Abstract

Nancy Strickland Fields shares how down-time during the pandemic inspired the urge to try Carolina Gold Rice. While visiting the Anson Mills website, she unexpectedly discovered ancestral corn thought to be lost to time. Learn how one click of a mouse resulted in the meaningful experience of returning ancestral corn to tribes in North Carolina.

Self-proclaimed history nerd and art junkie, Fields' 18-year museum career has focused on museum education and administration. She has worked at the Museum of Contemporary Native Arts (Santa Fe, N.M.), The National Museum of the American Indian (Washington, D.C.) and The American Indian Cultural Center and Museum (Oklahoma City, Okla.). Her current role is director and curator of The Museum of the Southeast American Indian (Pembroke, N.C.). She is the first Lumbee graduate of the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, N.M., where she earned a bachelor’s degree in museum studies. Strickland earned a master’s degree in history from the University of North Carolina at Wilmington and is currently a doctoral student in the public history program at NC State University. 

Strickland’s area of research focuses on Southeastern Native peoples and the American Colonial experience. She is a member of the Lumbee Tribe. Her family resides in and around the Pembroke area. She was raised in Charlotte with very close ties to her family in Robeson County.

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