the minnesota archaeologist

171 Pages·2013·4.32 MB·English

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Volume 71 2012
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Contents
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In Memoriam: Seppo Hemming Valppu (1948-2011) Volume 71 2012
A
David Mather ........................................................................................................................................5
r
c
Le Sueur’s Saltpeter Caves at Lake Pepin, Minnesota, and Wilderness Gunpowder Manufacture-Revision h
Greg Brick .............................................................................................................................................7 a
e D
a
Research Note: Pottery Firing Experiment at Grand Mound ol vid M
Michael K. Budak ................................................................................................................................21 o ath
e
g r, M
Research Note: Three-Dimensional Scanning at Jeffers Petroglyphs i in
s n
e
John Soderberg ...................................................................................................................................26 t so
ta
A
Research Note: Early Paleoindian Sites in the Vicinity of Rochester, Minnesota rchae
o
Bruce Koenen ......................................................................................................................................30 lo
gy
Radiocarbon Dates from Five Minnesota Sites in th
Patricia M. Emerson ...........................................................................................................................36 e Natio
na
Current Archaeological Investigations in Ontario: The Discovery of and Preliminary Information l Re
g
R egaDradvineg N Soervreisr,a Ml P.Aal.e .o..i.n..d..i.a..n.. .S..i.t.e..s.. .E..a..s..t. .o..f. .T..h..u..n..d..e..r.. .B..a..y.........................................................................45 ister o
f H
An Introduction to the Paleoindian Projectile Point Assemblage Recovered from the Mackenzie I Site istoric
P
near Thunder Bay, Ontario la
ce
Samantha Markham ............................................................................................................................60 V s: A
o N
e
w
Upper Rice Lake (21CE04): A Multiple Component Woodland Site in Clearwater County, Minnesota lu Se
Guy Gibbon (compiler) .......................................................................................................................74 m aso
n
in
Archaeology for All Ages: Public Archaeology Initiatives at the Shoemaker Site (21SN0164), e 20
1
2
St. Cloud, Minnesota 7 , p
Debra Gold ..........................................................................................................................................89 1 .99

The bow of the May Flower shipwreck in Lake Superior
Minnesota Archaeology in the National Register of Historic Places: A New Season in 2012

David Mather ......................................................................................................................................99 2
0
Bibliography of The Minnesota Archaeologist 1
Randy Blasus .....................................................................................................................................123 2
Published 2012 by Minnesota Archaeological Society
Printed by Prairie Smoke Press
The paper used in this publication meets the requirements of ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992 (Permanence of Paper).
MONROE KILLY - IN MEMORIAM 1
T M a
he innesoTa rchaeologisT
Volume 71 2012
Publications Committee
Managing Editor: Kent Bakken
Editor: Deborah Schoenholz
Executive Board of the Minnesota Archaeological Society
President: Rod Johnson
Vice President: Pat Emerson
Secretary: Deborah Schoenholz
Treasurer: Paul Schoenholz
Directors: Kent Bakken, Jim Cummings,
Chuck Diesen, Joe McFarlane, Ron Miles,
Anna Morrow, Debbie Pommer, Dan Wendt
The Minnesota Archaeologist is published annually by the Minnesota Archaeological Society. Subscription is
by membership in the Society. For information on membership and on the Society’s other activities, go to www.
mnarchaeologicalsociety.org.
2 THE MINNESOTA ARCHAEOLOGIST - VOLUME 71 - 2012
Copyright © 2012 by the Minnesota Archaeological Society. All rights reserved.
Requests to reprint should be addressed to Kent Bakken,
[email protected]
Publication of The Minnesota Archaeologist is supported in part
by a generous bequest from the estate of William Lundquist.
Published by
The Minnesota Archaeological Society
Fort Snelling History Center
St. Paul, MN 55111
and
Prairie Smoke Press, Inc.
