Hi all, my name is Savanna and this is my second year in St. John as an archaeology intern. I was pleasantly surprised to learn of all the projects that were finished in the year I was away. The biggest surprise was the museum at Cinnamon Bay. It’s been completely renovated since last year, and it’s looking really great. It is so inviting for visitors- beautiful display cases, new work tables and a slideshow that plays on a new TV. Another exciting change was the re-discovery of the lost petroglyph at Reef Bay. It’s hard to spot, but when pointed out it’s very interesting. The design is so different from the Taino petroglyphs on the other side of the pool.
Hassel Island is another place that changed so much over the past year. Last December, the trail system was at the very beginning stages of construction. I think we had gone up the day they put in the first trail with the bobcat. This year there are a number of different trails, with signs to inform visitors where to go and what they are looking at. The park is restoring various historic shop machines from the marine railway and the blacksmith shop that will eventually be part of an interpretive display, thanks to funding by Friends of the Park. While on the trails, we did some surface collections for VIIS 308, mostly in front of the leprosarium and the marine railway. We mostly found glass bottles and ceramics.
Ashley, the other intern, and I spent some time this year fixing up the campsite out here at Cinnamon. In addition to visiting Reef Bay and Hassel Island, we did a number of smaller projects. Trunk Bay won the prestigious Blue Flag award, and we went in to excavate the postholes for the sign, VIIS 309. The location is not far from the Taino burial site at Trunk Bay, so we did not know what to expect. In addition to some Taino polishing stones and pot sherds, we found a human tooth with the root attached. There were no other signs of human remains there however.
Ashley and I also did some trail maintenance with the “voluntourists” who meet on Tuesdays and Thursdays. We worked at Leinster Bay and on the Johnny Horn trail, and visited the old Murphy estate. It is believed that Mr. Murphy was an active Mason and held meetings in his great house, so the ruins could possibly be the site of the oldest Masonic temple on U.S soil.
Ashley and I accompanied Ken and Kourtney with mooring compliance over at Lameshur Bay. They dove and used a metal detector to look for anomalies around the moorings. Ashley was in charge of dive safety and I was in charge of maintaining boat operations. Ashley also had her first encounter with a barracuda- possibly the least friendly looking fish down here! Although Ken and Kourtney did not find any anomalies, Kourtney had one of the best dives of her life in front of White Cliffs.
I’m very grateful to both Ken and the Friends of the Park for having me down here for another 6-week archaeology internship. Although my internship is up, I will be on St. John until June and hope to volunteer and accompany the interns from time to time.

Hey all,
I'm Megan. I'm from Wisconsin, and going to be getting my masters in Anthropology/Archaeology at UW Milwaukee. I just finished an internship here at VI Natl. Park, which lasted the month of June and was pretty much amazing. June was mosquito season on St. John (or do they swarm year-round? I'm skeptical that you could ever be mosquito free on the island), but despite that, I got to take part in some pretty interesting and unique projects, a summary of which follows:
Cinnamon Bay Reinternment
This project (for those who have not scrolled down further) is to reinter remains of those individuals that were enslaved here and have washed ashore. Since the topsoil on St. John is so rocky, most of these burials occurred on the beaches. Hurricanes and erosion, however, have played a large part in the unearthing some of these gravesites. The end result of this is that the park service has at least 30 individuals that have been eroded out.
The community members of St. John decided that the current site on Cinnamon Bay (right behind the lab) would be the best place to reinter these remains. There is, however, a lot of archaeology already in the spot; this is where the archaeology interns come in. Because the project has been ongoing, we started excavation 70 cm below ground surface. In one 10 cm level, we found numerous pot sherds, lithics, and marine shells dating to the Taino culture on the island roughly 1000 BP.
Hassel Island:
Hassel Island is on the south side of St. Thomas and home to a number of historic ruins. The ones I got to see were the old army barracks at the top of the main hill, and Creque Marine Railway; Creque Marine is the site of the longest running steam powered marine railway in the world.
The park service is putting a trail in on Hassel, and our job was to find the barracks that would be by the trail. We bushwhacked our way through cactus, thorny vines, Christmas bush (a relative of poison ivy) and wild pineapple (also thorny) to enter in the GPS coordinates of the ruins. Once that was accomplished, we set out to enter in more coordinates of the path. Later, heavy machinery would use the coordinates we entered to clear the path and take out the vegetation that proved to be more than a match for our machetes.

Mapping:
There are a number of plantation ruins on St. John, and the park service needs to map them. This is so it knows what condition they are in and what types of buildings they consist of. This was probably the most fun project because we got to hike through the woods and find the ruins we needed to map that day. Mapping the site would take a few hours, even with the handy laser measurer; there were just so many components. At one site, there were at least 10 structures: an animal mill (to mill sugarcane), the sugar factory, a retaining wall, an ox pen, a bake oven, a kitchen, a main house, and a few quarters for those enslaved here - plus all the unidentified structures that were mostly rubble.

