Alberta’s Lower Athabasca Basin: Archaeology and Palaeoenvironments

565 Pages·2017·12.237 MB·English

by  Brian Ronaghan

Alberta’s Lower Athabasca Basin

Alberta’s
Lower
Athabasca
Basin
Archaeology
and
Palaeo
environments
EditEd by brian M. ronaghan
Copyright © 2016 Brian Ronaghan
Published by AU Press, Athabasca University
1200, 10011 – 109 Street, Edmonton, AB T5J 3S8
ISBN 978-1-926836-90-4 (print) 978-1-926836-91-1 (PDF) 978-1-926836-92-8 (epub)
doi: 10.15215/aupress/9781926836904.01
Cover and interior design by Marvin Harder, marvinharder.com.
Printed and bound in Canada by Friesens.
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Alberta’s lower Athabasca basin : archaeology and palaeoenvironments / edited by Brian M.
Ronaghan.
(Recovering the past : studies in archaeology, ISSN 2291-6784)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Issued in print and electronic formats.
1. Athabasca Basin (Sask. and Alta.)—Antiquities. 2. Athabasca Tar Sands (Alta.)—Antiquities.
3. Paleontology—Athabasca Basin (Sask. and Alta.). 4. Paleontology—Alberta—Athabasca Tar Sands.
I. Ronaghan, Brian M., editor of compilation II. Series: Recovering the past (Edmonton, Alta.)
QE748.A4A43 2016 560.9712’32 C2012-901896-1 C2012-901897-X
We acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Canada Book Fund
(CBF) for our publishing activities.
Assistance provided by the Government of Alberta, Alberta Media Fund.
This publication is licensed under a Creative Commons Licence, Attribution–Noncommercial–No
Derivative Works 4.0 International: see www.creativecommons.org. The text may be reproduced for
non-commercial purposes, provided that credit is given to the original author.
To obtain permission for uses beyond those outlined in the Creative Commons licence, please contact
AU Press, Athabasca University, at [email protected].
Contents

IntroductIon
The Archaeological Heritage of Alberta’s Lower Athabasca Basin
Brian M. Ronaghan | 3
Part One Postglacial Environments

1 | A Tale of Two Floods
How the End of the Ice Age Enhanced Oil Sands Recovery—and Decimated
the Fossil Record
James A. Burns and Robert R. Young | 25
2 | Glacial Geology and Land-Forming Events in the Fort McMurray
Region
Timothy G. Fisher and Thomas V. Lowell | 45
3 | Raised Landforms in the East-Central Oil Sands Region
Origin, Age, and Archaeological Implications
Robin J. Woywitka, Duane G. Froese, and Stephen A. Wolfe | 69
4 | Kearl Lake
A Palynological Study and Postglacial Palaeoenvironmental Reconstruction
of Alberta’s Oil Sands Region
Luc Bouchet and Alwynne B. Beaudoin | 83
Part Two Human History
5 | The Early Prehistoric Use of a Flood-Scoured Landscape
in Northeastern Alberta
Grant M. Clarke, Brian M. Ronaghan, and Luc Bouchet | 115
6 | A Chronological Outline for the Athabasca Lowlands and Adjacent
Areas
Brian O. K. Reeves, Janet Blakey, and Murray Lobb | 161
7 | Lower Athabasca Archaeology
A View from the Fort Hills
Robin J. Woywitka | 243
8 | The Early Human History of the Birch Mountains Uplands
John W. Ives | 285
Part Three Lithic Resource Use
9 | Beaver River Sandstone
Characteristics and Use, with Results of Heat Treatment Experiments
Eugene M. Gryba | 333
10 | The Organization of Lithic Technology at the Quarry of the Ancestors
Nancy Saxberg and Elizabeth C. Robertson | 359
11 | Microblade Technology in the Oil Sands Region
Distinctive Features and Possible Cultural Associations
Angela M. Younie, Raymond J. Le Blanc, and Robin J. Woywitka | 401
Part Four Archaeological Methods
12 | Quarries
Investigative Approaches in the Athabasca Oil Sands
Gloria J. Fedirchuk, Jennifer C. Tischer, and Laura Roskowski | 437
13 | Cumulative Effects Assessment
Evaluating the Long-Term Impact of Oil Sands Development on
Archaeological Resources
Brian M. Ronaghan | 479
List of Contributors | 541
Index of Sites | 549
General Index | 551
vi
Alberta’s
Lower
Athabasca
Basin