PO Box 439
Champlin, MN 55316
MONROE KILLY - IN MEMORIAM 3
T M a
he innesoTa rchaeologisT
Volume 71 2012
Contents
In Memoriam: Seppo Hemming Valppu (1948-2011)
David Mather ........................................................................................................................................5
Le Sueur’s Saltpeter Caves at Lake Pepin, Minnesota, and Wilderness Gunpowder Manufacture-Revision
Greg Brick .............................................................................................................................................7
Research Note: Pottery Firing Experiment at Grand Mound
Michael K. Budak ................................................................................................................................21
Research Note: Three-Dimensional Scanning at Jeffers Petroglyphs
John Soderberg ...................................................................................................................................26
Research Note: Early Paleoindian Sites in the Vicinity of Rochester, Minnesota
Bruce Koenen ......................................................................................................................................30
Radiocarbon Dates from Five Minnesota Sites
Patricia M. Emerson ...........................................................................................................................36
Current Archaeological Investigations in Ontario: The Discovery of and Preliminary Information
Regarding Several Paleoindian Sites East of Thunder Bay
Dave Norris, M.A. ...............................................................................................................................45
An Introduction to the Paleoindian Projectile Point Assemblage Recovered from the Mackenzie I Site
near Thunder Bay, Ontario
Samantha Markham ............................................................................................................................60
Upper Rice Lake (21CE04): A Multiple Component Woodland Site in Clearwater County, Minnesota
Guy Gibbon (compiler) .......................................................................................................................74
Archaeology for All Ages: Public Archaeology Initiatives at the Shoemaker Site (21SN0164),
St. Cloud, Minnesota
Debra Gold ..........................................................................................................................................89
Minnesota Archaeology in the National Register of Historic Places: A New Season in 2012
David Mather ......................................................................................................................................99
Bibliography of The Minnesota Archaeologist
Randy Blasus .....................................................................................................................................123
4 THE MINNESOTA ARCHAEOLOGIST - VOLUME 71 - 2012
Notice to Authors
The Minnesota Archaeologist accepts submissions of original research by professional or avocational archaeologists
on the archaeology and anthropology of this region. Materials should be received by March 31 for consideration for
that year’s volume. Authors should submit papers in accessible electronic formats (word processing files and digitized
images). Acceptable formats include .doc or .rtf text and tables and .jpg, .bmp, or .tif graphics; consult the editor
regarding other acceptable formats. Files in .pdf format will be accepted for initial review but must be replaced before
editing. Internet submissions are encouraged, with files sent as email attachments or via web download. However, please
contact the editor by email at the address below before sending such submissions, in order to arrange for the most efficient
transfer. Files can also be submitted on optical discs sent to the address below.
Note that figures should be scanned at a resolution of no less than 300 dots per inch (dpi) at 100 percent (full size as
printed) or submitted as high-resolution, camera-ready hard copy. Figures should not be embedded in word processing
or other files. For further information on electronic formats and file preparation, please contact the editor, who would be
happy to entertain your questions because it saves so much time and work in the long run.
Manuscripts will be edited for content with the consent of the author. Style will conform to the journal’s style, which is
based on the Society for American Archaeology’s Style Guide for American Antiquity and Latin American Antiquity and on
the Chicago Manual of Style. Copies of the Style Guide for the Minnesota Archaeologist are available from the editor or
may be downloaded from our website at www.mnarchaeologicalsociety.org.
Send materials or inquiries to
Managing Editor
Kent Bakken,
[email protected]
The Minnesota Archaeologist
Minnesota Archaeological Society
Fort Snelling History Center
St. Paul, MN 55111
www.mnarchaeologicalsociety.org
In MeMorIaM: Seppo HeMMIng Valppu (1948-2011) 5
In Memoriam: Seppo Hemming Valppu (1948-2011)
David Mather
State Historic Preservation Office
Minnesota Historical Society
Seppo Valppu was a quiet leader for environmental moved to Minnesota with his mother and brother.
archaeology in Minnesota. For his Master’s thesis, He earned degrees in Anthropology and Biology at
he was the first to document wild rice from a Lau- UMD and his M.A. in Ancient Studies at the Uni-
rel context, at the Big Rice site (21SL163) in the versity of Minnesota.
Superior National Forest. Through the course of He specialized in the identification of seeds and
his career, he worked as a research scientist at the other plant remains, but he also identified and tabu-
Archaeometry Laboratory and later at the Natural lated the other things present in the samples, such as
Resources Research Institute, both part of the Uni- insect parts, fungus, and animal bone. His work was
versity of Minnesota-Duluth. He also taught at the infused with his passion for ecology and scientific
Fond du Lac Tribal and Community College and taxonomy and was a major contribution to many
worked as an independent scholar in archaeological archaeological investigations. Seppo was equally at
and ecological research. home in the field or in the lab. He loved the outdoors
Seppo was born in Puolanka, in the Kainuu re- and made a point of visiting the sites he worked on
gion of north-central Finland. He was 15 when he to observe the modern vegetation, and he collected
6 THE MINNESOTA ARCHAEOLOGIST - VOLUME 71 - 2012
the soil samples himself whenever possible.
Seppo was rightly proud of his family. He spoke
of them often and was delighted to be a grandfather.
He was at his lake home at Brimson when he passed
away on August 10, 2011.
