Sense of Place

Rico Newman

At the November 13 CCASM meeting Rico Newman, a member of the Piscataway Conoy Tribe, talked about "Sense of Place", one of five parts of what could be used to describe the "World View" of Native Americans.  This World View was used to frame the discussion while documenting the oral history of the oldest Native Americans at the time.  Rico went on to mention various places associated with the Piscataway, the significance of the places, and the meaning of the names.  Many of these are located in federal, state, or county parks.  Rico is the director of the non-profit Maryland Indian Tourism Assoc., Inc.  He also talked about the efforts of the non-profit to create the Maryland Indian Heritage Trails in order to make people more aware of these locations and their significance to the Native American story.

Rico Newman is a former speaker for the Choptico Band of Indians and now serves as its Historic Preservation Officer.  He also recently accepted appointment to the Maryland Commission on Indian Affairs.

Attendance: 20

2014 ESAF Meeting

The Archaeological Society of Maryland (ASM) hosted the Eastern States Archaeological Federation (ESAF) Meeting.  The meeting was held October 30-November 1 at the Holiday Inn in Solomons, Maryland.  ESAF is the association of state (and provincial) archaeological societies in the eastern United States and Canada.  Although a high percentage of those attending were from Maryland,  around ten states and at least two Canadian provinces were represented. 

Lots of interesting talks.  Lots of nice (and interesting) people. 

Ten sessions with 73 presentations were presented over two days (October 31-November 1). The session titles were Indigenous Landscapes of the Chesapeake, D.C. Archeology, Contributing Papers (from Maryland), East Coast Shell Middens, Recent Landscape and Garden Archaeology in New Jersey, Recent Preservation Efforts on Virginia’s Eastern Shore, Contributing Papers (from Pennsylvania northwards), Archaeological Investigations of the Labor Force at Catoctin Furnace, War of 1812 in the Chesapeake and Beyond, Pig Point on the Patuxent. Click to see titles and speakers

There was a reception at the Calvert Marine Museum the evening of October 31.  This was followed by the traditional Canadian-American Friendship Party.  The Mid-Potomac ASM Chapter and CCASM were the American hosts.

Henry Miller was the speaker after the Saturday evening banquet, and he regaled us with the history of archaeology at St Marys City. 

Although only three CCASM members attended the conference, they did assist with the conference.  Also CCASM provided the projector for one of the conference rooms.

CCASM is a chapter of ASM.