Continuing The Lecture Series with Dr. Brandão!

Hello Good People! 

My name is Courtney, and I am taking on the field school this summer! I recently graduated from WMU with my second bachelor’s degree majoring in Anthropology with a minor in Biology. My interests include forensic anthropology/bioarchaeology, so a little different from the historical and public archaeology that this field school does, but this is shaping up to be a great experience! After the field school, I am planning on applying to grad schools and furthering my education in anthropology.

This past Wednesday, as part of the summer lecture series through the Niles District Library, Dr. José António Brandão presented about the Jesuits and their work at Fort St. Joseph with Dr. Michael Nassaney moderating. Dr. Brandão, of the history department at Western Michigan University, presented his paper, co-authored by Dr. Nassaney, The Jesuits at Fort St. Joseph in Southwest Michigan (2021). Some of the main points of Dr. Brandão’s lecture were how the Jesuits came to settle in the St. Joseph River area, their work in converting Native Americans to Catholicism, and the archaeological evidence of religious activity in the area.

The Jesuits came to the St. Joseph River area for the purpose of converting the Native population to Catholicism. Due to the trade accessibility and large amount of individuals in the area of the St. Joseph River, the French crown allowed the Jesuits to build a house and chapel in the mid-to-late 1680’s. Though the missionaries' documents are incomplete, we know that the Jesuits were not a constant presence at the Fort. Based on the baptismal register from the Fort, we know that the Jesuits came to perform baptisms, marriages, and funeral rites. They would also focus on conversions. The missionaries did face some challenges converting Native Americans to Catholicism due to the differing religious and cultural beliefs. The Jesuits had some success, but there was still a large part of the population that did not welcome conversion. Through pressure and persistence, some of the indigenous people in the area were converted. The cultural and religious practices that did not refute Catholic beliefs were left alone, which helped the case for further conversion and education on the tenets of the Catholic faith.  

Materials found at the site such as religious medallions, crosses, and crucifixes were used to aid in the conversion of Native peoples. These visual aids were significant in teaching the converted about the central tenets of Catholicism, with the medallions typically depicting the crucifixion, the holy family, and other Jesuit images. The crosses and crucifixes were used in similar ways. Crosses were more common and made of either copper alloy or silver (the silver crosses being one of the ways we can date the end of the French occupation of the fort). 

Another very interesting piece of religious material found at the fort was part of a cilice, an object used for self-mortification to imitate the suffering of Jesus Christ. Though the owner is unknown, we can infer that whoever wore it was a devout Christian, using it for themselves without being visible to the public. Based on the religious items recovered, we can infer that there was sincerity in religious beliefs, at least somewhat.       

Dr. Brandão’s presentation was a great overview of the history of the Jesuit’s, their work to convert the Native population to Catholicism, and religion at Fort St. Joseph. Be sure to catch the third lecture of the series this Wednesday, July 21st at 7pm from Robert Meyers. The lecture series is almost over, so be sure to tune into the zoom call!

Source: Brandão, J. A., & Nassaney, M. S. (2021). The Jesuits at Fort St. Joseph in Southwest Michigan. Journal of Jesuit Studies, 8(3), 355–384. https://doi.org/10.1163/22141332-0803p002

Kickstarting the Lecture Series with Dr. Nassaney

 Hi everyone,

My name is Rex Dillman (pictured below), and I am a student at Western Michigan University and am taking part in the 2021 Archaeological Field School at Fort St. Joseph. I am majoring in applied science and engineering and have a love for archaeology. 

The Niles District Library has a four-week program on Zoom where presentations center on the Project’s theme “People of the Post.” This week, on July 7^th, Dr. Michael Nassaney gave his presentation about the Fort St. Joseph Archaeological Project. This Project is run through Western Michigan University and the City of Niles. Dr. Nassaney is an expert on the Fort, he also teaches and has written multiple books about Fort St. Joseph. He began his presentation with a brief overview of anthropology and the subfields. He also went over the organizations and partners that are affiliated with the Fort St. Joseph Archaeological Project, such as Support the Fort. He discussed the importance of the work done at Fort St. Joseph as well as how the collection of artifacts found at Fort St. Joseph has reached over 300,000 artifacts.