All in all, it was a productive internship. I am so glad I got to experience what it's like to work on St. John, and I am especially grateful to the Friends of the Park, who made it possible for me to be there, and to Ken and Kourtney for letting me work with them.

VIIS Cultural Resource Project Updates -- 5/10/2011. The following projects were made possible either in part or whole through funding provided by the Friends of the Park.

Heritage education station and archaeology laboratory -- The work to restore and prepare the Cinnamon Bay warehouse/great house for the new heritage education station and archaeology laboratory began April 26. The archaeology lab has moved out of the historic structure and into a freight container at Cinnamon Bay. The public may still find folks out there a few days a week working out of the container as the park continues to excavate and analyze and catalog artifacts.
Work to be completed before the exhibit cases are installed is extensive. The concrete floor will be taken out and all electrical wiring will be installed in a new lime floor for the museum cases and lab tables. The windows and doors will be replaced with 18th century period construction techniques using hardwood and hand forged hardware. The walls will be lime plastered where needed and lime washed. A new security system will be installed along with phone lines and internet for research. The contract also includes the construction of discovery drawers for education purposes and a 60 inch indoor / outdoor tv screen for educational presentations. Accessibility will be provided everyone as a concrete sidewalk and a ramp into the building will also be built.

Accessibility Trail -- Investigations and monitoring of the accessibility trail at the Cinnamon Bay factory area is complete. In the process the investigations documented several surface remains and features that have helped the park define the village for those that were enslaved at this plantation. Friend’s archaeology funds were used to remove the plywood over the doors and windows of one of the historic structures along the walk. Using the archaeological information derived from the work done for the trail and using the guidelines for historic restoration, the shutters, doors and hand forged hardware were restored as defined for 18th century construction.

Cinnamon Bay Reburial -- This year the completion of the excavation unit at Cinnamon Bay for the reburial of the human remains is a high priority. In the last 10 centimeters excavated, eye inlays for wooden zemi statues were recovered along with beads used to make a chiefdoms belt and a three pointed zemi stone. The park is also intent on analyzing and cataloging many of the prehistoric items from this site. So far this year we are averaging approximately a thousand objects a month.

Artifact Research -- Speaking of prehistoric stone artifacts last month her Majesty’s Master and Commander and one of our favourite Danish interns Casper Toftgaard joined us again with new discoveries from the Danish National Museum. Casper is researching stone axes in the Danish collections that were excavated from St. John and taken to Copenhagen. In so doing he has found a complete stone ball belt from here (the implications of which are very significant) and has also provided the park with excellent photographs of the ball court stones from St. Croix’s Salt River Bay site and many other artifacts from here and across the region.



We also hoisted another Caribbean lithic researcher, Professor Sebastiaan Knippenberg of Leiden University, Netherlands who is the leading expert studying island stone sources to determine where stone tools originate from within the Caribbean. Sebastiaan completed his field research here in November. His report will help us sort our stone tools and determine what island they came from.



From Left to Right -- Intern Savanna, Leiden University Researcher Sebastiaan, park archaeologist Kourtney, Danish History student coordinator in Denmark and former Danish intern Jonas, and Kourtney's sister Carol


Historic Structures Preservation Projects -- The project to stabilize historic ruins at Catherineberg and the factory area at Cinnamon Bay has begun. The work is being completed by a local mason contractor and monitored by cultural resource staff. The mortar used in these types of preservation / stabilization efforts is key to long term preservation efforts. Therefore, mortar sample analysis was completed for this project. Bedding mortar and wall capping will be completed with Type S lime mortar with white cement and sand. All visible work and work around soft historic brick will consist of Virginia Lime Works Natural Hydraulic Lime (NHL) 3.5 and sand in the ratio determined by the mortar analysis. Most of the work to be completed consists of pointing and wall capping. However, in consultation with the VI Historic Preservation Office it was decided that the factory at Catherineberg should be restored as the photographic record depicts. At Cinnamon Bay the graves and the one fallen stone entrance column will be restored. Work is currently underway at the Catherineberg factory.

Historic Sites Research through the International Internship Program -- Currently two Danish history students from the University of Copenhagen, Lasse Rodewald and Aske Stick are here to help the park locate historic 18th century sites along the coast of Reef Bay. The students have spent several months researching in the archives in Denmark. After their month stay here they will return to spend several more months researching and writing up what they have found in the field. So far they have located what they believe is Rift Parret’s house. Rift had a wife, five children and three enslaved workers when he died in 1739. We were hoping to involve the community in this project more but unfortunately the areas we have had to survey are very steep, covered in Christmas bush, wild pineapple and catch and keep. Therefore we have been somewhat reluctant to invite the public.



Left to Right - Danish intern Aske, Beloit College intern Dave, Danish intern Lasse and Museum studies intern Christel at the Rift Parret ruins.

