Mary-
Sorry to be remiss in sending my personal preservation tale.  I had an
undergraduate degree in classical civilization, with a big interest in
archaeology, but the only path in that field was (after a lot more school)
looking to Europe and not to America.  After a disastrous winter selling
stockings at Berdorff Goodman I seriously considered higher education and
found, through a friend, the historic preservation program at Columbia.  I met
the inestimable Professor James Marston Fitch and decided that this was the
professor and the place for me.  There was the possibility that I could do
some good -- making the country a better place to live by helping keep
vestiges of our very rapidly disappearing physical heritage.  I've been in the
preservation field ever since and have been a preservation consultant in
private practice for the last 21 years.
Mary Dierickx, NYC