Where Are They Now?

Tracy Hoffman, 1994

The first time I picked up an issue of Biblical Archaeology Review (BAR) featuring “Dig Opportunities at a Glance,” I was a freshman in college. I remember opening the magazine, reading about the archaeological expeditions looking for student volunteers, and being intrigued by the thought I could help uncover the history of the ancient Near East. As a history major, the idea that I could walk down a street thousands of years old, hold a pot someone ate a meal from or uncover the destruction of a city was very powerful and—ultimately—impossible to resist. A few months after looking at that BAR, I boarded an El Al flight to Israel, where I would spend the next seven weeks excavating at the site of Ashkelon, a Philistine port city on Israel’s southern coast.

I loved everything about it: the dirt, the heat, the never knowing what I might find when I put my trowel in the ground. By day, I excavated a Roman period street with an open-air sewer near the city center, washed pottery and learned how to be an archaeologist. By night, I participated in the Harvard Summer School program and studied the history and archaeology of the Near East. Within a matter of days, perhaps a few weeks—but long before the end of the season—I knew I wanted to be an archaeologist.