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On site
A excavation site near Boone was the destination this month for 50 anthropology students.
It's extremely meticulous work.
Dirt is removed sometimes at a painstaking pace.
It is then sifted carefully making sure that nothing escapes your attention.
And even when an object is found, to most people the discovery isn't too
exciting or much to look at. Typically the findings are a hard-to-distinguish
small piece of pottery or a nail.
Yet to the anthropology undergraduate students engaged in excavating a site
just west of Boone, this is what they come to this remote site for. On two
days during the first two weekends in October, students from the Anthropology
308 class applied firsthand the finer points of archaeology they've learned
in class.
The course, taught by Nancy Coinman, associate professor of anthropology,
is an ongoing field case study of an archeological site in Logansport, a
present-day community situated on the uplands above the site along the Des
Moines River.
Along with several graduate students, Coinman took 50 students to the site
the weekends of Oct. 7-8 and 14-15. Each student is required to attend two
days.
While at Logansport, the students excavate four 10'x10' squares (units),
each supervised by a graduate student or teaching assistant. The students
who participate during the first day get experience in opening up a unit,
taking off the grass and roots, and excavating the plow zone, an area in
which the topsoil has been mixed by an agricultural plow.
Work progressed so quickly the first weekend that students began work in
the previously undisturbed layers of the dirt. They screen dirt through
screens and learn how to record artifacts.
On the last day students start backfilling the 10'x10' squares with the
dirt previously dug out of each site.
"We take the dirt out and see if we can find historic and prehistoric
artifacts," Coinman said.
Typically the students find broken ceramics, flints from stone tools and
nails. Nothing found these weekends will constitute a major discovery. Yet
for these students who are participating in their first field case study,
the discovery of even the smallest piece of ceramic can be an important
find.
"When we came out here I really didn't expect to find anything at all,"
said Rachel Studer, a sophomore anthropology major said. "But we've
actually found a lot of stuff. "And when you find something, it's really
cool."
Once an artifact is discovered, the student carefully extracts it from the
site. The artifact is then placed into a container and the location of the
discovery is plotted on a map.
David Gradwohl, professor emeritus of anthropology, started the project
in 1978. Since then close to 100 10'x10' squares have been opened, artifacts
discovered and removed, and the area backfilled by the students. During
the initial years of work, it was determined that both a historic Euro-American
mining community and at least two prehistoric Native American components
resided in the area.
Gradwohl and Coinman have maintained a record of the entire excavation process,
developing a handbook for the students in the class.
Around LAS
October 23-29, 2000
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