Buildings and landscapes are relatively easy to deal with because they usually are readily visible, although intensive research may be necessary to understand their historical significance. Most archaeological sites, however, lie below the surface of the ground and cannot be found without systematic survey.

Buildings and landscapes also tend to accrue their own constituencies—individuals and groups committed to their recordation and protection. Most archaeological sites are hidden from view and, therefore, are less likely to have advocates outside of the field of archaeology.

We can witness the demolition of a building or landscape.  But without archaeological surveys, sites could remain unidentified and lost to construction and natural disasters without us even knowing of their existence, much less understanding what we have lost by their destruction.

The NHPA assures us that, while we cannot save all archaeological sites, at least we will know what we are losing to federal undertakings because the NHPA requires federal agencies to inventory and assess the value of archaeological sites that may be adversely affected.

Another law of more recent vintage but of nearly as great an influence is the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) of 1990.  Created largely in response to accumulating grievances of Native Americans over the exhumation of ancestors and funerary objects and other objects significant to Native American and Native Hawaiian groups, NAGPRA imposes conditions on the removal and treatment of human remains and associated objects from Native American and federal lands and held in institutions (largely museums and universities) that are receiving or have received federal funds. In many cases, institutions have been required to inventory such materials in their collections, inform lineal descendants of the peoples whom those materials represent, and return them to the appropriate peoples. Upon their return, materials may be reburied, curated, or otherwise managed as members of the descendant community sees fit.

NAGPRA has had a significant effect not just on the practice of archaeology, but on the ways in which archaeologists see themselves and their work vis-à-vis descendant communities; and not just those of Indigenous communities, but of African American rural communities, Hispanic barrios, and mining towns of largely second- and third-generation European immigrants.

NAGPRA has fostered a sense among scientists, not well developed before the passage of the act, that those outside of the scientific community may also have a claim on the landscapes, structures, buildings, sites, and artifacts of their predecessors. Indeed, the NHPA allows individuals and groups that might not otherwise have standing under general law to be granted consulting party status to proposed federal undertakings, giving them ready access to project-related documents and meetings and allowing them to voice their concerns and have those concerns become part of the public record.

To be clear, these and other federal laws apply only to federal undertakings (actions involving federal lands, permits, or funds) and it is the responsibility of federal agencies to comply with the terms of the NHPA. As anticipated by that law, however, some US municipalities and states have taken their lead from the NHPA, codifying many of the principles and practices established in the NHPA and using two of the more important provisions of the act as historic preservation tools: the standards and guidelines issued and periodically revised by the Secretary of the Department of the Interior (US Department of the Interior, National Park Service 1983) and the National Register of Historic Places, often referred to simply as “the Register” (US Department of the Interior, National Park Service 1997).

The former provides clear guidance on who is qualified to undertake investigations required by the NHPA and the manner in which that work should be done and reported. The National Register establishes guidelines for determining the historical significance of a cultural resource, its eligibility for listing on the Register, and—most importantly from an operational perspective—four criteria for determining significance:

The quality of significance in American history, architecture, archaeology, engineering, and culture is present in districts, sites, buildings, structures, and objects that possess integrity of location, design, setting, materials, workmanship, feeling, and association, and:

A) that are associated with events that have made a significant contribution to the broad patterns of our history; or

B) that are associated with the lives of significant persons in our past; or

C) that embody the distinctive characteristics of a type, period, or method of construction, or that represent the work of a master, or that possess high artistic values, or that represent a significant and distinguishable entity the components of which may lack individual distinction; or

D) that have yielded, or may be likely to yield, information important in history or prehistory. (US Department of the Interior, National Park Service [1997], https://www.history.nd.gov/hp/nreligibility.html, accessed March 25, 2020)

In practice, Criterion D has been critical in assessing the historical significance of archaeological sites; however, all four criteria should be addressed in any evaluation of a building, landscape, or site for listing on the National Register.

