About Samuel Pfister

I am the collections manager at a small archaeology museum—The Badè Museum—in California's East Bay. Working alongside a curatorial staff that can be counted on one hand means that my responsibilities in the museum are varied; on any given day I am a docent, research assistant, conservator, archivist, marketing project manager, event planner, content producer, and exhibition designer. Overall, my work revolves around developing strategic methods for cataloging our vast and varied collection and telling our institution's story through emerging media. In pursuit of the latter, I've expanded the museum's social media horizons from Facebook alone to Instagram, YouTube, and even Tik-Tok. These aims are driven by my passion as an archaeology communicator. As a supervisor with the Tel Kabri archaeological project in present-day Israel, I frequently led tours of the 3,750 year old heritage site for international audiences and have written extensively for Biblical Archaeology Review—a popular print & online Near Eastern archaeology magazine. Otherwise, I'm also enthusiastic about bread baking (who *didn't* pick up sourdough baking this past year?), backpacking, board games, and speculative fiction—reading and writing it.

Samuel Pfister is the collections manager at the Badè Museum in California's East Bay.

Samuel's website

NBN Episodes hosted by Samuel:

July 27, 2021

Olga Tufnell’s 'Perfect Journey'

John D.M. Green and Ros Henry

Hosted by Samuel Pfister

Olga Tufnell (1905–85) was a British archaeologist working in Egypt, Cyprus, and Palestine in the 1920s and 1930s, a period often described as a golde…

May 4, 2021

Why Those Who Shovel Are Silent

Allison Mickel

Hosted by Samuel Pfister

Since the beginnings of organized archaeology in the Middle East in the 19th century, western archaeologists have typically employed large “gangs” or …

March 19, 2021

Wonderful Things

Jason Thompson

Hosted by Samuel Pfister

When asked what he saw after reverently peering into the freshly opened tomb of Pharaoh Tutankhamun, Egyptologist Howard Carter could only find the wo…