T.E.LAWRENCE (LAWRENCE OF ARABIA)

On February 7th, Dr. Amy Barron presented Archeologist, Teacher, Soldier, Spy.  Amy is a professor of Museum Studies at Sir Sandford Fleming College. She graduated from the University of Toronto with a PHD in Mesopotamian weaponry and is an archaeologist who has worked on digs around the world.  She ran us through the early archaeologists in the Middle East, introducing some interesting personalities and difficulties they had before WW2.

These people, with contacts throughout the region and some freedom of movement, were used on both sides of the First World War as spies. We learned of the strange life and family history of T. E. Lawrence, one of these archaeologist-spies best know as Lawrence of Arabia. We learned of the much admired, Influential Gertrude Bell (Egypt & Iraq) a formidable woman who was also an archeologist and Arabist working all over the middle east and who, with T. E. Lawrence (Egypt), believed that there should be independent Arab states after the war. She was at the conference that drew the state lines for the middle east after WW1.  Sir. C. Leonard Woolley (Syria) was a leading archeologist in the region and brought many of these people together. He also worked to bring information to the allies. Their stories are intertwined and fascinating and Amy made them come alive!