Other criteria stipulate the conditions under which a resource would not be eligible for listing on the Register. Municipal and state agencies devise their own standards and guidelines, and in some cases their own assessments of what is historically significant and what is not. Criterion D is particularly accommodating in this regard: whether a site has “information important in history or prehistory” depends on the scale at which the site is evaluated; e.g., the site of an 1860s rural cheese factory may hold significant information on the history (social, economic, and environmental) of New York State, but remain of relatively little significance to national history. The cheese factory may be eligible for special recognition and protections at the local level, as long as those protections do not interfere with project approval at the federal level.

Enter the Commercial Archaeologist

A number of names have been applied to this kind of work, none of which are satisfactory.

“Cultural Resource Management archaeology” is a misnomer, as consultants like myself typically have little or nothing to do with actually managing resources.

“Contract archaeology” is vague: any work involving funding also involves a contract, whether formal or a verbal agreement, including grant-funded research.

“Compliance archaeology” is closer to the mark, although not all non-academic archaeology is undertaken to assist a permit applicant in complying with a law.

“Commercial archaeology” seems most appropriate in that this kind of archaeological research, while it contributes to larger scientific matters, is conducted as a business; which is to say, one undertakes the work in the expectation of earning a living and it is driven by the needs of a client and not an investigator’s personal research interests. The clever commercial archaeologist satisfies both pecuniary needs and research interests.

As a practicing commercial archaeologist, I am  a professional archaeologist operating as a business supplying consulting services to permit applicants. That means I assist clients in complying with federal, state, or local historic preservation laws, particularly the NHPA, the State of Maryland’s version of Section 106 of the NHPA, and the subdivision regulations requiring archaeological review in Maryland’s Anne Arundel, Charles, and Prince George’s counties, as well as preservation regulations in adjacent states.

And that brings us back to how all of this actually works.

A Case Study

Getting back to our meeting in a government office, the participants are discussing an archaeological site. But what site? What kind of site? How did we learn about it? Before we can discuss the fate of this site, we need to learn how we got to the point where it became a subject of discussion.

A case study—the Mill Branch Crossing project—that involves three levels of government suits our needs.

In 2006, Gibraltar Real Estate & Development proposed the construction of a shopping plaza on a 90-acre parcel in Prince George’s County, Maryland, 10 miles or so east of Washington, DC. The project required permits from the US Army Corps of Engineers, the issuance of which was subject to the terms of the NHPA.

Maryland’s State Historic Preservation Office – as a consulting party under the NHPA and the lead historic preservation agency in any state undertaking – became part of the process.

Finally, Prince George’s County had, the year before, enacted its own subdivision regulations that required archaeological review.

Under the NHPA, the Army Corps was required to comply with the law, not the applicant; although the onus for actually doing so fell upon the applicant. While the Prince George County regulation placed responsibility for compliance on the applicant.

The applicant – Gibraltar Real Estate & Development – then commissioned Applied Archaeology and History Associates, Inc., (AAHA). AAHA is a company with more than the minimum qualifications required under Secretary of the Interior guidelines. They would conduct a Phase I archaeological site identification survey.

AAHA conducted a surface reconnaissance of the entire parcel, noting the locations and types of artifacts visible on the plowed surface. Had the fields not been plowed, a large shovel test survey across a grid would have been appropriate. Shovel testing involves archaeologists excavating holes about 16 inches in diameter, extending a foot or more in depth, screening the soil for artifacts, describing the soils, and then backfilling the holes. At Mill Branch, shovel testing was limited to the four archaeological sites found through surface reconnaissance.
The shovel tests were used to collect information on each of the four sites’ depths and soils.

The four sites were registered using the Smithsonian trinomial system:

• 18 represents Maryland as the eighteenth state in alphabetical order
• PR represents Prince George’s County
• 858 represents the next consecutive registration number assigned by the state to the site for the county

The four sites were registered as follows and are described below.

• 18PR858 – a mid-20th-century ranch house
• 18PR859 – possible mill site
• 18PR856 – ceramic, glass and brick debris
• 18PR857 – indications of an 18th-century dwelling

By consensus among the parties who would eventually attend that meeting in the government office building, 18PR858 did not meet the National Register criteria for listing and warranted no further attention.

