Past Events: 2010

ASBC_Lecture_Poster_November_2010.pdf

In the past, stone celts (adzes, axes or chisels) were a critical component of indigenous peoples’ technology for making objects such as canoes, houses, boxes, masks and memorial poles in British Columbia. My research into the mineralogy and spatial distribution of these artifacts indicates that celts made of particular rocks were exchanged within discrete zones or ‘interaction spheres’ of British Columbia. The largest of these interaction spheres was based on the exchange of nephrite/jade celts in southern B.C. Nephrite celts were produced by only a few communities along the Fraser River and were exchanged from Vancouver Island to Idaho, and Oregon to Prince George and beyond. My analysis of these artifacts using near-infrared spectrometry was successful at matching nephrite celts to nephrite cores found only at these specialized centres of celt production. My discussion will focus on interpreting systems of exchange from this data, exploring issues of elite manipulation of exchange, competition between production centres, and the correspondence (or lack thereof) of celt interaction spheres and ethnolinguistic groups.

ASBC_Lecture_Poster_October_2010.pdf

Archie Miller, with the experience of about forty years of working with the history of the Royal City, many of these as City Curator and as archivist, will present an intriguing collection of stories of finds, sites and information that are clearly connected to the field of historical archaeology. From a simple bullet in a doorjamb or an old chisel and template to a large Victorian home, other reminders of the early streetcar system, and a whole lot in between, the stories are eye opening, informative, and always entertaining.

New Insights into the Old Cordilleran Tradition

Fifty years ago, B. Robert Butler introduced the idea of the Old Cordilleran Culture, a distinctive flake-and-biface lithic industry which he believed to represent the initial human occupation of Northwest America. We now know that Old Cordilleran was not the earliest. But it is distinct from its predecessors, so much so that it likely represents a secondary immigration down the Pacific Coast from Beringia. Despite its long history in the archaeological lexicon, the Old Cordilleran has received little research because its near-exclusive occurrence in near-surface deposits has made it difficult to date and information on subsistence impossible to obtain. Within the last decade, however, the first large-scale data recovery excavations, coupled with technological advances in dating and residue analyses, have made it possible to understand when and how Old Cordilleran folk lived their lives. This lecture will discuss findings from the excavation of three Old Cordilleran components near Granite Falls, Washington, with emphasis on the age, lithic technology, subsistence, and adaptive strategy of these early occupants of our region.

ASBC_Lecture_Poster_April_28th_2010.pdf

The Seymour Valley Archaeology Project documents logging camps and residential locations in the Lower Seymour Conservation Reserve in North Vancouver during the early 1900s. Research has focussed on three sites with evidence of Japanese. One camp appears to have been organized and laid out in a typical Japanese fashion, complete with a bathhouse. After its initial use as a logging camp, a small group of Japanese may have continued living here hidden in the woods until World War II. Another camp is likely evidence of Japanese transitioning to a typical Pacific Northwest logging camp style. A third camp was probably used for a variety of functions over the past 100 years, beginning as a Japanese camp around 1900 and used most recently as an outdoor marijuana growing operation. Several hundred artifacts provide clues to the daily life, alcohol consumption, health, and gender.