Maritime Research Projects -- Two underwater survey projects continue as time and resources allow. One project aims to complete the park’s efforts to install moorings for large boats. To complete this installation requires 106 compliance that insures that no significant resources will be damaged as a result of this action. The first half of this project; a magnetometer survey of the proposed site areas has been completed. Currently, the anomalies are being mapped so that ground truthing can be undertaken.

The other project is being completed in partnership with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). The goal of this project is to locate cultural resources and abandoned and illegal traps in the Coral Reef National Monument. The project started with the use of Navy self guiding side scan sonar torpedo shaped devices that located and scanned possible targets. Since the majority of the survey area was completed in over 100 to 130 feet of water it was determined to be too time consuming to dive on the large number of targets identified. As a result NOAA’s research vessel the Nancy Foster was brought down in March and we used an ROV to basically fly to and video record each target. Two possible wreck sites were identified for further ground truthing investigations, as were illegal fish traps in the park and the documentation of several lion fish at 110 feet.

Hassel Island -- Work continues on Hassel Island. This last month we completed surface data recovery for a portion of the new trail to the Officers Quarters. Our work will continue as we map out the route from the Officers Quarters to Cowell Battery and complete data recovery as required to complete 106 compliance.

Hello all! My name is Crystal and for the past 3 months I have been interning at the Archaeology Lab/Museum at Cinnamon Bay. Unlike most of the other individuals who come down to work at Cinnamon, however, I was not an Archaeology intern but a Museum Studies intern. This meant that my days were spent in the lab cataloging and analyzing artifacts, although I was allowed to help with the excavation occurring behind the lab a few times, which was very educational. It was interesting to see how methodical all of the archaeology interns had to be while digging and mapping the unit, as well as to see all the artifacts that I later washed and cataloged in situ or in context with each other. While I have a BA in Anthropology and have taken a few archaeology classes, I never attended a field school so it was fun to see this aspect of the work. As I mentioned earlier, the majority of my time was spent cataloging and doing preliminary analysis of artifacts within the lab’s collections, the majority of which were from an excavation at Cinnamon Bay that took place from 1998-2000, at a site that is believed to have been a Taino ceremonial center. While this was technically my main responsibility, I also spent a good deal of time talking to everyone that came into the lab, explaining what we were doing and answering questions about the history and prehistory of St. John. The most interesting project I was given, however, was when I was asked to design mobile displays for the St. John’s Arts Festival, which took place at the end of February. Not only did this allow me to tap into my artsy/designer side, it meant that I got to handle our more impressive artifacts that are often kept in storage, as they are usually too delicate to be put on display, such as the Taino offering of closed bivalves that was removed in one piece from the 1998-2000 excavation at Cinnamon Bay, and the multiple miniscule shell beads that would be in danger of being lost if left on the display cases currently in the lab. Being able to work with these artifacts, especially the ceramics, also meant that I learned quite a bit about the chronology of the cultures that inhabited the island. It is one thing to read about how the effigies that adorned the offering vessels changed over the centuries from being very anthropomorphic, or human-like, in appearance, to having bat noses and headdresses. It is quite another to see it all in a case in front of you, and to have the effigies matched up with other ceramics from the time period. It was very sad day when I had to put all of the artifacts back into storage and return to simply describing them to the museum’s visitors. It is also very depressing that I had to leave before the renovations on the lab finished, but all internships must eventually come to an end. With any luck I will return to St. John in the near future and be able to see these artifacts on permanent display, telling the long, long story of the history of St. John.

WINTER 2011 ARCHAEOLOGY HAPPENINGS

Hello my name is Rachel Applefield and I am a Cultural Anthropology major from the University of North Carolina Asheville and the newest intern. In the fall of 2011 I will be attending grad school to pursue Marine Archaeology with an emphasis on the historic period of the Caribbean and technologies associated with submergence archaeology. Given my interests, the opportunity to be able to come down to the Virgin Islands and intern with the National Park Service seemed fitting, not to mention exciting.

MAGNETOMETER SURVEY
During my first week I, along with NPS archaeologists Ken Wild, Kourtney Donohue and magnetometer specialist Tim Smith from Denver, traversed seven of the bays around St. John pulling and learning about the ways of a magnetometer which reads magnetic fields. NPS wants to put in moorings that can accommodate larger vessels; the magnetometer will help us locate anomalies that could be shipwrecks before putting the moorings in place. Now that the readings have been taken and the data compiled, Ken and Kourtney can dive and discover the nature and composition of these anomalies.