Site 18PR859, initially characterized as a grist or saw mill site, proved to be a relatively recent flood control or monitoring device that did not meet criteria for historical significance.

Site 18PR856 is a small scatter of ceramic sherds and vessel glass sherds and brick fragments that could be of 18th-century vintage, but appeared to lack information potential, perhaps because the site was lost to plowing and erosion. Considered in isolation, 18PR856 did not meet criteria for listing on the Register.

Site 18PR857 yielded a large number of 18th-century ceramics, glass vessel sherds, and handmade brick indicative of an intact 18th-century dwelling site, likely part of a plantation. Archival research failed to definitively identify the family who lived there, but the site clearly predated the American Revolutionary War. Initial surface finds, coupled with shovel testing, suggested that 18PR857 would meet National Register criteria, and the Phase I report included a recommendation for additional investigation.

The permit applicant commissioned AAHA to conduct a Phase II site examination of 18PR857 to assess the size, depth, integrity of archaeological deposits, and date of occupation. The team excavated 19 square units, each one-meter (approximately three feet) on a side, in those portions of the site with concentrations of artifacts.

The Phase II study confirmed the dates of occupation (18th century) and demonstrated that subsurface features survived intact. That is, several units exposed the tops of postholes, trash-filled pits, and a possible masonry foundation, all potentially rich sources of information that could answer research questions about the Colonial period in this part of Maryland and the greater Chesapeake Bay region.

 

The Phase II consultants recommended eligibility for listing on the National Register of Historic Places under Criterion D, asserting that 18PR857 could yield important information on how planters in the uplands of coastal Maryland organized their house sites, implemented strategies of food and commodity production, and altered the local ecosystem through intensive cultivation and animal husbandry. The true value of the information would come in comparing the analysis of this site to the results of data analyses conducted on contemporary sites in the region, revealing patterns of both common practices and variability that ramified throughout the subsequent history of the region.

Consensus on the importance of 18PR857, and particularly its meeting Criterion D (but not Criteria A or B—associated with historically significant events or persons—but possibly meeting Criterion C—design and/or construction techniques characteristic of the period), brings us back to the meeting.

Determining Treatment for the National Register-Eligible Site 18PR857

Bringing together the federal, state, and county agency representatives, client, and the client’s attorney and archaeologists is the necessity of discussing one issue: what do we do with 18PR857?

As de facto custodians of our common heritage, agency archaeologists tend to support the preservation of sites for future investigation when questions about the past, methods for exploring it, and tools for collecting data may be more sophisticated.

The permit applicants wanted the site excavated to remove an encumbrance on their planned development, and their attorney supported their interests.

As a commercial archaeologist, I had my own interests to consider, as well as those of both my clients and the agency archaeologists: excavating an entire site would be a large, lucrative contract, and AAHA’s findings indicated that the site would yield useful data for my research into Colonial-era subsistence practices in the Chesapeake region.

The negotiation was protracted and, at times, contentious. Preserving a half-acre site in the middle of a shopping plaza posed expensive engineering and aesthetic design challenges and likely would reduce future profits on the development. In-situ (in place) preservation of the site effectively would remove it from scientific investigation.

The lead agencies could authorize the investigation of the site at some future date, but only portions of the site; there were no protocols in place specifying the conditions and limits of such permission, or even guidelines as to what constitutes “the future.” Insistence on in-situ preservation, in my opinion, also neglected to consider another cultural resource: the funds that the permit applicants would provide for the research, funds that would not be available if the site were preserved in place.

But excavation, especially in this context because the entire site would be excavated, would preclude future investigations by more capable investigators with superior questions, methods, and tools. Of course, scientific questions, methods, and tools develop through application as new data and unforeseen circumstances arise during the course of scientific investigations. Preserving a site does not advance science, and preservation could result in a site remaining unexcavated, essentially eliminating it from research beyond the small amount of data collected in its initial identification and assessment.

