Welcome to an extended bonus episode of Finding Medina.

I'm calling this one Digging Medina.

I'm Brandon Seal.

Two emails, separated by almost a year, restarted our search for the Battle of Medina.

The first email came on December 6, 2019, about six months after the last episode had dropped

from our Finding Medina podcast season, which I recommend you look up and listen to so that the rest

of what follows here makes sense. Good morning, Mr. Seal, the email again. We haven't met,

but Kay Hines provided me with your email.

I'm the new regional archaeologist for South Texas at the Texas Historical Commission.

I'm not sure if you're yet aware, but there's a newly invigorated push within our agency to determine the Battle of Medina's location.

We're hoping to involve researchers such as yourself who have dedicated years, if not decades, to this issue.

For now, a small team that includes myself, Emily Dilla, our newly appointed Archaeology Division Director, Brad Jones,

and our GIS specialist archaeologist Virginia Moore, is tasked with familiarizing ourselves with the materials that we have on hand.

This was great news. The Texas Historical Commission was moving tasked with familiarizing ourselves with the materials that we have on hand.

This was great news.

The Texas Historical Commission was moving the Battle of Medina to the top of their list.

And why not?

The largest, bloodiest battle in Texas history, the first steps toward Texas independence,

the critical series of events without which the rest of 19th century Texas history doesn't really make sense, why shouldn't these things be a focus for the Texas Historical Commission?

But Emily's email also felt like a part of our formula for finding the battlefield was working.

Fundamentally, our idea had been to try to crowdsource history here.

Our goal in publicizing the battle and bringing more eyeballs to it

...