Research and Civil War Archaeology

This past Friday, I had the pleasure of presenting a paper at the annual conference of the Pioneer America Society: Association for the Preservation of Artifacts and Landscapes. The conference was held at the "PSFS" building, now the Loews Hotel, in downtown Philadelphia. My paper covered certain aspects, primarily architecture and retail display, related to my research in early ready-made clothing and the "slops" trade. I have an article on this subject in the works and it should appear in an academic journal within a year or so.

In another vein, check out the recent field reports from the Johnson's Island Civil War prison site, where I worked as a student and instructor for several years. As always, the excavations on the location of this Prisoner-of-War depot produced interesting results this summer. Among the most interesting are a few firsts for the site: a copper-allow photograph mat fragment and a suspender buckle. You can read more about archaeology on Johnson's Island here.