Decisions about the fate of 18PR857 did not occur solely within a social vacuum. Public meetings of the county’s Historic Preservation Commission and Planning Board were held. These quasi-governmental entities consist of appointed community members, usually with some connection to urban planning, environmental conservation, historic preservation, history, archaeology, or architectural history. The meetings are staffed by county employees, including an attorney and the county’s historic preservation staff, which includes an archaeologist. Anybody has the right to speak at these meetings and there are procedures and rules for doing so.

There was a great deal of public comment on this project, some of it quite animated; but the concern was not about the archaeological site, the existence of which was unknown prior to its discovery by AAHA. The concern was with development on a farm that was adjacent to a zone in which the county placed restrictions on development and along a highway that already handled traffic loads exceeding capacity.

Preserving the site was a means of stopping the proposed development, or at least scaling it down. As 18PR857 is not a Native American site, there was no basis for consultations with state-recognized Native American groups. There are no federally recognized Native American tribes, or nations, in Maryland. And there is no clear federal process for consulting with Native American groups for most kinds of archaeological sites. Whereas, Native American burial sites always necessitate consultation.

Eventually, the parties reached a consensus: the applicants could commission a Phase III data recovery (also called impact mitigation) at 18PR857, approving a research design that I had prepared. The research design posed several nontrivial questions that could be addressed given the kinds of data already produced by the Phase I and II investigations. It also detailed the field, laboratory and analytical methods that would be used to answer those questions.

Phase III Mitigation

The Phase III work began in November 2019 and the fieldwork ended June 1, 2020. Analyses and a draft report were completed in April 2021. The products include: a detailed report; a large collection of objects, records, and data for use by future scholars; public and academic presentations; a projected book on Colonial era dietary practices and ecological consequences; and, in a small way, this chapter.

The fieldwork by the crew revealed the remains of a Principal Dwelling (Figure 2), probably a log structure on a partial stone foundation with a brick chimney, occupied by a planter family. This was likely William Goe (a Scotsman), his wife Mary Boyd (daughter of the John and Mary Boyd who settled this parcel in the late 17th century), and their children.

Thirty feet from the dwelling was a privy and another 50 feet to the south were two long, narrow buildings built on wooden posts set into the ground and two privies, one replacing the other. These buildings likely accommodated those people—free or enslaved, or perhaps both—who worked for the Goes. A large pit that appears to have been used by all to discard bones, broken vessels, and other trash occupied the middle ground between planters and workers. Remnants of fencelines also were evident, dividing the houselot along north-south and west-east axes.

Documents and archaeologically recovered artifacts suggest that the Goes were a family of modest means, occupying 100 acres of Mary’s parents’ land, a 650-acre tract that they called Amptill Grange. Other Boyd children, their spouses, and children occupied their shares of the estate. William and Mary Goe owned some tablewares, including decorated earthenwares and porcelains (Figure 3), but there was no evidence of large, matched dish sets and the crew did not recover any significant evidence of other household furnishings.

Large numbers of nonhuman bone and carbonized plant materials (burning being the primary means by which plants survive archaeologically) were recovered. They revealed a household diet consisting largely of meats from domesticated species (cows, pigs, sheep, and some poultry), a number of hunted species (deer, rabbits, squirrels, mallards, and Canada geese), and locally caught catfish and white perch. There were also remains of oyster and non-local fish (rockfish and porgy). These ocean species were likely procured through others, possibly by way of family-owned businesses in the nearby hamlet of Queen Anne.

The comparison of food remains and architecture with those of other Colonial-era sites in the region suggests that the Goes’ diet was similar to those of other local Colonial households. It differed only in  a greater reliance on poultry and wild species along with a reduced dependence on beef cattle and pigs. The analyses continued, particularly to make comparisons with contemporary sites in terms of biological (bones and burned plants) and artifact assemblages. However, the resulting report and collections are the effective end products of the Phase I-III historic preservation process.An archaeological assemblage is the totality of artifacts, ecofacts, human-collected and modified animal and plant remains,* fieldnotes, photographs, catalogues, and drawings from a site.