Introduction | The
Archaeological Heritage
of Alberta’s Lower
Athabasca Basin
brian M. ronaghan
From its headwaters in Jasper National Park, Alberta’s Athabasca River travels
some 1,500 miles northeastward across the province, its waters ultimately flow-
ing into Lake Athabasca. The river drains a vast region—roughly 159,000 square
kilometres—along the southern margin of Canada’s Boreal Plains ecozone,
which encompasses much of central and northern Alberta. In contrast to the
grasslands further south, the Boreal Plains ecozone is heavily forested, forming
part of Canada’s more broadly defined boreal forest.1 The Lower Athabasca
basin lies wholly within the Boreal Plains ecozone, and, although some notable
uplands occur, the area consists for the most part of glacial lake bed or till plain
on which large tracts of muskeg and fen have developed between areas of
modest elevation. Major fish-bearing lakes—Lake Athabasca and Lac La Biche—
are situated along its northern and southwestern margins, respectively, and
smaller lakes and ponds are scattered throughout the area. As with similar
regions across the northern hemisphere, food resources are relatively meagre
and widely distributed, traditionally supporting only comparatively small popu-
lations of hunter-gatherers. With the exception of the access afforded by the
river, travel throughout the region is difficult.
Although the Lower Athabasca basin features a broad spectrum of natural
resources, two classes of resource have proved to be of major commercial inter-
est to outsiders. In 1778, explorer and trader Peter Pond arrived in the Athabasca
region and established a fur trade post, thereby inaugurating an activity that
would serve as the basis of the region’s commercial economy for a century and a
doi: 10.15215/aupress/9781926836904.01 33
half. Pond noted the occurrence of a fluid tar-like substance (Stringham 2012, 21),
which explorer and trader Alexander Mackenzie described in his journal a
decade later, in 1788:
At about 24 miles from the fork [of the Athabasca and Clearwater
Rivers] are some bituminous fountains into which a pole of 20 feet
long may be inserted without the least resistance. The bitumen is
in a fluid state and when mixed with gum, the resinous substance
collected from the spruce fir, it serves to gum the Indians’ canoes.
In its heated state it emits a smell like that of sea coal. (Mackenzie
1970, 129)
As Mackenzie noted, the Athabasca River and some of its tributaries had cut
down through the surrounding bedrock, exposing bitumen along river banks in
various locations to the north of modern Fort McMurray.
Aboriginal people had known of these bitumen deposits for millennia. Long
before Pond arrived in the oil sands area, a Cree chief, known in historical rec-
ords as “the Swan,” had brought them to the attention of the Hudson’s Bay
Company traders. In 1715, the Swan visited York Factory, where he described the
Athabasca region, telling of a river on whose banks could be found “Gum or
pitch.” Four years later, the Swan returned to York Factory, bearing a sample of
“that Gum or pitch that flows out of the Banks of that River,” which he presented
to HBC governor Henry Kelsey.2 Other resources in the region were, however, of
greater value to the indigenous inhabitants. As the chapters in this volume dem-
onstrate, a conjunction of natural and human factors has resulted in an unusually
rich record of landscape development and human use that makes the Lower
Athabasca basin exceptionally valuable for understanding the early history of
Canada’s north. The archaeological record currently being revealed represents
perhaps the most intense pattern of prehistoric human landscape use yet identi-
fied in Canada’s boreal forest region.3
Investigation into the character, extent, and value of Alberta’s bitumen resour-
ces began in the 1890s. Early in the twentieth century, in an account of an exped-
ition to the Mackenzie basin in connection with Treaty 8 (signed in 1899), Charles
Mair wrote: “The tar, whatever it may be otherwise, is a fuel, and burned in our
camp-fires like coal. That this region is stored with a substance of great economic
value is beyond all doubt, and, when the hour of development comes, it will, I
believe, prove to be one of the wonders of Northern Canada” (1908, 121). Mair’s
instinct would prove to be correct. Research was accelerated by the demand for
fuel during both world wars, and in the early 1960s a commercially viable process
4 Introduction
doi: 10.15215/aupress/9781926836904.01