The Kankakee Protohistory Project brings together excavation and environmental analyses to reconstruct the entangled human and environmental histories of the Kankakee River from protohistory to the present. Beginning in 2016, we are currently conducting a multi-year excavation project at Midewin National Tallgrass Prairie of a Huber site occupied during the early 17th century.
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Pete Geraci discusses Winfield Mounds in new documentary
Looking for some new content to stream? Check out this cameo by MGC star, Pete Geraci, describing some work from at Winfield Mounds in Illinois. He shows up around 22 min in!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2fDFyBpTWSY
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Drought at MGC!
Reader beware--this is our most technical article to date! But you know all those mussel shells we dig up? Well, we tested them for stable oxygen isotopes and established that it was much drier at MGC than it is now. Like all research--now we’re wondering how they were able to grow so much corn in these conditions.
If you’d like the read the article, we get 50 free downloads--and we want our volunteers to snag all of them!
And don’t worry--no painted shells were destroyed!
Click here to read!
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Online Lecture Tomorrow--July 16, 7pm (Central)
Join Mark and I for an online lecture about findings from Middle Grant Creek! No registration or fee. Just click the link below
LINK to participate in webinar sessions: https://usfs.adobeconnect.com/r9-midewin-1000/. Registration is not required. Registration is not required.
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Summer Reading
As you probably have guessed, it looks like we won’t be excavating this year. Social distancing just wouldn’t be possible (though trust us--we tried to figure it out!). However, I do have some good news....!
Just today, Mark and I published an overview article summarizing our work over the past four years. We get 50 free downloads--and we hope our volunteers will use all of them! Just click here.
And! It wouldn’t be summer without at least some MGC archaeology discussions, so we’ve reschedule our “winter” lecture series to an online webinar on July 16th. Stay tuned for more details!
In the meantime, be sure to check out the article to see all the amazing archaeology we’ve accomplished together here!
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American Paw Paw (Asimina triloba)
We are hard at work analyzing data here at Notre Dame this winter. One of those tasks includes going through all the charcoal you collect in the field and carefully pack in foil pouches. Well, in one of those pouches--we found a paw paw seed!!
It was confirmed by Leslie Bush, who analyzes and identifies the seeds and charcoal from the site (and took the picture above).
Paw paws are delicious fruits and indigenous to the area, but their seeds are not often preserved. So this find speaks to the excellent preservation at the site.
It’s also a fun find for Mark and me--since we are both big paw paw enthusiasts. How much, you ask? Well, we’ve gone foraging for paw paw together.
And I went to the Ohio Paw Paw Festival this past fall with a friend!
Clearly, people have been enjoying paw paws for a long time!
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Happy Thanksgiving! MGC is currently featured on the Passport in Time website. Check it out!
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Bald eagle in Feature 12
Terry Martin is hard at work and this week identified a Bald Eagle sternum located in Feature 12. Raptor bones are rare at sites in the Midwest. We believe that the eagle may have originally been used in a ceremony. Stay tuned as we learn more about it!
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Congratulations to Terry Martin!
Terry Martin-- expert archaeologist, analyzer of faunal, digger of features, and lover of Taco Tuesday--won the Midwest Archaeology Distinguished Career Award this week at the Midwest Archaeological Conference in Mankato, MN. Terry is a emeritus curator of anthropology at the Illinois State Museum and an expert on animal bones found at archaeological sites. Most of you have had the pleasure of working with Terry on-site and are familiar with his wealth of knowledge and readiness to share it. We are very fortunate to have Terry Martin as our colleague on this project and our friend. Congratulations, Terry!!
A pic of Terry in his natural habitat at MGC. :)
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That’s a wrap! Thank you to all our volunteers!! We had an amazing season, and we could not have done it without you!!
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Only one more day!!
This season FLEW by! How is tomorrow already the last day? Today we had a busy day! With finds coming out one after another! Big highlights were finishing Feature 11 and Feature NBE 1!
In our ongoing Feature 13, they found a rim of the largest jar we’ve had at the site!
And a beautiful piece of pottery decorated with bold trailing (the wide lines).
Not to be outdone, the excavators of Feature 12 had a massive bone lens--full of bones, including deer antler.
And these small bones/tendons likely used as part of game.
And last, we also found the bowl of a clay pipe!
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Today we found a bison scapula hoe in the same feature as the mano and metate. You can see the hole in the center where it would have been tied to a pole.
This is a similar tool to one historically documented among the Hidatsa in North Dakota. Below is a picture from 1912 of Buffalo Bird using this tool. Read Buffalo Bird Woman’s Garden online here.
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Grinding Stones
Today we found a mano and metate--stones that were used for grinding grains or nuts into flour. The mano (right) would be ground against the metate (left). We can see how both have flattened surfaces from this action. Because large rocks are fairly scarce at Middle Grant Creek, it’s interested that these two were thrown away in such great condition. We also may have another piece of the agricultural toolkit in the same feature--so stay tuned!
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Today was a busy day! But the best kind of day--full of amazing finds. These large pieces of pottery came out of Feature 12 and fit together.
Our awesome volunteers also found this gaming piece, made of carved bone.
The big find today were some pieces of a basket or matting found in Feature 11.
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Today, we had Pete Kodat come by and help us explore the potential housing area!
At the main part of the site, we found this small carved turtle shell fragment in one of our features.
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Midewin in the news!
Two articles are out over the past week. Check us out!
https://www.theherald-news.com/2019/07/26/archaeological-digs-at-midewin-national-tallgrass-prairie-yield-clues-to-pre-colonial-life/agzn22h/
https://www.chicagotribune.com/suburbs/daily-southtown/ct-sta-midewin-archaeology-st-0731-20190729-kks47gk7zzdbtiiqgfoy2kcndm-story.html
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Stone tools--all day
Today we had a whole array from stone tools coming from new units and features. Here are some of them!
This small microlith and Madison point came out of a new unit.
This very large uniface along with a scraper and an expedient drill came out of another new unit.
Another very nice point.
We also found both halves of a small mammal mandible in Feature 10.
And a new style of rim sherd that we haven’t seen yet at the site (also from Feature 10)!
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Today, we closed out Feature 6! Two years in the making, and spotted this tiny copper/brass wire in the final layers.
Ve’Amber Miller and Jeff Spanbauer’s (pictured) persistence paid off when they finally found the feature at 48cm depth in their unit.
And everyone is guessing how deep this pit will go!
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