These are kept together as a collection. This allows for the comparison of one assemblage to assemblages from other sites.

*resulting from food preparation and consumption 

To be clear, this process did not begin and end in a single meeting in an office building. It required numerous meetings (both private and public), telephone calls, formal letters, and e-mails over many months. And, of course, it had at its core the scientific processes of research design development (the questions to be asked), methods development (the means of answering those questions), data collection and processing (field and laboratory work), analysis, and report writing.

The goal—achieved, I think—was to balance competing needs and interests and to ensure the best use of 18PR857 as a scientific resource, as an historical touchstone for the region’s citizens—including descendants of the planters and enslaved people and servants—and as a source of material to foster discussions about race relations, the environmental consequences of intensive commercial agriculture, and other matters of current social concern (Gibb 2021). The work at 18PR857 Goe Plantation from its original discovery and testing by the AAHA team to the excavation and analysis of the current team, has proceeded in a thoughtful manner, adapting long-established methods to the specifics of the site.

This work should not be confused with “rescue” or “salvage” archaeology, an ad hoc process of extracting whatever one can from an archaeological site in imminent danger of destruction from natural catastrophes (e.g., forest fires, shoreline erosion) or construction occurring outside of the archaeological review process.

Salvage archaeology typically garners available, but usually insufficient resources, and uses methods adopted expediently, usually in the absence of specific research questions and with minimal or unsystematic documentation in the field. The purpose of salvage often is expressed as recovering material for some unspecified future scholars, without any specific nontrivial questions informing the kinds of materials recovered or the manner of their recovery and recording. Under extraordinary circumstances, archaeologists might choose to salvage a site in the face of imminent destruction, but this is not the manner in which most archaeology is, or should be, done; it does not conform to generally accepted definitions of science.

Careers in CRM Archaeology

Reading about the process above, you might wonder what role you might play in it. Let’s look at the employment prospects first and then consider volunteer participation. Real estate development and engineering are very much part of the process, providing the reason for implementing the process and providing funds and data (e.g., topographic maps of the subject parcels and control points which archaeologists use to accurately locate sites and test units on the surface of the earth). In terms of archaeology, there are three categories of employment across which mobility is possible, but in my experience uncommon. I exclude traditional academic or museum employment from consideration here because jobs in these spheres usually operate outside of CRM; however, university instructors and museum staffs occasionally conduct work in CRM. In doing so, I think, they become, for the duration of such contracts, commercial archaeologists. I also omit the many specialties in archaeology (e.g., faunal analysis palynology, geophysics) as individuals generally are drawn to these after they are engaged in archaeology and most do so within private consultant forms or government agencies and museums.

Agency archaeologists are government employees, generally with advanced academic degrees (master’s, doctorate) in anthropology, archaeology (generally a subdiscipline of anthropology in the US), history, or American studies. They specialize in historic preservation law, but also maintain research interests that, ideally, their position benefits from and which they can satisfy through their official positions. Part-time, seasonal, and contract positions are not uncommon, but most agency archaeologists enjoy fulltime positions with benefits. Most might argue that their compensation is not commensurate with their levels of education and responsibility, especially in comparison with other professionals in government service, but their level of satisfaction in terms of what they contribute to their field may be higher than that enjoyed by professionals in other fields.

Also employed by government agencies, but not typically involved directly in the legal compliance process, are registrars and collections managers. Archaeological registrars oversee the management of data on archaeological sites, collecting data provided by professional and avocational (unpaid) archaeologists. Registering archaeological sites and supplying associated data on artifacts, soil, topography, hydrology, property ownership, prior studies, etc., are critical components of the process of complying with federal, state, and municipal historic preservation laws and ordinances. Data management requires knowledge of the field as well as of relational database management and, increasingly, geographic information systems. Registrars are ideally placed to analyze data from across the jurisdiction of their agency and can achieve a perspective that goes well beyond the site focus to which excavators often succumb. Registering archaeological sites and supplying associated data on artifacts, soil, topography, hydrology, property ownership, prior studies, etc., are critical components of the process of complying with federal, state, and municipal historic preservation laws and ordinances. Data management requires knowledge of the field as well as of relational database management and, increasingly, geographic information systems.