NEW PETROGLYPH FOUND
On January 21st I was able to accompany Ken as he led a group of volunteers on a petroglyph hunt after a mysterious black and white photo of a previously unknown petroglyph in the Reef Bay area was brought to Ken’s attention. Armed with a copy of the photo the group searched around the petroglyph pool ; it was finally discovered by a couple of archaeology enthusiasts, Sue and Darrell Borger from Racine, WI. After studying the rock fissures in the photograph, Sue Borger was able to recognize and locate the rock face with the ancient glyph. The geometric glyph which has been found in other parts of the Lesser Antilles but not within the Virgin Islands is thought to predate the classic Taino period and could serve as evidence to an earlier pre-Taino culture’s existence on the island.
*The picture below is the original and had been chalked. In order to help preserve them, petroglyphs should never be chalked.



THE INTERNS AND WHAT WE ARE DOING
Joining me down here are recent grads Steve Jankiewicz from University of Illinois, Dave Simpson from Beloit College and Crystal Williams of Wake Forest. These interns are coming in with anthropology backgrounds and experience in CRM work and museum studies.
Dave and Steve are working on doing historic analysis of artifacts removed when an accessibility trail to the Cinnamon Bay factory and great house was put in. Crystal along with local intern Chela Thomas are busy in the archaeology lab doing museum curation and cataloging. As for me, I will be compiling a list of the plantation ruins on NPS land that are accessible to the public and putting together a brief history pamphlet that will be made available to visitors of the lab.
In addition to this Dave, Steve, Kourtney and I have been busy excavating the unit behind the lab for the burial of human remains from a historic period cemetery that had washed out because of beach erosion. We have also begun to look for and document new sub-sites at the L’Esperance plantation ruins.
Check back for more later!

As a part of our internship last semester, we had the wonderful opportunity to go to St. John. Out area of interest was the East End of the island, an area that we began to focus on in the archives in Copenhagen prior to our departure. The moist and hot air that “welcomed” us on our arrival the 21 of March would take some time to get used to, but we were soon acclimatized and heading into the jungle searching for potsherds and ruins. We made several trips out from our camp in Cinnamon Bay to the East End, accompanied by NPS Archaeologist Ken Wild, and at times other interns from the US Mainland. One of our earlier trips was to the ruins of Halover, an estate that had drawn our attention in the archives. According to the material found in the archives, this was one of the larger estates in the area which had up till 40 enslaved workers in the early nineteenth century. This, however, did not fit with the archeological findings at the site, which indicated that the site had most likely been abandoned in the 1790s. Later on, back in the archives, we found evidence, which combined with the archeological studies, suggested that the estate had moved to Turners Point, probably in the 1790s. This new piece of information would not have been possible to put together without the combination of archeological field work and archival studies. The trips out into the wilderness of the East End, the hours spend working with the American interns, as well as enjoying the free time with them, and the beautiful island itself, are just some of the fond memories that we have from our time on St. John.
- Signe Haubroe Flygare & Stig Søndergaard Rasmussen.

2010-2011 Projects

Hi I’m Kourtney, I’ve been an archaeology intern with the park in the past and now I’m back, working through the Friends while awaiting my background check to clear so that I can become an official NPS archaeology employee…hoping any college loan defaults don’t affect my clearance :)

For interested interns that have not been to Cinnamon Bay below is a photo of the Lab at Cinnamon and we have attached a link to the Intern Survival Guide in the side bar.





I rushed back to the islands this September to assist in salvaging the resources threatened by the hurricanes this season. Our most crucial project involved addressing the beach erosion at Cinnamon Bay. Following Hurricane Earl, the erosion exposed a burial on the beach at Cinnamon. The skeleton was articulated and almost complete, excluding the cranium. Based on the elements present, the burial contained the remains of one young adult female. The burial was exhumed and will remain in a safe location until the forthcoming reinterment.

We are aware of the historic cemetery that has been inundated by the sea at Cinnamon Bay. However, this burial does not appear to be associated with that cemetery. Instead, the burial was located beneath a house structure, one that was most likely burnt down during the St. John Slave Revolt of 1733. We plan on mapping the area to confirm this but cannot do so until we first try to minimize the affects of the erosion. Our first plan of action involves applying matting and sandbags to the edge of the archaeological sites that are eroding. Following this, we are planning to reopen the Cinnamon Bay Prehistoric Site in order to salvage the archaeology in case of complete inundation.

We are now without our very valuable intern Chela :( who is gone until February. We are actively recruiting interns to help us with all the ongoing projects such as underwater surveys, excavation of units, site condition assessments, artifact analysis, and cataloging. Below is a more concise list of the current ongoing projects we are working on.



TYPE - PROJECT - DESCRIPTION

VIIS-352 - CINNAMON BAY ACCESSIBILITY TRAIL - Monitor construction of accessibility trail through the Cinnamon Bay Sugar Factory ruins. Complete archeological data recovery, analysis, cataloging and report.

FRIENDS - Install Historic Shutters and Doors - Contract and provide architectural info and oversee installation of replicated historic doors, blacksmith hardware and shutters on two historic structures at Mary Creek and a Cinnamon factory ruin

VIIS-351 - CINNAMON BAY EROSION STABILIZATION - Stabilize and salvage material from the coastal archaeological sites that are threatened at Cinnamon Bay following hurricane season.

