August 2, 2003

From: Scott Beld
Sent: Monday, August 04, 2003
To: Oxbow Archaeologists
Subject: Ponton Site - August 2, 2003 - Outhouse found?

Hi Oxbow Archaeologists,

We made it out to the site yesterday and had a good day excavating (see pontonmap 8-3-03.pdf). John O., Dave, Kevin, Greg and I were there.

We started the day finishing unit 515R498 that was begun the previous Saturday (July 26) – we didn’t finish it that week because it rained on us about 11 A.M. and we had to leave the site. Yesterday we finished the unit. The feature or disturbed area that we noted at the end of last year continues into this unit (see photo 515R498 copy.jpg). The photo shows a feature boundary, the “fuzzy brown band”, running through the center of the unit (labeled “edge of feature”). To the left of this line is the normal yellow sandy matrix (contains little gravel). To the right is an orange (mottled with yellow) sandy gravel (contains a lot of gravel). The dark brown stains appear to be shovel dug holes (particularly the top square one) – this indicates someone else has dug there before us.

After we finished this unit we moved to the block of units to the south that I gridded out a couple weeks ago. I decided to open these units because about 10-15 cm of a feature was exposed when we excavated the south edge of the block to the north (i.e. the block of units in the center of where we’re excavating now). This feature appeared to be a little over 2 meters long from what we could see and I thought it could develop into a cellar when more of it was exposed. Yesterday we started in this block by excavating unit 509R500 (see 509R500 copy.jpg). In the photo you can see the feature in the east (right) third of the unit – there is a brick in the fill near the top. There are also several rodent burrows visible in the yellow sandy matrix to the left, as well as another stain in the southwest corner.

509R499 – after lunch John O., Greg and I excavated the unit to the east to expose more of the feature. The feature extends over the entire floor in this unit (see 509R499 copy.jpg) – dark brown mottled with orange and yellow sand and gravel with some charcoal and wood fragments. There are several brick fragments in situ and I noted several nails and flat glass fragments when I was troweling the top of the feature for the photograph.

508R500 – Greg and I excavated this unit to trace the feature to the south down the west side of the block. Only a trace of the feature was present in the extreme northeast (upper right) corner of the unit (see 508R500 copy.jpg) – so this feature is probably to small to be the cellar.

508R499 – Greg and I continued to trace the south edge of the feature to the east. The feature is only present at the north (top) edge of the unit (see 508R499 copy.jpg).

This new feature appears to measure a little over 2 meters east-west by a little over 1 meter north-south. This size is perhaps consistent with an outhouse (a double seater??).

We left the site at 8 P.M. so I didn’t have time to photograph artifacts – I’ll try to do that Wednesday and send another email later in the week. We did find some notable artifacts – Greg found a Middle Woodland projectile point and I found a couple lug fragments from an iron pot or kettle.

Wednesday, we’ll plan on doing flotation and washing the material from the units we excavated this week.

Next Saturday, we’ll plan on excavating at the site – we should be able to finish exposing the new feature!

Hope to see you at the site!

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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