Hi everyone,

My name is Joshua Rifkin, and I have the honor of interning at the Maryland State Archives for the summer, where I will be continuing the research of the Maryland 400. I graduated from the Park School of Baltimore in 2013 and am about to enter my third year at Stevenson University, where I am studying public history and cyber security. In 2013, I spent my senior year working and ultimately completing a 60 minute documentary about my school’s 100 year history, in which I researched the impact of WWI and WWII on the school’s evolution. That documentary ended up being featured on PBS’s blog.

Without a doubt, the founding years of this nation are my favorite period in history to research. Thus, I am quite excited to not only have an opportunity to work on, but also to learn about the Maryland 400 beside Project Director Owen Lourie and Staff Researcher Sean Baker. The timeless and transcendental documents here at the Archives will help me uncover the lives of those who valiantly fought the British during the Battle of Brooklyn. I look forward to being able to add my own research to the wonderful work on the project all ready done by Jeff Truitt, Daniel Blattau, Emily Huebner, and Taira Sullivan, by using the primary sources and documents the Archives has in its possession.

Throughout this project, I will be updating the blog with posts about the lives of the Maryland 400 and interesting insights, as well as in-depth biographies of some of the men of the Second and Seventh Company of the First Maryland Regiment.

-Joshua Rifkin