I fondly recall visits to Seppo’s home laboratory
in Duluth. It was a little room next to the sauna, lined
with bookshelves overflowing with reference manu-
als and other interesting things. His microscope oc-
cupied one table in the corner. On my last visit, in
January 2011, other surfaces were filled by trays of
Petri dishes with sprouting seeds under lights–part
of an ecological research project on the control of
invasive purple loosestrife, he explained. Seppo,
Jim Cummings, and I were looking through botani-
cal samples from the burn layer of the protohistoric
house feature at Petaga Point (21ML11), preparing
for our upcoming presentation at the Council for
Minnesota Archaeology symposium in Inver Grove
Heights.
Our conversation continued long into the
night, as it often did, ranging far beyond our pres-
ent research project. We snacked on cardamom-rich
homemade pulla bread when we regrouped the next
day, after Seppo’s early morning trip to his favorite
supplier of Lake Superior whitefish. He had picked
up extra fish for both Jim and I to take home. I
quickly scribbled his preparation instructions in my
journal as we said goodbye, and it’s my pleasure to
pass them on to you here:
Seppo’s Smoked Whitefish
• Wipe fish with paper; cut off tail
• Spread some cooking oil on aluminum foil
• Sprinkle salt and brown sugar on both sides
of fish and in cavity
• Wrap fish tight in the foil
• With coals on one side of grill, place fish
on the other side of the rack, near the grill
vent
• Cook for about an hour with medium coals;
turn occasionally
• Open up foil like a boat (keeping ends
closed); put wet apple wood chips on the
coals
• It is done when the fish is getting brown.
BRICK- le Sueur’S Saltpeter CaVeS at lake pepIn, MInneSota - reVISIon 7
Le Sueur’s Saltpeter Caves at Lake Pepin, Minnesota, and Wilderness
Gunpowder Manufacture
Greg Brick
Department of Earth Sciences
University of Minnesota
Minneapolis, MN 55455
[email protected]
Editor’s Note: This paper was originally published in the 2011 volume of The Minnesota Archaeologist.
Unfortunately, that version contains a number of errors that had been pointed out by the author but remained
uncorrected in the final printed version. Therefore we reprint the entire paper here, with corrections and
revisions. Our apologies to the author and readers for the oversight.
Prompted by French fur-trader Pierre-Charles Le Sueur’s 1700 report of caves containing saltpeter (potas-
sium nitrate) along the Minnesota shore of Lake Pepin, this study investigated the concentration of nitrate
in cave sediments along the Mississippi River bluffs in Minnesota and to a lesser extent the entire Upper
Mississippi Valley. Elevated concentrations of nitrate, up to 3.5 percent dry weight of sediment, were found
in a wide variety of rock voids. These sediment nitrate concentrations are comparable to the nitrate ac-
cumulations found in Mammoth Cave, Kentucky, an historical nineteenth-century saltpeter mining locality,
which range up to 4 percent. This is enough to show that Le Sueur’s claim of finding saltpeter (more likely,
a saltpeter precursor, such as calcium nitrate) in Minnesota caves, for making gunpowder in the wilder-
ness, is credible, but other considerations raise serious doubts. In any case this is the earliest report of cave
saltpeter from North America, predating more probable French saltpeter manufacture from Missouri caves
in 1720.
Introduction de la Harpe’s version of Le Sueur’s journal, as
published in Conrad (1971:32-33), under the dates
Cressy (2011:75) asserts that saltpeter (potassium
September 10 to September 14, 1700:
nitrate), the most important component of
gunpowder, “was the crucial link in the chain of
In these regions, a league and a half to the
chemistry and power, comparable in strategic
northwest, there is a lake named “Pein” which is
importance to modern oil or uranium.” The British
six leagues long and more than a league wide. It
Empire, for example, historically owed much of its
is bordered on the west by a chain of mountains;
strength to ready supplies of saltpeter obtained from
on the other side, to the east, there is a prairie,
India (Frey 2009). Gunpowder was composed of
and to the northwest of the lake a second prairie
75 percent saltpeter combined with sulfur (10%)
two leagues long and wide. Near by there is a
and charcoal (15%) but saltpeter had many other
chain of mountains which must be two hundred
uses such as a meat preservative, a medicine, and
feet high and more than a half league in length.
a fertilizer (Calvert 1961:2) and among Native
Many caves are found there in which bears
Americans it was used for work with dyestuffs
hibernate in winter. Most of these caverns are
(Browne 1935).