He then went through a brief history of Fort St. Joseph. The Fort was built first as a Jesuit Mission in the 1680s, and the French quickly struck a partnership with the local Anishinaabe tribes. This fort was one of three in Michigan built by the French. Fort St. Joseph was a mission first on the east bank of the St. Joseph River south of now downtown Niles, Michigan. The French government wanted to use the land resources for trade, and this allowed for a good relationship between the French and local Native tribes. The Anishinaabe traded large amounts of natural resources every year for different trade products from Europe. Animal furs and hides were made into fur coats and hats that were popular all over Europe. Natives received guns, metal to make objects, pots, brass lead and steel knives.

The British took command of the Fort in 1761 and had control for two years. In 1763, local Native American tribes banded together with the French to try and retake the Fort in a battle called Pontiac’s rebellion.  The British did end up retaking the Fort, but it was not regularly garrisoned. In 1781 the Spanish took the fort for 1 day, looted it and left it abandoned. The Fort was never used again and eventually forgotten about. The United States was then established, and Fort St. Joseph became an area where the French, British, Spanish and United States were once in control, and thus Niles became the city of four flags.

The fort was finally rediscovered in 1998 when Western Michigan University was invited into Niles to find the original fort location. Once the Fort was located, excavations began in 2002. We are still excavating today, over 20 years later, and are learning more and more about how the people of Fort St. Joseph lived.

Dr. Nassaneys lecture was informative about not only the history of the fort, but also about this year’s theme of the People of the Fort. There will be another lecture this Wednesday, July 14^th at 7pm from Dr. Brandão! Be sure to tune into the zoom call it will be held on.

Excavating in Trench 1

Hello everyone!

My name is Jenny, and I’m a senior at WMU. I am an Anthropology major with a minor in Classical Studies, and this is my last class before I graduate! My plans after school are to start my career, and eventually go back to school and focus on paleoanthropology. This is the first field school experience I’ve ever had, and it has been very cool so far. We’ve been lucky this past week to get nice and cool, though still some rainy, days while working at the site in Niles. 

My partner Rae Daun and I are excavating in Trench 1 at Fort St. Joseph. Our unit, which was previously partially excavated by another student in 2019, was laid out slightly larger than our peers’ units. The unit dimensions are 1 x 1.5 meters instead of a 1 x 1 meters because we ran into some difficulty getting our southwest stake into the ground. It was harder for us because the ground in this corner has a gravelly texture, resulting in the area not being stable enough to get a plastic stake into it. We also found an obstruction deeper in our soil, so hard that it bent the tip of a thick metal stake that we tried to get down there. (I hope we get to find out what the obstruction is!) Because of this issue, we had to extend our south half another 50 centimeters, which is why we have an 

extra half meter measurement. We also had a bit of trouble working around the dewatering pipe that runs  through our trench. But thankfully, we were able to raise it a bit so we could get the dirt out from underneath.

After getting the stakes in and stringing our unit, we mainly focused on the north 50 centimeters of our unit, which was the section previously excavated in 2019. We spent a while just clearing out the fill dirt in this part because it would tell us how far down we needed to go before reaching the tarp that was put down to protect and identify the area where excavation was halted. We were very careful with digging around the tarp, as it was fragile and hard to find below the soil. Eventually, we found and removed the tarp.

Once we removed the backfill in that section, we began troweling the southern 1 x 1 meter section of the unit to eventually make it level with the north side. Currently, we’re still working on this part and we have found a couple of large stone, which we think may be limestone. For now, we are working around the the big rocks because we aren’t sure how far down they go.

Thanks for reading! I can’t wait to see what we end up finding out this summer.

- Jenny

Week 1: Where Do We Start?

Hello friends,

My name is Chloe Trinka and I am a junior at Western Michigan University. I am an anthropology major with a minor in biology. My special interest field is paleopathology, and I am hoping to follow this career and passion all over the world. The Fort St Joseph Archaeological Project is the first field school I have the pleasure of being apart of and I could not be more excited to see where this one takes me! 

This week started out with an immense number of outdoor chores, team lunch giggles, and a little bit of rain. Some chores included weed whipping, digging water runoff trenches, and helping create a safe walkable path for the public when they join us for our open house August 7th and 8th. I was prepped so well by my directors that within the first day of being on the site I got to start working on my unit which is South 5 East 16. This was the first time I had ever done anything like this and the satisfaction of seeing my unit get deeper and deeper is the best! 

To the left is a picture of me at my unit during the first day at Fort St Joseph. The joy is evident even after 7 hours in 92-degree weather. There is no place I would rather be for the summer!

-Chloe