Field School

Community Based Archaeology
I really enjoyed working with the community where we were doing our research. We helped re-mud and clean the inside of the St. Francisco de Assisi Church, and were invited to participate in a precession with pilgrims, who were passing by on their annual journey to Chimayo. They come from all corners of New Mexico and gather in Chimayo for a mass, walking about 100 miles. Other people from the community and others came by during the weeks we excavated. They gave us a different perspective in looking at what artifacts we were finding, what these artifacts were used for, and where buildings used to be, helping us to understand what happened in the past.

Rock Art
Exploring the nearby rock art was exciting for the first few days, but when we began to record all of them I got pretty tired of staring at the same rock for hours at a time, measuring out the petroglyphs, looking around for nearby plants and objects (the view shed), taking numerous compass readings, and writing all of it out. It was difficult jumping over boulders, dodging cacti and at the same time looking for rock art. Bugs were constantly flying inside my mouth and up my nose, so it wasn’t my favorite part of the summer. However, the view in the Rio Grande Gorge was amazing. I was really amazed that there was still visible rock art from around 2,000 years ago.

Survey
Survey was one of my favorite parts in the field. I found some tepee rings near some rock art, but we surveyed another time in the gorge. I got assigned the creek bed. There was nothing except old, rusted metal cans that people had been using as target practice. I thought it was interesting that people were practicing on metal cans which were only a few feet from some of the rock art. There are places nearby where people have chipped the rock art out of the basalt, and I’m glad they didn’t destroy these.

Research in the Archives and Indexing
For two days one of the TA’s and I traveled down to Santa Fe to go to the SHPO office and the Lab of Anthropology on Museum Hill. We looked up information on Turley’s Mill (on old Moonshine Mill that we would have worked at, but we ran out of time), and the Ranchos Plaza. We stopped by the Lab of Anthropology, where the ARMS office is, and looked to see if they had any other information on Turley’s Mill. Since they didn’t, we copied the information we had and gave it to them to store in their office. After coping everything at SHPO we’ve been working on organizing all the information in an index that can be kept here in Taos, so people working on projects in this area will have access to all this research.

Excavation
I loved excavating in and around a house, especially since I like doing historical archaeology. We dug several units near old trash pits and privies, and inside the dining room. I mostly worked outside, and I was so excited when we bought shades for the outside units, because for a few weeks there was absolutely no shade, unless you worked inside. I only spent one day working inside, and all I found was layers and layers of old adobe floors. It was a pain to get through. We had to almost always use a pick axe. I really enjoyed working outside. It doesn’t seem as cramped space wise. I and one guy had worked on one unit for about a week, but when I came back from the archives, everyone was switching partners. I really wish we could have kept digging there, because we knew the history behind the unit. I and another guy took the TA’s old unit. We dug several 10 cm levels within a day. When someone else took over my old unit they uncovered an old ditch, and/or possible pipe tunnel, and/or acequia. I wasn’t too happy about that, but we found the metal end of an old hoe in our unit around the same time. For the first few levels all we found we only found bits of glass, metal nails, and rocks, but the deeper we got the more ceramic sherds we found, many of them indigenous. I found a plastic doll foot, which the woman who owned the house remembered losing when she was a little kid. I love the feeling of seeing something that no one had seen in 30 + years.

Washing/Cleaning/Organizing Artifacts
I spent a few days in the lab washing, cleaning, and organizing artifacts, which I’ve been doing all of this during this past semester in my Zooarchaeology class, so it wasn’t anything too new to me. It was nice, though, to take a break from being baked by the hot sun for hours every day.

Future Archaeologist
This field school helped me to think about what kind of archaeology I wanted to do in the future and helped me realize that I really want to do this kind of work for the rest of my life, even if it doesn’t pay very much at all. I decided I really want to work in historical archaeology, and some how use my German major by working in an old German immigrant community here in the Americas. Now all I have to do is find a good school to go to….