VIIS-191- CINNAMON BAY PREHISTORIC SITE - Ongoing analysis and cataloging of artifacts from the excavations of the Pre-Columbian site at Cinnamon Bay.

SEC. 106 - CINNAMON BAY EMERGENCY EXCAVATION -Emergency salvage excavation of the Pre-Columbian ceremonial site at Cinnamon Bay, following its endangerment due to the 2010 hurricane season.

VIIS-339 - CINNAMON BAY REINTERMENT - Complete excavation of a unit at Cinnamon Bay that will later become the reburial plot for the assemblage of human skeletal remains that were disturbed from the historic cemetery on the beach.

PMIS/FRIENDS - CINNAMON BAY CONTACT STATION - Develop interpretive heritage exhibits at the Cinnamon Bay archaeology lab. Monitor the restoration of the structure and oversee the construction of the display exhibit cases.

SCA - HASSEL ISLAND INTERPRETATION TRAIL - Supervise Creque Cultural Landscape survey carried out by SCA. (STT Historical Trust)

FRIENDS/ Education - CREQUE SIGNS - Complete development of 5 Interpretive Signs for Creque Marine and have them installed

FMSS/PMIS - HASSEL ISLAND ROYAL MAIL STEAM PACKET STABILIZATION - Monitor the stabilization and construction of the ruins at the Royal Mail Steam Packet Company.

FMSS/PMIS - HASSEL ISLAND CREQUE MARINE DOCK - Monitor the construction of a safe dock and assure this is done as historically accurate as possible.

ASMIS/FMSS - RESEARCH HASSEL ISLAND BARRACKS STUDY - Review research by Charles Consolvo and enter data into site files, FMSS and ASMIS

FRIENDS/STT - HIST TRUST HASSEL ISLAND METAL CONSERVATION - Oversee conservation of the historic metal material recovered from surveys carried out at Hassel Island.

FRIENDS/Education - PREHISTORIC CERAMIC REPLICAS - Consult with pottery Gail Van der Bogart to replicate prehistoric ceramics for the Contact Station at Cinnamon Bay.

COST SHARE GRANT - VIRTUAL PRESERVATION OF CULTURAL RESOURCES - Oversee the University of Maine Engineer Students while digitally mapping the ruins at Cinnamon Bay in order to virtually preserve them.

SEC. 106 FRIENDS/FMSS - VEGETATION REMOVAL FROM HISTORIC SITES - Monitor volunteer coordinator Jeff Chabot and volunteers while undergoing clearing of historic sites in the park. Complete surface collection and measure ruins for FMSS

VIP/ASMIS - MAPPING HISTORIC RUINS: ANN HERSH - Assist in mapping ruins with volunteer architect at Turner site.

SEC. 110/ASMIS/FRIENDS - DANISH INTERN PROJECT: 2011 - Guide Danish interns from the University of Copenhagen through survey, data recovery, analysis in conjunction with their historic background research and report.

FRIENDS/Education - ARCHAEOLOGY INTERN PROJECT 2010 - Train archaeology students in the NPS CRM standards and procedures.

FRIENDS/Intern research - ST JOHN LITHIC STUDY 2010 - Assist in two projects led by a Danish and Dutch students researching prehistoric lithics for the park. (Casper and Sebastian) Data will result in required analysis for report purposes

FMSS/PMIS - MAHO PARKING LOT - Monitor construction of parking lot at Maho Bay.

SEC. 110 - NOAA/Navy UNDERWATER SURVEY - Survey with NOAA using self guiding UW sidescan vehicles to locate submerged resources and complete UW compliance.10/4-15. Underwater anomalies survey ongoing

SEC. 110/SEC. 106 - PAQUERAU SALVAGE - Site is threatened and never recorded. Must clear vegetation, complete archaeological data recovery survey, map assess condition and complete analysis, cataloging and report.

SEC. 110/SEC. 106 - HOPE SALVAGE Site - is threatened and never recorded. Must clear vegetation, complete archaeological data recovery survey, map, assess condition and complete analysis, cataloging and report.

SEC. 110/SEC. 106 - VESSUP SALVAGE - Site is threatened and never recorded. Must clear vegetation, complete archaeological data recovery survey, map assess condition and complete analysis, cataloging and report.

SEC. 110/SEC. 106 - BORDEAUX WEST - Site is threatened and never recorded. Must clear vegetation, complete archaeological data recovery survey, map, assess condition and complete analysis, cataloging and report.

SEC. 110/SEC. 106 - Survey - 200+ acre donation never surveyed for Cultural Resources area has largest plantation on the island BEVERHOUDTSBERG This year complete phase 1 survey of area to include location of major structural remains and archaeological sites.

