Leah Rae is doing her summer internship in Archives and Special Collections (located in the Killam Library). Her main focus is working on the Shipping Collection, an extensive collection of thousands of documents detailing around 2,000 ships from the 1800s-1970s.

“I am learning a lot about ships that I didn’t know before. I can now identify the differences between a cruiser, a destroyer, a junk and a barque,” says Leah.

Leah is originally from Vancouver. She holds a degree in creative writing from the University of British Columbia. She is also a poet and runs a magazine called Poetry is Dead with her friend, Daniel Zomparelli. She first came to Nova Scotia to visit her best friend, who was living in Hubbards. “I fell in love with the Maritimes at that point, and when I decided to do my MLIS, I was thrilled at the opportunity to go to Dal,” says Leah.

Leah has been interested in archives for a long time, and visited the Library and Archives of Canada on a school trip to Ottawa last winter. “I was lucky enough to be able to complete my practicum with Wendy Robicheau at the archives at Acadia University this spring, and am delighted to be able to spend the summer working here at the archives,” says Leah.