more than forty feet deep and between three
In 1700, the French fur-trader Pierre-Charles Le
and four feet high. A few have very narrow
Sueur (1657-1704), while ascending the Mississippi
entrances, and all of them contain saltpeter. It
River, reported saltpeter caves in his journal, which
is dangerous to enter them in summer because
previous researchers (Halliday 1968; Hill et al.
they are filled with rattlesnakes, whose bite is
1981; Shaw 1992:52) have reasonably interpreted as
very dangerous. M. Le Sueur saw some of these
being located along the west side of Lake Pepin, in
snakes that were six feet long, although usually
Minnesota. According to the translation of Benard
they are only about four feet.1
8 THE MINNESOTA ARCHAEOLOGIST - VOLUME 71 - 2012
There are several other versions of the (Needham 1986:95). What is called a “saltpeter
translation, as discussed by Wedel (1974), and the cave” in the literature does not always mean a cave
one presented by Neill (1872:41) gives different that actually contains saltpeter (potassium nitrate)
dimensions for the cave: “Most of the caverns are but rather a precursor substance, historically known
more than seventy feet in extent, and three or four as “petre dirt,” containing calcium nitrate, which
feet high.” Le Sueur’s comments about the caves must be converted into saltpeter by human activities
being inhabited by bears in winter and rattlesnakes such as lixiviation (leaching) with lye made from
in summer suggests that they were visited (by potash, and boiling (Hill 1981). The manufacture of
someone) throughout the year, and presumably potash from wood ashes was a frontier technology
there would have been a reason for this. Although in its own right (Miller 1980).
not explicitly mentioned in Le Sueur’s narrative, Although Le Sueur described the Lake Pepin
French fur traders could have sought out saltpeter fissure-fill as “saltpeter” he was more likely
to manufacture gunpowder, or perhaps as a meat referring to calcium nitrate. The prevailing
preservative, in the absence of salt from saline humidity in Minnesota caves is too high for him to
springs (Jakle 1969). have encountered anything other than deliquescent
There was an extended French presence in the salts, dissolved in the sediment, rather than
Upper Mississippi Valley (UMV) that would have crystallized saltpeter (Hill and Forti 1997:157).
required gunpowder from some source and the Apart from whitish snow-like efflorescences,
usual assumption is that all of it was imported. As not even experienced saltpeter prospectors could
early as 1686, the French fur-trader Nicolas Perrot identify nitrate-rich sediments by sight and the usual
established Fort St. Antoine on the Wisconsin side confirmation was a bitter taste (Brown 1809) until
of Lake Pepin, near what is today Perrot State Park modern chemical tests for nitrates were developed.
(Nute 1930). Wedel (1974) presents a scholarly Gale (1912) and Mansfield and Boardman
discussion of Le Sueur’s presence in the UMV based (1932), however, do not include Minnesota in
on American, Canadian, and French archives. Le their lists of states with nitrate deposits. Most
Sueur was involved with founding a post on what is historic American saltpeter caves are found in the
now Prairie Island, Minnesota, in 1695. Perhaps his southeastern United States. Minnesota lies well
best known exploit was the establishment of “Fort outside the classic “saltpeter belt” that runs from
L’Huillier” or “Fort Vert” at the site of a supposed the Appalachians west to the Ozarks, so Le Sueur’s
copper mine on the Blue Earth River, in 1700, description of saltpeter caves merits further scrutiny.
shortly after visiting the saltpeter caves (Hughes While Le Sueur’s account was discussed at a major
1908; Wood and Birk 2001). saltpeter symposium (Hill et al. 1981) there is no
Trewartha (1938:193) describes another one of record of anyone searching for this seemingly
Perrot’s forts, this one along the Mississippi River in anomalous occurrence before the present study.
the vicinity of the lead mines near Dubuque, Iowa.
The lead could be used to manufacture bullets: The Saltpeter Context
The earliest documented search for cave saltpeter in
Perrot’s mines, as they were called, were worked
Europe was the 1490 exploration of Sophienhohle
more or less constantly by Indians and by white
(Sophie’s Cave) in Germany but the main occurrence
voyageurs who used the lead to supplement the
and exploitation of this cave resource has been in
fur trade. Penicaut in the journal of his ascent
the United States (Shaw 1992:52). The manufacture
of the Mississippi with Le Sueur in 1700 states,
of saltpeter from cave sources was labor intensive
“we found both on the right and the left bank
and could only be justified when the price of
the lead mines, called to this day the mines of
saltpeter was high. More usually the raw material
Nicolas Perrot, the name of the discoverer.”