SEC. 110/SEC. 106 - Drier, Sullivan and Constantine Estate Surveys - Follow up on pedestrian survey. Map structures and test integrity of sites for ASMIS.

SEC. 106 - MAGNETOMETER SURVEY FOR DEEPWATER MOORINGS - Survey for impacts of CR due to the deepwater mooring replacements in compliance with Section 106. Jan 9-16, 2011. Complete anomalies survey after magnetometer survey

FRIENDS/EDUCATION - PREHISTORIC AND HISTORIC VIDEO TIMELINE - Compiling archaeological data to create a video timeline of St. John. Produced by Bill Steltzer and Ken Wild

Dissemination of Scientific findings - Present findings as required for publication and peer review - Present scientific findings at the International Congress for Caribbean Archaeology for publication

Hey folks my name is Kelsi Lindquist and I’ve been interning here on St. John for the last few months. I first came in contact with the NPS and friends a couple summers ago while I was living on St. Thomas. I met Ken and volunteered with him as he was beginning an excavation at Maho Bay. That experience really opened my mind to archaeology and from then on I geared my education and life toward anthropology. Now I am an anthropology major at Brigham Young University in Provo where I’m studying both cultural anthropology and archaeology. I’ve stayed in touch with Ken who generously offered me an internship this summer and so here I am.



On this internship, I’ve been lucky enough to have worked on an actual archaeological excavation and have had the unique opportunity to work with and learn from professional archaeologists. The Cinnamon Bay Lift Station project was already underway when I arrived but what I may have missed was made up for with the wide array of experiences during the following three months. From troweling to mapping to dry screening to water screening ankle deep in mud (see picture) to bailing hundreds of gallons of rain water out of the unit to chasing tarantulas, massive crabs and other jungle creatures out of the unit to washing artifacts to analyzing artifacts to cataloguing artifacts to painting numbers on artifacts to a number of other odd tasks.



As we explained to visitors multiple times every day, the reason we were digging there at Cinnamon was to preserve the cultural remains that had been deposited there that would have otherwise been destroyed by the construction of the new lift station. And by doing that I’ve gained a greater appreciation and respect for those people, whether from the Taino or colonial period, who lived on the island so many years ago. I’ve had the opportunity to observe their handiwork on celts, beads and ceramics. It’s been exciting to try and determine the thought processes and behavior of those people. All in all this initial experience of working as an archaeologist has really given me an appetite for a wider understanding of people and their culture. A big thanks to Ken, Karl, Bob, Jason, Kourtney, Matt, Chela and Marlise who all taught me so much in the field and put up with my lack of experience. Thank you!

Marlise’s Blog May
It’s hard for me to believe that I have already been working here for 5 months. I started as an archaeology intern here in mid-January after leaving the snow back home in Colorado. After a couple of months of living in the tents at Cinnamon, I finally got used to the cold showers and cooking on a gas burner. I would fall asleep to the sound of waves at night and wake up to lizards scurrying up the walls in the morning.
Moving here and working with Caribbean archaeology was very different than the south western archaeology I was familiar with. I had been working for an archaeology firm in western Colorado doing artifact drawings, graphic design and a variety of lab work. My first weeks down here were spent reading and learning about the history of the Virgin Islands.



Marlise in the excavation unit at Cinnamon

I have been impressed learning about the richness of the Taino culture. The artwork they created was rich in symbolic and religious meaning. The artifacts collected during archaeological excavations here on St. John include stone carvings and shell beads, ceramics adorned with human-like sculptures , as well as historic European artifacts People have been living on St. John for over 3000 years, with a history spanning from prehistoric peoples, European conquest and slave trade to cruise ships and tourism.¬¬
One of the things the interns have been doing here is giving archaeology talks at Maho resort. I watched the presentation a couple of times as the previous interns gave the talk and then gave the talk myself. People seem to really enjoy learning about the place they are visiting and the audience had lots of interesting questions. The most common question seems to be, however, “Why do they drive on the left-side of the road here?” No one really knows for sure, but the close proximity of the British Virgin Islands seems to be the origin. Talking with visitors about the work we are doing here is a big part of our job. Visitors come into the lab on the beach and look around or talk to us while we’re excavating and we’re able to answer people’s questions about the history of the island.
These last few months have been full of many different projects. We have mapped and took GPS points of plantation ruins on the steep hillsides of the island, continued working on the excavation behind the archaeology lab, and gone over to Hassel island for projects and talks. In April a new excavation at Cinnamon started and a crew was hired for the project. Matt, the other intern and I, were on the crew so we moved into housing with the crew chief. We also undertook the Danish International internship program during the month. We had three Danish students, Signe and Stig were our history students here to discover ruins they found in the archives. Casper was here to pursue his research on the prehistoric lithic (stone tools) of the island and how they compare to those in the collections in Denmark. I got to go out with the history students into the bush to help them locate three new plantations that are some of the first to be settled and abandoned on the island. As of this post I am working on developing the first interpretive signs for Hassel Island about the historic Creque Marine Railway.

