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Pastimes : Archaeology -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Neeka who wrote (588)	7/8/2011 2:15:44 PM
From: Zakrosian	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 7899

I took a field course in college; we were excavating a large Indian village on the Potomac that had previously been dug by the University of Michigan in the 20's. The director figured we'd get our training on a site where we couldn't do much damage. First day out, we learned that there was a lot of material that had been missed. Also, the UM excavation hadn't cross-sectioned post molds, so there was a lot of info regarding the town's structures that we could recover. This site had been farmed for almost 50 years. Nevertheless, we came across a pristine clay pipe - probably colonial, about 250 years old. Survived the plowing, etc. One of the students sat on it and completely crushed it.

To: Neeka who wrote (588)	7/9/2011 7:36:23 AM
From: Tom Clarke	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 7899

I thought I'd find something here at my house by now. Built in 1830 to be an inn, it operated until 1849 when the local Congregational Church bought it to house their pastor. I bought it from the church in 85, so you'd think being the 3rd owner of a house this old there'd be all sorts of treasure around. Turns out one of the ministers was quite the amateur archaeologist and probably pulled every loose brick and loose floorboard. So far I've found a 19th century button, a silver dollar, and lots of broken crockery out in the yard. I haven't dug around much out there, sometimes after a rain things just appear. I have dug up quite a few old bottles on a neighboring property, which had been a farm until relatively recently. They dumped stuff behind the chicken coop for a long time. I found some real treasure when my dad was stationed in Peru. Sometimes a few of the military families would caravan out to old ruins and have a picnic. While the grownups were eating and drinking some of us kids would go off and dig. I found a piece of pottery that had an intact handle and there was still paint on it. A friend found a sewing kit. The needles were made of bone and were wrapped in a case made from woven fibers. The coup de grace was finding two skulls. My mom put them in her rock garden. :) When it came time to come back to the states my dad said we had to leave the skulls, it could be a problem if they checked our crate. This was the mid 60s, I hope Peruvian authorities are doing a better job now of protecting those old ruins. Maybe they are so numerous they can't oversee them all.