2026 Public Archaeology Days (Apr-Jun)

CCASM has been working with Charles County at the ongoing Public Archaeology Lab since 2015.  The lab is for processing artifacts recovered from various archaeology initiatives in Charles County -  including artifacts from investigations of sites on County properties, artifacts recovered from savage archaeology in the County, as well as artifacts recovered around the 1970's before the Port Tobacco Courthouse was reconstructed.  Esther Read is the archaeologist in charge.

Location: Courthouse (2nd floor; use South Wing door) and Burch House (both inside and outside) in Historic Port Tobacco Village  map 

  Next dates: 
  Note: (We try to post the latest schedule as soon as we get it - may not get until Monday morning. 
            Being in the field depends on the weather - if it's not raining and not too hot or too cold.)
       

 Monday,   May 18  (11 am - 3pm)    In field Mulberry Grove

 May 22 - June 1 - ASM Field Session at Teagues Point in Charles County (so no lab or field with Esther) 
     marylandarcheology.org/Field_Session/FieldSessionRegistration.html  for information only

Rhenish salt glazed stoneware
(penny for size reference)

To coincide with the Maryland House and Garden Tours on Saturday May 16 Esther had been asked to investigate a small area at historic Mulberry Grove.  Elsie, Melinda, Kathy, Linda, Doug, Denise, Claudia joined Esther to put in 4' X 4' unit next to where the homeowner had found 'blue & white ceramics'.  The owners thought it was a privy site, but the soil was like concrete.  Denise, Esther, Elsie, and Doug took turns trying to shovel, making very slow progress.  Claudia frequently sprayed down the  unit with water but that still didn't help much.  When not shoveling most of us joined Linda & Malinda with screening.  At first we were finding mostly modern artifacts.  We eventually stopped skim shoveling, and Linda, Elsie, and Esther troweled,.  Sometimes we had to use a brick hammer to break up the soil. Since there was no observable differences in soil color or texture, Esther decided to determine the strata by arbitrary depths as opposed to looking for soil changes. We took half of the unit down through a second strata and began to find much older artifacts - Rhenish salt glazed stoneware, whiteware, two ceramic floor tiles, plus some prehistoric artifacts. We chose the Rhenish sherd as the artifact of the day.  Most of the oldest material was found embedded in the northern wall. On Monday we will probably put in a small unit extending one foot to two feet from the north wall of the original unit.

We were digging right next to the visitor parking area and interacted with many visitors.

Trying to trowel unit
(water sprayer in foreground)

Looks like screeners are
having more fun

Thanks to Elsie for info and Esther for photos.

Blue Flow RIm

Due to the weather we could not be in the field on May 11.  Linda, Denise, Elsie, Evie, Claudia, and Rich were at Burch House with Esther.  Everybody was in different rooms doing different tasks but we did choose this flow blue rim as the artifact of the day.  It had been recovered during the recent excavations at the Rich Hill.
Thanks to Claudia for the photo and the info.

April 27 Esther was at Rich Hill to dig small units for the Ghost House footers.  The dig went well.  We opened two units but did not finish. We'll be going back, not sure of the dates yet. We have through the end of July to get this done. Thanks to Ned for mowing around the units.  Melinda and Claudia helped with the set up and ran the screens. We have three new volunteers who came out to help.  
Thanks to Esther for the info.
(Note: Rich Hill still has poison ivy, and the roots that may show up in the screens.  Claudia and Melinda were the only ones willing to possibly get poison ivy, and they did.)

April 20 while Esther was away, Linda showed Denise, Elsie, Claudia, and Carol the possible activities she would be using at the "CCASM" talk she is giving at the Library this coming Saturday and next Thursday.  We had thought one would be more for children and one would be more for teens and adults, but the library advertised both for children.  Then Linda reviewed the new annual Photo contest that SRPT is having.  Linda has been quite busy.  Then after lunch it was back to cataloging 1970s PT artifacts.  Elsie and Denise worked on miscellaneous while Carol and Linda worked on pearlware.

April 13 was an interesting day at Burch House.  Outside Linda, Malinda, and Elsie created a flower garden behind Burch House in an area that had been cleared of weeds.  They laid down cardboard, covered that with soil, and scattered lots of different types of flower seeds in a relatively small area.  It will be interesting to see how this turns out.  Inside Carol and Esther looked at nails recovered from behind Stagg Hall and verified that most of the nails had been machine cut - somewhat of a surprise.

The April 6 Lab day was part clean up day and a little bit of lab work at Burch House.  The inside of Burch House was in a little bit of disarray after the "Rich Hill" furniture that was being stored at Burch House was finally able to be moved to Rick Hill.  Linda, Denise, Elsie, Claudia, Evie, Kathy, Malinda, and Carol were there to help - rearranging the remaining furniture, dusting, and sweeping up (a lot of stink bugs).  Elsie and Claudia went outside to weed the area near the road.  Linda, Denise, and Evie inventoried the bags and other supplies and did miscellaneous other things.  Kathy, Malinda, and Carol started combining and processing three screens for FS23 from Swann Site.  

2026 Public Archaeology Lab Days (Jan-Mar)
2025 Public Archaeology Lab Days (Oct-Dec) -- 2025 Public Archaeology Lab Days (July-Sep) 
  -- 2025 Public Archaeology Lab Days (Apr-Jun) -- 2025 Public Archaeology Lab Days (Jan-Mar)  
2024 Public Archaeology Lab Days (Oct-Dec) --2024 Public Archaeology Lab Days (July-Sep) 
  --2024 Public Archaeology Lab Days (Apr-Jun)  --2024 Public Archaeology Lab Days (Jan-Mar)
2023 Public Archaeology Lab Days (July-Dec) --2023 Public Archaeology Lab Days (Jan-June)
2022 Public Archaeology Lab Days (July-Dec) --2022 Public Archaeology Lab Days (Feb-Jun)
2021 Public Archaeology Lab Days (Mar-Dec)
2020 Public Archaeology Lab Days (Sep-Dec) --2020 Public Archaeology Lab Days (Jan-Mar)
2019 Public Archaeology Lab Days (Jul-Dec)   --2019 Public Archaeology Lab Days (Jan-June)
2018 Public Archaeology Lab Days (July-Dec) --2018 Public Archaeology Lab Days (Jan-June)
2017 Public Archaeology Lab Days (July-Dec) --2017 Public Archaeology Lab Days (Jan-June)
2016 Public Archaeology Lab Days (July-Dec) --2016 Public Archaeology Lab Days (Jan-June)
2015 Public Archaeology Lab Days