New work in Nine Mile Canyon. Light on archaeology information, but still- progress in the canyon.
Nine Mile Canyon Work

Good News Everyone!

Saw this story about a missing Fremont figurine. For those out of the Utah loop, thought you'd like to see the story. Lost Figurine Returned

Fremont Fighting and Insights into JCJ via Barb Frank

Hi all,

I heard a funny story about JCJ and thought I should pass it on. Last Friday, I went up to SUU to look at some Fremont remains. My friend Ryan Harrod (a physical anthropologist PhD candidate and expert on non-lethal violence) and I are interested in looking at Fremont remains to see if they were participating in violent behavior. Ryan and his chair, Deb Martin have been accumulating databases on violence throughout the SW. I thought it only fitting to lump the Fremont into that database. Subversive labeling as a SW culture!

In December, we went to the MPC in Provo to have a look at a few Fremont skeletons as well. Our current sample is only 16, but I guess by bioarchaeology standards, that's pretty good.  Preliminary findings show that of the eight we looked at in Provo, only two demonstrated evidence of healed cranial depression fractures (this is not counting Seamons Mound). The eight we looked at in Cedar City ALL had some form of cranial trauma. Six of the eight had healed cranial depression fractures occurring in a range of areas on the skull: parietal, occipital, and frontal. The other two had severely broken/healed noses. So, that's pretty interesting. Seems like Parowan Valley Fremont liked to rumble. I'll keep you all posted about these developments.

Now, onto the fun part! While at SUU, Barb Frank and I got to talking about Joel. She once again mentioned his "beautiful, brown beard" (remember that, Cady?) and that it was "like a beaver pelt hanging from his chin". I then proceeded to tell her the Wendover story. Since she did field school with Joel and Dave Madsen, this was a great story for her. Then, she shared a good one about Joel. She asked me if Joel had ever mentioned his field school roommate, Dave. I said he had not. This was new to me. Here goes:

At the beginning of one of the field schools (I don't know which one), Jennings had all the students line up. For some reason, Joel was running late or could not be there for this line-up. Jennings had all of the women choose their roommates and then all the men. Among the group of guys, there was one named Dave. Dave was (as Barb put it) "flaming". He was a dance major, but somehow got into the Archy fieldschool. Barb said she thinks Jennings allowed the kid to come along because he needed the field school fee money. Dave wore his hair in a samurai top-knot and dressed in saffron robes (ala Buddhist Monks). When it came time for the men to choose their roommates, they all chose each other and left Dave the odd man out (HA!). Jennings said, "Well, Dave, I guess you'll be rooming with Joel. He's not here, but you'll meet him later."

Joel shows up, realizes what's happened, and resigns himself to dealing with Dave as his roommate. Apparently, Dave was a practitioner of yoga but preferred to do it in the nude. Each morning, Dave would strip and begin his yoga in the room. Barb said that Joel was up and out of his room before anyone else was awake just to avoid the site of Dave in all of his glory. It sounds like Joel got up earlier and earlier each morning just to avoid the possibility of interacting with Dave in the mornings.

This story cracked me up. I can just picture Joel shuddering in disgust as this guy, Dave, began his morning exercises. I wanted to pass it on to all of you.

Utah's in trouble

Despite the main stream media's attempt to cover up the story, Brad has uncovered the truth; that clearly, this guy is the person currently in charge of all archaeology in Utah.

A possible new format for this blog/community

Hey all,

I've recently been sucked into the online community of Reddit. I'm not sure if any of you have heard of it, but it's very similar to digg or stumble upon.

In my mind, one of the difficulties with the blog format is the lack of message board capabilities. Blog posts are made, comments are posted, and in order to read those comments, one has to open the post.

The Reddit format allows the original post to be displayed and then shows all subsequent comments directly beneath the post. I have taken the liberty of creating a subreddit: reddit.com/r/fremontfarmers.

It may not get off the ground, but it's worth a shot. Just trying to keep this thing alive and maybe a new format would be helpful.

Call for references/pdf's

Hey all -

Here's my third and final post of the afternoon. (I'm binging.) In relation to my dissertation work and in helping out Tim Kohler for a side project on modeling population fluctuations in the SW, I'm going to be trying to create some kind of an individual-body-based Fremont census database (niner). Basically, I'm looking for records of Fremont burials/skeletal remains along with associated demographic info (sex, age, etc.), date(s), and provenience.

Over the past few years, I've been compiling a good-sized library of Fremont articles and publications. Basically, I've got everything that's freely available and accessible online from Malouf (1940) to present (~150 individual articles plus the Antiquities Section pubs and the Utah Archaeology's), as well as whole or partial inventories of the actual specimens from BYU, USU, UMNH, Antiquities, and Joan Coltrain. So, I'm good with all that, but it's the gray lit and other not-easily-accessible venues where I'm lacking. The next time I'm down in the area, I'll try to get my hands on some of the MPC publications, but if anybody knows of any reports mentioning Fremont remains off the top of their heads, pass that info on this way. You don't have to actually go and dig through them page by page (although I might be able to pay you in hugs and candy), just a reference would suffice. I could take it from there.

Thanks again for the help -


BRAD

This just in

Ran across this by accident today. Looks like a probable Fremont burial was found in a front yard just west of the UofU campus. Good to see Derinna Kopp still in action. Tough to see her without Kevin and Ron.

Get the story here.

Who's in charge, here, anyway?

Jack Broughton came up last week for a seminar presentation, and I went out to dinner with him, Karen Lupo, Dave Schmitt, Tim Kohler, and others. They were quizzing me on the situation surrounding the Antiquities Section firings, and I was doing pretty well until they asked, "So, without a state archaeologist, who's overseeing the work in Utah?" I was stumped.

I asked this of Dr. Yoder in an email the other day, but I'd like to get everybody's thoughts. With all the crap that's gone down surrounding archaeology in the state of Utah over the past while, who really is in charge now? Everything is so fractured and fragmented now. (Kudos to the powers that be. Your plan to trivialize Utah's cultural resources even further has worked beautifully.)

My top three archaeologists in descending order of influence/authority/etc: Dave Yoder--Chief PLPCO Archaeologist, Lori Hunsaker--Deputy SHPO, Jim Allison--UPAC President and actual practicing archaeologist (no offense, Dave).

Am I missing anyone? I know there are others with more tenure and experience in the state. In any case, we all know it's a pretty screwed up time right now. (Our own department isn't flying the flag that high, either, from what I've been hearing.) But, for as low-key and laid-back as I am (I might have one lonely activist bone in my body), these kinds of problems actually make me want to work in Utah to try and fix what appears to be a really messed-up situation.

Thoughts?

Another publication from our FoFs!

Hi All,

This moring, Cady Jardine posted a link on Facebook notifying us of the publication of a book chapter. I hope I'm not stealing her and Chris' thunder, but I felt like this was blog worthy. Especially since we're struggling for content these days.

The chapter, co-authored by Joel C. Janetski, Cady B. Jardine, and Christopher N. Watkins is titled:

Interaction and Exchange in Fremont Society

Here's the link

Their chapter joins a collection of other chapters written by some heavy hitters of Great Basin archaeology. Nice job, guys. I'm excited to read it (free .pdf proofs, anyone?)

I remember sitting in the same office at OPA while some of the drafts were being written. I'm glad to see this come to fruition.