Jessica Dewitt PhD

Jessica graduated from the University of Rochester with her M.A. in History in May 2011. Jessica’s Masters Thesis is entitled “A Convergence of Recreational and Conservation Ideals: The Cook Forest State Park Campaign, 1910-1928,” and discusses the connection of the Cook Forest campaign to national conservation and state park trends. Jessica began the PhD program in the Department of History at the University of Saskatchewan in September 2011. She passed her comprehensive exams in October 2012. She is currently working on her dissertation, a comparative study of provincial and state parks, which defines the unique role that these park “middlemen” play in North American society. Jessica is learning GIS methods as a research assistant in the HGIS Lab. She works on contract mapping, historical map digitizing, GIS quality control and other lab projects. She is also the webmaster and communication director for the lab and the Sustainable Farm Systems project.