Hello everyone!
This is Kaylee Hagemann, you may remember me
from the Fort St. Joseph Archaeological Field School of 2017. Right now, I am
starting my third year at Western Michigan University. This semester, I am
hoping to finish up the classes I need for my Anthropology Major and I am now
taking classes for my Religion minor. I also took on the independent study for
the field school to continue further research for Fort St. Joseph.
For our field school, we spent the summer digging at the
Fort St. Joseph site (20BE23). Once summer is over, we pack everything up and
fill our units, that we spent weeks in, with dirt (I miss my unit very much). But,
our research does not end once the season turns to Fall. Field students have
the opportunity to enroll in an Independent Study to continue researching Fort
St. Joseph. Hailey Maurer, Meghan Williams, Genevieve Perry, and I are working
with Dr. Michael Nassaney to
continue research and analysis for the Fort St.
Joseph Archaeological Project (FSJAP). |
| The view of the Archaeology Lab from Moore Hall's entrance |
During the Fall semester, we spend most of our independent
study time in the lab that is located at Moore Hall on Western Michigan
University’s (WMU) campus. Moore Hall is the building of Anthropology, it is
where most Anthropology classes and Anthropology professor’s offices are held.
For our independent study, we have a whole list of tasks to
complete by the end of the fall semester. We must do inventory on our 2017
field season artifacts, bag the artifacts, digitize our field notes
(transferring the information to an online form), create a new brochure,th - 15th),
Midwest Archaeology Conference (Oct 19th - 21st), Michigan
Archaeology Day (Oct. 28th), and Portage Lake Center Elementary S.T.E.M
Night (Nov 30th).
work
on blogs, social media, and photographs, mail T-Shirts, and create the Annual
Report. We also have a list of events that we intend to attend to represent the
FSJAP: Midwest Historical Archaeology Conference (Oct. 13 |
| Boxes of artifacts from Summer 2017 excavation to be inventoried |
We are all assigned to complete some of these tasks. I was
to do the first blog, create ideas for a new brochure, and work with Dr.
Nassaney on the inventory of the artifacts. I did inventory on Tuesday morning
of this week. During the summer, the artifacts were separated by object and put
in small bags, then those small bags were put in bigger bags that represented
artifacts found within that level of a particular unit. Then these bags were put
into boxes in order to keep the levels of each unit all together. When doing
inventory, we take out a box and pull out one unit level bag at a time, empty
out it’s contents, record the information on the tags in an inventory, weigh
the artifacts using grams, and make sure the tags are correct and the artifacts
are indeed what the tags say they are. So far we have completed inventory on
one box and still have several boxes to go. I am finding that I am enjoying
doing inventory. I get to see exactly how many artifacts we found (one unit bag
had over 500 unburned bones!) and recall all the excitement of discovering an
artifact in the field and now being able to study them further and determine
what the material is, how it was made, and what it’s function was.
For this independent study, I really look forward to
learning more about identifying artifacts and being able to go to the
archaeology events.
For all our followers, I wanted to say thank you for staying
with us, we appreciate you so much! Have a great day!
- Kaylee
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