Collections managers have the intimidating job of properly caring for the collections that come to a collections facility (usually lodged within a museum, often at the county or state level). The range of materials could include human remains, food remains (bone, carbonized plant remains, pollen samples), deteriorating iron, decaying wooden boats, stone tools, ceramics, and large quantities of mollusk valves, masonry rubble, and stone tools, to name a few. Some require conservation to ensure that they will not continue to deteriorate. Iron artifacts, for example, typically continue to rust, and at an accelerated rate once excavated and exposed to air. A plastic resealable bag of iron artifacts, even in a facility in which temperature and humidity are tightly controlled, can turn into a bag of dust in a few years if the contents are not stabilized and conserved through desalinization and other processes. Collections managers must have “intellectual control” over the materials in their care, which means they need to know where every item is, even those on loan to other institutions, and their general condition. The position lends itself to all kinds of personal research projects, as well as those demanded by the job.

Finally, there is the commercial archaeologist. Meeting Secretary of the Interior guidelines requires an advanced degree in one of the above-named fields, but education does not—cannot—end with formal classroom work. Unlike academic archaeologists whose primary responsibility typically is teaching undergraduate and graduate students, commercial archaeologists cannot specialize and work in only one research area; e.g., early Colonial-era plantation sites in the Middle Atlantic U.S. or early Holocene Paleoindian sites in the American Plains states. Conducting an archaeological survey of, say, a 100-acre parcel prior to redevelopment could lead to the discovery of Native American deposits dating back five centuries or five millennia, a late 18th-century enslaved peoples’ quarter, a Civil War infantry encampment, a late 19th-century blacksmith shop, and an early 20th-century poultry house.

The competent, productive commercial archaeologist participates in professional conferences, reads widely, continually learns new skills and researches types of sites new to his or her experience, recognizing that all sites and subjects potentially interest somebody and, therefore, require good faith consideration. Commercial archaeologists work from home and for themselves, for small firms operating out of rented houses or storefronts, and out of moderately large and large firms, some operating as divisions within international engineering firms.

Compensation varies depending on responsibilities, experience, and a degree of business acumen, which helps perpetuate the firm, irrespective of size. Those working for larger firms often have the opportunity/onus (depending on one’s perspective) of traveling and working in different regions; smaller operations tend to work within particular regions, states or provinces, if not specific counties, or parishes. Many, like me, work for themselves, aided by staff technicians or contract workers, determining our own schedules and operating as small businesses. A flexible work schedule also allows me to do pro bono work with volunteers and to volunteer on colleagues’ projects. (There is a substantial literature on volunteerism in archaeology, and I have written on the subject of citizen science: volunteer participation in scientific research [Gibb 2018].)

To be clear, the positions that I have sketched are career positions. Absent from the discussion is how one gets to those positions. There are many jobs available in archaeology (such as field technician and lab technician jobs) for those with an undergraduate degree or without any degree whatsoever.  Some are seasonal, some might last months, years, or an entire working life. The usual route is to take a field school in archaeology, typically during the summer, through a college or university, and taught by an experienced, reputable archaeologist with the requisite credentials. A field school lasts a minimum of six weeks to be recognized as such. Shorter classes are deemed “field experiences” and are valued, but considered less than a field school which can be an issue if a position opening specifies successful completion of a field school.

There are alternative routes; for example, sustained volunteer work with a reputable organization such as the Smithsonian Institution. Participants could get a wider range of experiences through volunteering, making them more desirable employees. Volunteering also allows greater flexibility for those who cannot afford to commit to six weeks or more and pay additional tuition for a field school.

