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Collector News: Sharing History with Future Generations
Due to the pandemic, MVAC’s annual Artifact Show was cancelled in both 2021 and 2022. However, the pandemic did not stop collectors/avocationalists from their continued search for artifacts, and sharing their finds with their family, local students, and the public.
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Jay Bittner
This past year was very busy. My girls Elise and Olivia continue to help me find and discover new archaeology sites. They get so excited when they find a flake in the field. Olivia found her first projectile point last spring and Elise found her second projectile point last summer.
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Both girls are learning how to properly photograph record and document every flake and artifact that they find, to help gather data for future research. I was able to record and report several new sites with the Wisconsin Historical Society, as well as updating a few previously recorded sites. I appreciate the help, support, and recommendations from MVAC with recording these sites! In November of 2021, the Bittner 2 site was plowed up. I recovered another stone axe from the site. It was broken in half, but it’s exciting to find another one. I also visited the Hunger Bear Mound site, which is still intact. There is a plowed field adjacent to the mound I was able to walk with visibility around 90%. I found two flakes in the field, which can be reported as an isolated find.
Above: Stone axe recovered from the Bittner 2 site.
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Jaremy Cobble
I did quite a bit of surface collecting last year and found a few interesting artifacts. I found my first artifact made of hematite, which was a very small celt. I knew right away it was hematite by the shine it produced with the sunlight reflecting off it, but I did not know exactly what it was until I pulled it out of the ground. I was pretty excited! A few days later, I was hunting a field somewhat out of the normal site area, thinking that I may find a stray projectile point or two and came across a nice dark gray “flake.”
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After I pulled it out, I realized that it was not a flake, but a base of a Wyandotte Turkey Tail point! I could not believe it. One practice that I have started to do is mark the GPS coordinates of my finds (using an app on my phone) to have a good record as to where I found each one. I highly recommend this as something that all avocationals should do. I believe it adds a valuable piece of information when you catalog your artifacts. My hope is to go back and more thoroughly look over the area where I found the Turkey Tail point, since I kept record of where I found it with the GPS. I am hoping to find more pieces of it or possibly others, since these types of points were generally in caches. All the artifacts are from Sheboygan County.
I had a fun time last year taking my daughter out in the field for the first time. Every five minutes she had to show me all her finds. With the help of my wife, she found her first arrowhead.
I also made it out to do fieldwork for five days at the DeWulf site near the quad cities Illinois, in May and September, volunteering for Dr. Thomas Loebel of the Illinois State Archaeological Survey. This is an extremely interesting Paleoindian site, which was accidentally found by two avocationalists approximately ten to fifteen years ago. Almost all artifacts (mainly bifaces) at the site have been thermally burned and broken and almost all of them are made of Hixton Silicified Sandstone, Galena chert or Blanding chert. Interestingly, Moline chert is found in outcrops only a few miles away and it is essentially absent at the site. In addition to the biface fragments, approximately a dozen unworked copper nuggets have also been recovered in the site area.
Above: Artifacts collected during surface survey by Jaremy Cobble in Sheboygan County.
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Hoyt Strandberg
Hoyt survived two Covid infections, spending 10 days in the hospital during his first infection. After his recovery, he was back to conducting surface surveys and finding interesting artifacts. Pictured at right are artifacts recovered by Hoyt Strandberg in 2022.
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Betty Steele
Betty continues to share her late husband Gary’s collection with students in the Black River Falls school district. Since schools have been back to in-person classes, Betty and MVAC archaeologist/Education Coordinator Jean Dowiasch have provided presentations to the district’s 3rd graders at the Black River Falls Library. Thanks to Library Services Coordinator Vicki Doud Fisher for organizing the visits.
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Above: Betty Steele (left) shared her family’s collection during presentations for students from Red Creek Elementary at the Black River Falls Library.
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Meaningful Mentoring
Christine Hippert, professor of archaeology and anthropology at UWL, is spearheading a new mentorship program for the UWL School of Education faculty. The program is designed to help faculty get acclimated to the community while succeeding and advancing in their careers.
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Archaeological Terms, Artifacts, and Specific Sites Snippets
New information added to MVAC’s website in November:
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Creating MVAC: A 40th Anniversary Interview with MVAC’s Founder, Jim Gallagher - Video
Link to view post
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Regional Interest
Links are provided to other organizations, videos that may be of interest to our readers. MVAC is not responsible for the content of other groups' videos.
YouTube - Traveling Prehistoric Seas: Boats, the Oceans, and Archaeological Evidence for Precolumbian Voyages
AIA Milwaukee Society
YouTube - The archaeological and paleoecological legacy of the Itasca Bison Site (21CE1)
Minnesota Archaeological Society
YouTube - 1,200-Year-Old Dugout Canoe Recovered from Lake Mendota
Wisconsin Historical Society
Zoom - Identifying Oneota Cuisines
The Charles E. Brown Chapter of the Wisconsin Archeological Society
YouTube - Behind-the-Scenes Look at the Recovery of a 1200-Year-Old Canoe from Lake Mendota
Wisconsin Historical Society
YouTube – Fur Trading in the 18th-century: A View From Réaume’s Leaf River Post, Wadena Co, MN
Minnesota Archaeological Society
YouTube - There is Flint: Rediscovering the Grand Meadow Chert Quarry
Minnesota Archaeological Society
Zoom - Working to Stay Together in “Forsaken Out of the Way Places”: Investigating Anishinaabeg Family Logging Camps as Sites of Social Refuge and Resilience During the Era of Assimilation in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, 1880-1940
The Charles E. Brown Chapter of the Wisconsin Archeological Society
Zoom - Ancient Pottery, Cuisine, and Society at the Northern Great Lakes
The Charles E. Brown Chapter of the Wisconsin Archeological Society
Historic Preservation and Archaeology Webinars
Wisconsin Historical Society
YouTube – Phase III Excavations at 47CR660 – Lessard Site (Vicki Twinde-Javner)
Colorado Archaeological Society, Indian Peaks Chapter
YouTube - Iowa Stories: Household Economy at Wall Ridge (Jim Theler and Joe Tiffany)
State Historical Society of Iowa
Podcast - The Power of Indigenous Knowledge (Heather Walder)
Wisconsin Humanities
Zoom - From the Mountains of the Philippines to the Shores of Lake Superior: Exploring the Performance of Pots
The Charles E. Brown Chapter of the Wisconsin Archeological Society [Note: it must be watched through the zoom client software. It can be installed for free online; just the regular zoom viewer does not work.]
YouTube - The Moon's Tears Fell on Cahokia
The Archaeological Conservancy
YouTube - Evidence for Bison Butchering and Use from the Joy Creek Major Site
Iowa Archaeology
YouTube - Archaeological Examination of the War Eagle Shipwreck
La Crosse County Historical Society
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