the story of the battleship USS Massachusetts (BB-2). The Massachusetts was launched in the 1890s as a brand-new and ultra-modern battleship for the United States Navy. It saw service through World War I. After it was decommissioned it was used as target practice off Pensacola. The sunken ship was made property of the state of Florida in the 1950s and was incorporated into Florida's Underwater Archeological Preserve in 1993.
Dr. Scott-Ireton is the Associate Director of the Florida Public Archeology Network. She graduated from the University of West Florida with a Bachelor's degree in Anthropology and a Master's degree in Historical Archaeology. She also has a Ph.D. in Anthropology from Florida State University. She worked with the Pensacola Shipwreck Survey, West Florida Historic Preservation, Inc., and the Florida Bureau of Archaeological Research before joining FPAN.