Regardless of the route, prospective participants should expect, indeed demand, that the principal investigator, or PI (person in charge of the archaeology), and host institution provide a safe environment: safe from outside threats, safe from bigotry, and safe from harassment. The PI and host institution also should meet and preferably exceed the minimum standards for ethical behavior, details of which can be found in the principles espoused by national and international professional organizations (e.g., Society for American Archaeology [www.saa.org/about-archaeology/archaeology-law-ethics]. Accessed March 14, 2021.). The work should have scientific merit and the data collected answer specific research questions, the results of which will be eventually shared through technical reports and publications, as well as through websites, public lectures, and exhibitions.

Every field school—every archaeological investigation—should develop around specific research questions and employ methods suitable for answering those questions. A successful field school experience is a cherished life-long memory, regardless of whether or not it leads to a career in archaeology.

Which of these career positions may be suitable for you, if any, I can’t say. While historically a straight cisgender white man’s field, archaeology benefits from diverse perspectives and there are now as many women as men in the field.  Women and transgender persons are increasingly visible in the field and cisgender males likely occupy fewer than half the positions sketched above (that said, cisgender men – specifically white men – still dominate the most prestigious and higher salary levels of employment).

There is room in archaeology, as in every field of human endeavor, for people of all abilities; and most of the frontline archaeological science is done by those of us driven by curiosity, the joy of discovery, and the camaraderie of a team working toward mutually agreed upon goals. Personality, individual and family needs, interests, and other variables play the principal parts in such decisions.

For my part, I quote the writer/actor/producer Mel Brooks: “It’s good to be the king” (History of the World, Part 1, 21st Century Fox, 1981). There is a lot to be said for working for oneself in a field one loves. The joy of approaching each day as an adventure more than balances the occasional financial uncertainty, the frustration with clients and agency colleagues, and the often physically demanding nature of the work. With nearly 50 years of fieldwork behind me, I don’t want to imagine another way of life.

Note: This chapter was adapted from a beta version of Traces.

James G. Gibb majored in anthropology as an undergraduate at Stony Brook University (1978). He earned his master’s degree (1985) and doctorate (1994) at Binghamton University, and a certificate in computer-aided design and drafting at Anne Arundel Community College. He has worked in cultural resource management for 45 years, running his own consulting firm since 1989. Gibb also is the founder and director of the Smithsonian Environmental Archaeology Laboratory (SEAL) at Smithsonian’s Environmental Research Center in Edgewater, Maryland. The SEAL team consists entirely of citizen scientists, volunteers who rather than assist a scientist are themselves the scientists, producing new science individually and in small groups under Gibb’s guidance and presenting results at professional conferences and publishing in professional journals. Gibb lives just outside of Annapolis, Maryland, with his wife Bonnie and three ill-behaved dogs.

Part of this chapter is from Traces by Whatcom Community College and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License, except where otherwise noted.

References

Brooks, Mel. (1981). History of the World, Part 1. Motion picture from 21^st Century Fox, produced and directed by Mel Brooks.

Gibb, James G. (2018). “Citizen Science: Case studies of public involvement in archaeology at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center.” Journal of Community Archaeology & Heritage, 6(1), 2-30. DOI: 10.1080/20518196.2018.1549815.

Gibb, James G. (2021). A Phase III Archaeological Data Recovery of the Mill Branch Crossing Site (18PR857), Queen Anne District, Prince George’s County, Maryland. Gibb Archaeological Consulting. Submitted to Mill Branch Crossing, LLC., Crofton, Maryland.

Society for American Archaeology. (2021). Archaeology Law and Ethics. Retrieved from http://www.saa.org/about-archaeology/archaeology-law-ethics. Accessed March 14, 2021.

US Department of the Interior, National Park Service. (1997). “How to apply National Register criteria for evaluation.” National Register Bulletin 15. US Department of the Interior, National Park Service. Retrieved from https://www.nps.gov/subjects/nationalregister upload/NRB-15_web508.pdf. Accessed 14 March 2021.

US Department of the Interior, National Park Service. (1983). “Archeology and Historic Preservation: Secretary of the Interior’s Standards and Guidelines. Professional Qualifications Standards.” ParkNet, National Park Service. Retrieved from https:// www.nps.gov/history/local-law/arch_stnds_9.htm. Accessed 14 March 2021.