Day 5;Kids are on a real adventure and discovery at the camp

What an adventure we are all having!!!!! This is a real academic Indiana Jones in action.... On Monday the kids and counselors received a map originated by the Rochester Museum of Science with long houses marked on it. We didn't know if we would really find anything of importance but as it turns out the RYSAG has discovered a real site with an even older house or camp site of people that are thousands of years before the Seneca. How awesome is that!!!!!!

Chief Krumrine, Excavation

It's a little confusing to the kids and the counselors, because we were expecting to find an Iroquois longhouse (at least that's what the map suggested) and we've been emphasizing Iroquois culture. But, as I told the kids last Monday, we could find an occupation from a totally different time period going back as late as 10,000 years. That's what happened, which is both exciting and demonstrates the nature of archaeological research (as quoted in Raiders of the Lost Ark, archaeology is not an exact science!). The people who likely occupied this site were archaic hunters and gatherers (pre-agriculturalists and pre-Seneca) whose ancestors moved into this area when the glaciers retreated and took advantage of abundant game and plant resources that were available in the valley and upland areas. I'll put together a collection of Iroquois artifacts that the kids can look at, maybe at headquarters, and compare to the artifacts that they're finding at the site. Hopefully this will help them conceptualize better that these are different people than the Seneca (although it's also important to note that many Seneca may not agree with that, since many NA creation stories reinforce the idea that groups had originated where they were when Euro-Am came). At least culturally speaking, they are different. The Seneca history that they're learning is still very important in allowing them to construct the culture history of the area (vital to any offical contact archaeology report!).

To view our kids in the news on Saturday in the D & C go to

http://www.democratandchronicle.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080719/NEWS01/807190327/-1/archive1

Yours,

Susan