was obtained from “dungheaps, pigeon lofts, under
floors and in crypts” and “dovecotes, barns, stables
In a strict sense, saltpeter, also called niter, refers
or outhouses” (Bull 1990:5, 7). Another source of
to potassium nitrate, but it has also loosely been
saltpeter during the Middle Ages was niter beds, a
applied to sodium nitrate and even calcium nitrate
sort of compost pile that was designed to generate
BRICK- le Sueur’S Saltpeter CaVeS at lake pepIn, MInneSota - reVISIon 9
saltpeter (Williams 1975). produced saltpeter collapsed after the war and
The production of saltpeter began in the extraction was terminated. It was cheaper to import
American colonies as early as 1642, using niter beds saltpeter from British India than to transport it over
(Calvert 1961:3). Suitable caves were generally the Appalachians or otherwise make it domestically
lacking in the New England colonies (O’Dell 1990) (Calvert 1961:20).
and the earliest record of cave saltpeter in America During the American Civil War, the North had
dates from Le Sueur’s visit to Minnesota in 1700 free access to imported saltpeter and had the ability
(Shaw 1992:52). Breckenridge (1925) asserted to blockade the South, cutting off imports. The
that saltpeter harvesting in Missouri began as early Confederate Nitre Bureau was established in 1862
as 1720 when the French mining entrepreneurs and began to harvest saltpeter from caves, especially
Philip Francis Renault and M. La Motte opened the in Alabama, Georgia, Tennessee, and Virginia
territory’s first lead mines. Faust (1964:42) states (Powers 1981). Saltpeter was also manufactured
that Clark’s Saltpetre Cave in Virginia was worked using bat guano from caves in Missouri and Texas
as early as 1740. Faust (1967:67) surmised that (Hutchinson 1950:396). Mammoth Cave was
the Kentucky “long hunters” must have made their located in Kentucky, a state of mixed sympathies,
own gunpowder in the remote trans-Appalachian which made it unsafe to restart mining operations
wilderness in the years before the Revolutionary there. The uneconomical, labor-intensive nature of
War, just as it was made at Fort Boonesborough these Confederate saltpeter workings is suggested
in Kentucky (George 1987). Thomas Jefferson’s by the fact that in areas captured by the Union Army,
Notes on the State of Virginia describes saltpeter the caves were ignored by the North (Chandler
caves in that state (Jefferson 1995 [1787]:34). In 1949).
the American West there are later examples of fur As late as World War I, prospectors sought out
traders who manufactured gunpowder from cave natural nitrate deposits in the United States (Gale
deposits, such as General William Ashley in the 1917) in a tradition stretching all the way back
1810s (Breckenridge 1925). to Le Sueur. The days of natural deposits were
When the Revolutionary War began, the numbered, however, owing to the development
American colonists were cut off from British of atmospheric nitrogen fixation, which involved
gunpowder imports and had to find their own converting the nitrogen of the atmosphere into
sources of saltpeter. In 1775 the Continental ammonia, which could then be converted to nitrate.
Congress published a pamphlet giving directions Although the electrical fixation of nitrogen had a
for making saltpeter, providing enough for the lengthy history (Farrar 1971), it was not until 1913
American forces (Calvert 1961:5-7). E.I. du that the Haber-Bosch process (developed by Haber
Pont came to America in 1800, bringing French and industrialized by Bosch) became the first really
technology, and soon established his Eleutherian successful nitrogen fixation method, being put into
Mills on Delaware’s Brandywine River (Stapleton commercial operation in Germany and then around
2006). Some foresighted individuals anticipated the the world (Leigh 2004:140-154).
time when supplies of gunpowder would again be Useful overviews of saltpeter manufacture are
cut off. This time, however, the search for saltpeter provided by Partington (1960), Calvert (1961),
was taken across the Appalachians. Samuel Brown, Williams (1975), Needham (1980, 1985, 1986),
professor of chemistry at Transylvania University O’Dell (1990), and the extensive annotated
in Lexington, Kentucky, purchased Great Saltpetre bibliography by Ball and O’Dell (2001).
Cave in Rockcastle County, Kentucky, in 1804 and
hired an engineer to construct a saltpeter works. Field and Laboratory Work
The saltpeter was shipped to Lexington, which
The location of Le Sueur’s saltpeter caves is not
had six powder mills in operation by 1810. The
identified on historic maps. Franquelin’s 1697 map
technology developed at Great Saltpetre Cave was
of the Upper Mississippi area, which had Le Sueur’s
adopted at nearby Mammoth Cave, which was
input, predates the cave visit, and although a five-
mined for saltpeter during the War of 1812 (George
part map of the Mississippi River was compiled by
2005:38). However, the market for domestically
the famous French cartographer Guillaume Delisle