UMass Magazine Online

Spring 2005

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Prerequisite

What Lies Beneath
UMass Archaeological Services unearths New England history by the shovelful

—Deborah Klenotic




	Sifting through history: Nick Hearth ’03 screens soil at an archaeological site, looking for artifacts of the past.

BRAKING TO A BOUNDING STOP in a rutted field, Mitch Mulholland, director of UMass Amherst Archaeological Services (UMAS), takes in the view through the windshield of his old van: pink plastic flags on short wire stems dot an expanse of weeds and grass down to a distant fringe of trees. A young guy in a maroon UMass t-shirt approaches the driver-side window. A hatchet hangs from his tool belt.
“We’re getting features in tons of sites, Mitch,” reports Chris Donta, project archaeologist for this dig in Middleboro, Mass. He nods toward the trees. “With the river here, I knew this was going to be a good one.”

“I could almost sense the site,” replies Mulholland, swinging his lanky frame out into the noonday heat.

If anyone can nose out a good archaeological dig, it’s Mulholland, who has clambered the heights of Acadia National Park and descended 18 feet into the salt marsh below Hingham, Mass., all in the name of artifact preservation. Since he started UMAS with UMass Amherst grad students in 1983, Mulholland has steered the contract-funded public archaeology consulting service into a $600,000-a-year operation that is the second largest in New England.

It’s impossible for Mulholland to drive a half hour in Massachusetts without pointing to a place—sometimes literally the exit ramp—where his crew has worked. Recent project sites span the state from Martha’s Vineyard to Springfield. They’ve worked in Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine, too, as well as along gas pipeline routes from New York to Rhode Island.

Donta leads Mulholland to the center of today’s activity: a white canopy covering two “one-by-ones”—precise, one-square-meter excavation units in the ground—and a pile of “back dirt,” or soil that has been screened. The nearby UMAS van is open, offering ready access to tools and buckets. Two wood-framed screens stand like easels in the grass. A woman and man in loose, dirt-streaked jeans dig screen dirt at a third one-by-one. A second field crew works at other units 50 yards off.

This farm has been sold to a developer. To determine what history lies underground before it’s covered over with houses, the field crew has worked here full-time for three weeks, staying in a nearby motel. They’ve dug 180 test pits and, having found signs of prehistoric activity in the soil, are now digging trenches for excavation.

“Any time there’s construction that gets federal or state funding or permitting, there has to be an archaeological review,” explains Mulholland as he moves about the site taking the black-and-white photographs that are required by federal law. “Traditionally, American archaeology occurs in an academic setting, with most of the field work conducted in the summer as a part of a field school or as a grant-funded excavation tied to a researcher’s interests. In contrast, our work is driven by the interests of public agencies or private organizations that are required to include archaeology in their construction/planning repertoire.”

The bureaucratic term for what they do is “cultural resource management,” says Mulholland, “but we arkies prefer the term ‘public archaeology,’ since our projects are for public benefit and all of our artifacts and reports are curated for future public research.”

UMAS, a unit of the UMass Amherst Department of Anthropology , has worked for the National Park Service, the Massachusetts Highway Department and Department of Environmental Management, towns, schools, and utility and energy companies.

Mulholland keeps 10 full-time staffers in year-round employment with benefits and hires about another 20 each year as seasonal field crew and other workers. Many staff members are graduates of the UMass Amherst Archaeology Field School, run by professors Elizabeth Chilton and Bob Paynter.

“The challenge for us is that we don’t have a nest egg, because we’re nonprofit,” notes Mulholland. “And because we’re nonprofit, state organizations get a good deal from us. And they get protection of archaeological sites from our experts, whose problem orientation and methodology are academically driven.”

This morning’s finds included a projectile point (or arrowhead) found by Melissa Wales ’01, a graduate of the UMass Amherst Field School. Lying perfectly intact in her palm, the artifact of Native American life is a breathtaking sight, and Wales is pleased, but not surprised. “We find points at most sites,” she says, picking up her shovel and further deepening the trench. “You get a system down and can bang these units out pretty quickly.”

Next to her, Marcus Tate ’03, also a Field School grad, screens the dirt. More than artifacts such as projectile points and pottery shards, Wales and Tate are looking for soil “features.” These are “subtle soil changes that are the result of prehistoric cultural activity,” explains Donta, and they provide the all-important context for found artifacts. Post and root mold, ants, charcoal, quartz flakes from tool-making, black earth from pot spills—soil features like these make archaeologists’ hearts pound. Wales and Tate have found an arc of charcoal in their trench that suggests Native Americans had a fire pit or hearth here thousands of years ago. Because many other units have also revealed features in this phase-two excavation, Donta thinks the site may warrant a phase-three excavation in which the trenches would be expanded to two square meters or more.

Because, as Mulholland notes, “once you dig it up, it’s gone”; the field crew assiduously recreates the site context in maps, notes, photos, and diagrams of each trench, and includes meticulous measurements of the features. This documentation, along with any artifacts found, goes back to their laboratories in Machmer Hall.

“For a project of this size,” says Mulholland, “we’ll file a 60- to 70-page report and do another year of work, cleaning the artifacts and analyzing and entering
the data.”

Eventually, all artifacts and records will be curated by UMAS and stored in the Department of Anthropology’s facilities on campus, where the findings of about 500 excavations are housed. Like the rest of the collection, the artifacts from this field in Middleboro will be available by permission for study by qualified members of the public, who will also see just how good a site it was.

Related Sites:
http://www.umass.edu/tei/arch/
http://www.umass.edu/anthro/
http://www.nps.gov/

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