Karson Winslow, 2010 Intern
A gentleman asked me the other day why I was interning with the National Park Service on St John. He thought that with the bad economy, that had to be the reason why I didn’t have a “real job.” Either that or I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do with my life. I responded with the exact opposite. I know exactly what I want to do in my life and right now, this is it. I joined on as an intern and volunteer because I purely have a desire to be in the field of archaeology. In the field now for a little over five years, I have had the ability to work in some really great places and with very knowledgeable and amazing people. This destination has been no exception.
I went to school in California and attended UC Santa Cruz, receiving a BA in Anthropology (2005). I continued with my education and moved to South Australia to attend Flinders University for graduate studies focusing in Maritime Archaeology (2007). After University, working in a number of places including Tasmania, St. Augustine, Florida, Galveston, Texas and terrestrial work throughout California, I decided to focus on a region I believed would most apply to my studies and experiences.
Being an archaeologist, the system is similar and relatively universal in the different locations where one works, but each individual area brings its own cultural identity. For this reason I choose to explore the past as well as explore these unique entities most people might not even know exist.
For now, I will only be on St. John for a short while, though I intend to return and continue working and volunteering on island in the near future. With the Caribbean being such a “Colonial Melting Pot” if you will, with so many European powers utilizing these waters and these islands, there is a very important history here that belongs to all of these nations, including those who inhabited the islands before.
Days are spent at Cinnamon Bay working in the Archaeology Lab. Work out there consists of informing visitors about the history of the area and explaining the purpose and focus of the work we do. We are also working on cataloguing artifacts from the excavation at Cinnamon Bay that was completed at the Ceremonial grounds of the site, as well as washing and sorting artifacts from a current re-burial project the VINP is presently undertaking. If not in the lab, we are in the field recording the remains of known sites on and around the island or gathering historic data on field artifacts. Such as recording the exact measurements of the one surviving historic marine iron bollard at Creque Marine so that identical ones can be reproduced as part of a park funded project that is aimed at providing safe docking for visitors while maintaining the historic scene.
I would just like to say a quick thank you to the supporters and Friends of the National Parks, without whom it would not be possible for the interns and myself to be here. I very much appreciate the support and generous donations towards the park.
Karson Winslow

Ken giving an educational tour to a St Thomas school group at Creque Marine. While we interns recorded artifact data.

Marlise recording Bollard data for reproduction.

Hassel Island Day Trips

As of right now, a project is taking place on Hassel Island, just off of the island of St Thomas. The small island has had many uses over the years and numerous structures and features remain visible today. Currently the interns are partaking in recording officer barracks, long houses and other structures located there. This involves taking measurements of the in situ structures and noting any artifacts located on the surrounding surface. These structures in particular, all that is left at the surface are parts of the side walls and staircase. The dimensions are taken and recorded; orientation of the building is noted and any other important details that might reveal pertinent information to the location.

A group of volunteers, including Volunteer Coordinator Jeff Chabot, National Park employees, Thomas Kelley, Ken Wild, Lauran Riser and interns Marlise Reed and Karson Winslow rounded out the team of jungle cutters going to clear paths to the archaeological sites in question. With machetes and loppers in hand a trail was blazed through the lethal Christmas Bush, Cacti and other thorny flora. Did I mention that the sites were also located on the top of the hill? We really appreciate the great help of the volunteers who came out with smiles and packed lunches to spend the beautiful day clearing bush for the archaeology to happen.

We had some time to record a Leprosarium with a cistern attached.




The majority of the day was used clearing bush, which gave little time for recording. We plan to return to the site for more recording in the future.

The next visit was done in conjunction with a day trip kayaking company ran out of St Thomas bringing a group of roughly 20 visitors. Ken Wild conducted a great four hour tour of the island starting at Creque Marine Slipway, the oldest and largest known steam powered marine railway of its time. It was built by the Danish in 1840 and many of the parts are located on site today.
This day didn’t involve fieldwork by the archeologists, but functioned as great tool to learn more about the history of the area.

The last trip out to Hassel, we met up with a group of Army National Guard men and women, who are based in St. Croix; all having served in Iraq or Afghanistan. Ken gave them a tour while Karson and Matt recorded historic slipway features. These features were recorded in part to historically recreate the slipway authentically. Thank you very much to the St. Croix group for a great day!!

