APRIL 7, 2004

From: Scott Beld
Sent: Thursday, April 08, 2004
To: Oxbow Archaeologists
Subject: Weds. 4-7-04 and upcoming events

Hi Oxbow Archaeologists,

A week ago Conrad and I gave presentations on the artillery button and the C-14 date, respectively. I’ll be putting pages on the website about these talks before too long!

The next speaker will be Dan Fisher (University of Michigan Museum of Paleontology) who will talk on his mammoth and mastodon research (mainly the Siberian aspect of the work). That will be Wednesday, April 21 at 7 P.M. in the Visitor Center auditorium – so mark your calendars!!

The MAS Annual Meeting will be held at the State Museum a week from Sunday on April 18. The afternoon program will be on “archaeological frauds” and this will be a good chance to see the Michigan Relics display.

The Barnes site (Paleo-Indian) material now has a page on our website . Almost all of the artifacts from the site are illustrated. Our website’s address is: www.chippewanaturecenter.com/Oxbow .

Also yesterday (April 7), I excavated my first units of the season with Ron Burk and Mike Mauer. You may recall that Ron found a fluted point (in two pieces) and a sidescraper about 2 years ago after the farmer had plowed deeper on a site he had been collecting for about 25 years (see Photo 1 in the photo gallery). Yesterday, Ron and Mike gridded out the area where the point was found (see Photo 2 and 3). Before they gridded out the site they found two quartzite choppers about 50 meters east-northeast of the fluted point findspot (see Photos 4-7) and a Meadowood point made from Pipe Creek chert about 8 meters west of the fluted point findspot near where the sidescraper was found (see Photo 8) – this point dates roughly 1000 B.C. give or take a few centuries. In the afternoon, we opened and excavated the plow zone of two units. Plow scars were readily apparent (see Photo 9 and 10). There was a feature at the base of the plow zone – 30 cm (see Photo 11). This is almost certainly not a Paleo-Indian feature and may be historic (not that it appears to be square) – Ron might find another sheep burial!

This Saturday, we’ll do lab work in the morning. I’ll be digging with Ron in the afternoon and will probably leave CNC early around noon. I know it’s a little short notice for people to go on Saturday but if you are interested your welcome to go down with me (it’s about a half hour drive due south of CNC). We may want to plan a few Saturdays excavating with Ron here in April and May – particularly if your getting sick of lab work – think about it and let me know.

Also a week from Saturday (April 17) I won’t make it up to CNC because it’s the COMA Annual Meeting and I’ll need to be in East Lansing in the morning. However, if Ron’s digging I may skip the COMA party and dig with him in the afternoon.

Hope to see you at some of these events and activities!

Scott

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Scott G. Beld, Ph.D.
Research Associate II
The University of Michigan Museum of Paleontology
1109 Geddes Road
Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109-1079
Phone: 734-764-0489 (UMMP Main Office)
734-763-9253 (My Office)
Fax: 734-936-1380
Email: sbeld@umich.edu
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