October 2 Garage Sale to Benefit CCAS

The Garage Sale was a success.  Jane Keller organized the Garage Sale that was held Oct. 2, and the proceeds were donated to Charles County Archaeological Society (CCAS).

We would like to thank Jane for all her fund-raising efforts.  Also we want to thank all the CCAS members as well as all of Jane's neighbors who donated the money from their sale items to CCAS. 

Almost set-up

People browsing

At Nanjemoy Heritage Day

CCAS had an exhibit at the 10th Annual Nanjemoy Heritage Day on Saturday September 25.

Jane, Elsie, Carol at CCAS Exhibit Table

Phil also at the Exhibit Table

Elsie talking about the archeology
that has been done at Port Tobacco

Jane Keller, Elsie Picyk, Carol Cowherd, and Phil Angel represented CCAS at the event.  They had an enjoyable afternoon meeting others interested in archeology as well as promoting archeology in Charles County.  They were so busy they forgot to take many pictures.

If you look closely at the exhibit, you might be able to see the Port Tobacco Display, prehistoric ceramic sherds, projectile points, posters for telling time with historic artifacts, and notebooks with diagnostic information for identifying historic and prehistoric artifacts.  

We would like to thank those CCAS members that provided items for the exhibit as well as the extra tables on which to display the items.  And we would especially like to thank Dr. James Gibb for allowing us to use the Port Tobacco Display.

Learning about the Posey Site and its Artifacts

Sara Rivers Cofield

At the September 1 CCAS meeting, Sara Rivers Cofield talked about the Posey Site and its artifacts.  These artifacts show how interaction with European colonists changed the material culture of Maryland’s Indians.  The Posey Site is a late 17th Century Charles County site located at the Indian Head Division, Naval Surface Warfare Center.

Sara is the Curator of Federal Collections at the Maryland Archaeological Conservation Laboratory. 

She also brought some of the Posey artifacts housed at the MAC Lab.  Below members and guests get a chance to look at shell beads, bone objects, terracotta pipe fragments, copper objects, and glass buttons among other things.

Joshua, Barbara, Elsie, Bob

image from www.jefpat.org

She was unable to bring the Posey artifacts in the image at the right since they are in a display on the first floor of the Charles County Government Building.  So the next time you visit the building be sure to look for the display.


For more information on the Posey Site, visit Posey Site Summary on the Jefferson Patterson Parks and Planning website www.jefpat.org.

Thank You for the Munsell Soil Color Chart Book

New Munsell Soil Color Charts

A person who wants to remain anonymous has donated money for CCAS to purchase a new Munsell Soil Color Charts book.

Thank you so much.




We have already used it for the excavations at the Burch House.  It will also be used as CCAS gets more opportunities to do field work.

For those of you familiar with the Munsell book, you will notice this is a new edition with much nicer pages, ones from which the paint chips will not be falling off.

Munsell Soil Color Chart- 10YR Page

So once again, Charles County Archaeological Society thanks you.

Volunteering at Burch House Addition Excavation

Starting April Charles County Archaeology Society members helped the Port Tobacco Archaeological Project  (PTAP) with excavations at the Burch House in Port Tobacco, MD.  On August 31 we reached the "bottom" of the units next to the Burch House.  The excavations were necessary for a planned addition to the Burch House.   This house is one of three surviving 18th-century houses in the town.

Here are the pictures of us working as well as pictures of progress over the past months.

Elsie and Kelley
Carol and Elsie
Anne, Jim, and Jane

Jim, Elsie, and Carol
Elsie
Peter

Pictured above are CCAS members Carol Cowherd, Elsie Picyk, and Jane Keller along with Dr. Jim Gibb, Managing Director for the Port Tobacco Archaeological Project.  The women sitting in the units are PTAP crew Anne Hayward and Kelley Walter.  And the person with the  big smile is Peter Quantock, another member of the PTAP crew and also a CCAS member.  The last picture indicates how we tried to cope with the heat during July.  Elsie Picyk brought her box fan, and everyone drank lots of water.

On May 20 the foundation to the 19th century addition to Burch House was uncovered.

May 22

Burch House
To find out more about the 19th century Burch House addition, go to http://porttobacco.blogspot.com/2010/06/some-burch-news.htm

On June 22 we identified a post hole with a post mold from an earlier structure.  The picture on the right was taken looking north from the dirt pile behind the two orange buckets seen in the June 22 picture.

June 22

The work to uncover earlier strata continued while Peter took time to talk with visitors.

 
July 8

Aug 4

In all the units we have found a layer of burned oyster shells about 2.5' to 3' below the surface.  In some places only black loamy soil with no artifacts was below the oyster shells.  But on August 3 an area containing charred wood fragments (up to  approximately 3" x 1") was uncovered.  See the darker area in the lower central part of the picture at the left.  It could be a fire pit or ...   The last stratum removed before the picture was taken contained very few artifacts but those found included 3 tobacco pipe stems, 3 quartz flakes, and one prehistoric pottery sherd! 

Aug 31

On August 31 we reached sterile soil in all the units.  The picture at the left shows the foundation of the Burch House.  On the left are the bricks for the original cellar. To the right of that in the exposed soil under the foundation are a post hole and post mold, probably from a structure that predates the building of Burch House.

We'll let you know when the report documenting this effort is available

To see some of the artifacts we found see Finding 19th Century Ceramics and Glass

or look on the PTAP blog http://porttobacco.blogspot.com/.