Crawling Through St. Augustine Archaeology: Week 5, the 20th Century
Every October, we traditionally host our St. Augustine Archaeology Pub Crawl to celebrate International Archaeology Day. Unfortunately, this year we are unable to host the event due to restrictions on public events because of the global pandemic. However, we'll be bringing you a virtual crawl through the City's archaeology through a weekly series featuring archaeological research, links to more resources, and fun beverage pairings. Keep your eyes peeled for a new post every Friday.
This week, we'll dig into the archaeology that happened in the 20th century.
The Sites:
This week I thought I should highlight some of the reasons we know about all of the sites through the centuries of St. Augustine's existence. Archaeology itself has a long history in the city and today, we have several thriving research programs focusing on the nation's oldest city.
Archaeology of one type or another has been happening in Northeast Florida for almost 150 years. The first to dig into sites here were antiquarians focused largely on Native American sites like mounds and middens. Gentlemen explorers like A. E. Douglas and C. B. Moore would come to Florida from the north, excavate sites and then send their collections back to places like the American Museum of Natural History in NYC or the Peabody Institut of Archaeology in Massachusetts.
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| Display case of C.B. Moore's Florida Collection at the Peabody Institute back in the day. Photo: Peabody Institute of Archaeology. |
The City itself saw the first archaeological discoveries in the early 1900s. Early discoveries like Native American burials at the Fountain of Youth Park added to the tourist attractions in town. By the 1930s, the city had established the first historic preservation board in the state to help protect the historic structures and view sheds in St. Augustine. In 1958, an act of state legislation founded the the St. Augustine Historical Restoration and Preservation Commission, with the goal to "acquire, restore, preserve, maintain, reconstruct, reproduce and operate for the use, benefit, education, recreation, enjoyment and general welfare...[St. Augustine's] historical and antiquarian sites." The commission had a vision to create a Spanish Colonial Williamsburg, of sorts.
So what does any of this have to do with archaeology? Well, the commission began employing archaeologists to uncover the foundations of colonial structure so they could recreate these buildings. In total, the commission completed over 29 restoration projects, most of which included archaeological investigations. You can read more about these preservation efforts - and the early archaeology they supported - in this awesome StoryMap, or explore the archives and collections from the commission at the Governor's House Library.
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| 1963 excavations of a house on St. George St. reveal the foundations of a colonial building. Photo: Governor's House Library. |
For well over 50 years, the University of Florida has also conducted a lot of research on colonial St. Augustine. Since 1968, UF has held an annual historical archaeology field school in town, sometimes in partnership with the Florida Museum and/or Florida State University. For the last few decades, a lot of the research has been under the guidance of Dr. Kathleen Deagan, now a curator emertus at the Florida Museum. They've posted a lot of their research online in the virtual exhibit I've been promoting throughout the blog series.
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| The two archaeologist who have probably led the most excavations in St. Augustine: Carl Halbirt, retired City Archaeologist, and Dr. Kathy Deagan, curator emeritus at the Florida Museum. Photo: St. Augustine Social |
The last piece of the puzzle is an Archaeological Preservation Ordinance put in place to help protect archaeological sites on the municipal level. The ordinance, enacted in 1987, establishes archaeological zones throughout the City limits that require archaeological investigations in the face of certain types of development, on private and public lands alike. The program is not intended to stop development, but to allow for the documentation of archaeological deposits before destructive activities occur. The program's main research focus is to understand the changes and development of the City through time. You can read more about the City's Archaeology Program, including specifics on the ordinance and some featured projects, on their website.
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| Archaeological investigations are required in many parts of the City before certain types of construction. Photo: City of St. Augustine. |
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| Andrea White (front) and Katherine Sims are the current rockstar staff of the City of St. Augustine's Archaeology Program. Photo: City of St. Augustine |
The Beverage
For our last beverage recommendation, we'll leave it to you to choose your favorite! So many archaeologists, historic preservationists, historians, avocational volunteers and just genuinely caring people have worked to uncover the City's past, each bringing their own unique insights and interests to the research. And they've revealed what a diverse past the City has had. So we invite you to bring your own favorite flavors to the mix while you explore this research. Maybe you'll uncover something new to add to the story!
Text by Emily Jane Murray. Photo credits in captions.