My name is Eric Vane and I am a newly arrived archaeology intern courtesy of the Friends of the National Park Service. I graduated from Beloit College in the great state of Wisconsin (which was experiencing 35 degree weather when I left) with a B.A. in Anthropology. After spending a summer walking cornfields for an archaeological firm in northern Illinois I am more than excited to escape to warmer climes and tropical jungles.
This is my second stint on St. John with Ken Wild, and The Friends of the National Park Service. My first experience lasted three weeks from May to June of 2008 predominantly on Hassel Island. I assisted with the surface collection of the Leprosarium/ Yellow Fever Hospital, and helped process the artifacts. I also worked with several Danish students who were exploring the history of Hassel Island by using the archives on St. Thomas, and St. John.
So far my six days back on St. John have seemed like a vacation in comparison to last year. Instead of hard cots and platform tents at Cinnamon Bay we have fans, electricity, and… gasp… real mattresses at Maho Bay. Instead hacking through dense jungles of thorny plants, and poisonous brush we have been in padded chairs in air conditioned labs; we know this will end soon. Despite the air conditioning we have all been eager to get into the field, and so today we went to investigate a reported gear/ship wreck off Henley Cay on the South western side of St. John. After setting anchor Katherine, Margaret and I snorkelled along the coastline until we encountered the reported “gear”, which turned out to be an old airplane engine. While Ken was diving the site and recording the find we also found some additional wreckage including what we anticipate is the plane’s wing and the wreckage of a sailboat they may have crashed into the island and sunk during one of the many hurricanes that have hit the islands in the last few decades.
Margaret and I are getting ready to move into the Cinnamon Bay campground on November first, so we shall enjoy our last few days with the fans at Maho. We have opened up the Cinnamon Bay lab, cleaned it out, and spent a couple days there this week washing ceramics from the Cinnamon Bay excavation. We also reopened an old excavation unit nearby, which has lain dormant since 2007 with the exception of a colony of biting ants whom were busy doing their own excavation. Only one 10 centimeter level has been excavated here and already a Danish coin, the smallest Taino shell bead to date and an eye inlay for a Taino wooden Zemi statue. This unit is being excavated for the reburial of the human remains that have eroded from the shoreline at Cinnamon Bay. This excavation will be stopped again for a short time as we once again travel to Hassel Island. This time we will be monitoring the removal of a very old dump at Careening Cove. There is no telling what we may encounter as the cove has been used for centuries.
Unfortunately today is Chela’s last day of work, and we will hate to see her go. Other than that I am excited to be back in the Virgin Islands, and am having a great time.

-Eric Vane-

My name is Chela Thomas and I have been working for the National Park Service for a few months now. In this time, I have been trained in the preservation of artifacts from various places on St. John and from an old Yellow Fever hospital and Leprosarium on Hassel Island. My appointed tasks included making bags and tags for the artifacts as well as washing them at times. I am able to catalog the artifacts and verify that everything from the site that I was working with is accounted for and included in the reports.

I grew up on St. John and I recently graduated from the University of the Virgin Islands with a Bachelor of Science in Biology. I have been travelling between St. John and St. Thomas for as long as I can remember, so being able to work with the different artifacts has opened my eyes to the way things were. This is my second summer assisting with artifact preservation and I have come to enjoy it very much. My duties last summer included cataloging the historic photographs and some of the same things as now.

While working on the artifacts form the Leprosarium, I took a particular interest in the bottles fragments. I wanted to know what different types of bottles were used for and how they were made. I learned that most of the bottles I had encountered were used for medicine or alcohol. As I cataloged artifacts from other sites, my interest grew from just bottles to glass in general. I wanted to know how the different types of glass got their distinct colors. My interest in glass got me into trying to analyze different types of finishes and trying to guess what the bottles would have been used for. While most glass is undiagnostic, there are some bottles and maker’s marks that have specific date ranges attached to them.

In addition to glass, I recently have gained an interest in different types of ceramics including porcelain and shell edged wares. The variety they contain is amazing. Each pattern has a different date range but they tend to overlap in certain cases. Some of these ceramics are still in production today and even though they are mass produced, they look the same as they did when they were first being made.

Finally, due to my background in science, I was asked to assist Susanna in the conservation of archeological metals. This involves the use of chemical indicators and titration to determine the level of chlorides still present in the metals. We are trying to look at the chloride levels on a monthly basis and just received funding to improve our conservation set-up with new tanks and more sodium carbonate.

On the whole, I feel that my experience here has deepened my appreciation for the islands and I hope that I can continue my work here.

Hello from Margaret!

Hello Everyone! I’m Margaret McWhorter, one of the new archaeology interns. I’m from South Carolina and graduated from the University of South Carolina (the real USC) this past December with my bachelors in Anthropology and Russian. My main focus in school was prehistoric archaeology and I am so excited about St. John’s prehistoric offerings. Today is my second day here and I am already getting exposed to lots of different areas of National Park Service life. This morning we had a large meeting with the National Park Service regional directors and other regional bigwigs. Later on today Ken, Kathryn, Lauran and I are going out to Trunk Bay to survey the ruins of the former manager’s house. Everyone has been so warm and welcoming; I couldn’t be happier to be down here working in such a beautiful place. I really want to thank the Friends for making this possible.