Hot, humid, sticky, icky, dirty and exciting all sum up the past two days of field work at Pickawillany. Oh, did I mention hot? Really hot?
After sweltering Monday the crew came over to the museum for a small “thank you” cookout. The evening started with comments from Erin Bartlett, regional manager for OHS, Andy Hite, site manager for OHS and Jim Oda from the Piqua Historical Area Friends Council.
Afterward the staff and students were presented
certificates of appreciation for the work they have done helping to shine light upon the lives of those who lived at Pickawillany (photo 1, Hite, Oda and Dr. Annette G. Ericksen). During the rest of the event pictures that had been taken during the dig were projected for everyone to see and the all-you-can-eat hot dog, brat and hamburgers were enthusiastically consumed.
Tuesday’s humidity hung in the air for most of the day, only resulting in a slight drizzle over lunch time. Feature 10 proved to be exciting, revealing some old friends such as gun flints and small glass white “seed” beads and introduced us to some new ones. Our first larger caliber musket ball (photo 2), our first kernel of carbonized corn (photo 3) and our first beaver mandible (photo 4). Other firsts include a small blue “seed” bead, two fragments of what could turn out to be leather and an item that might be bronze/brass hardware for a trunk (photo 5 in situ, photo 6 in hand).
One thing we know about tomorrow it that it will continue to be nasty-hot. The unknown is what else we may discover about those who were here before us.
Stay tuned for more!
