Tag: Saints Rest

Detroit: Stove Capital of the World

Detroit: Stove Capital of the World

For most people, Detroit is known as the Motor City.  With the big three companies situated around the city, Detroit is a proud producer of automobiles for customers all over the world.  However, what people don’t know is that cars aren’t the only product that 

Excavating Saints’ Rest

Excavating Saints’ Rest

Saints’ Rest was first erected in 1856. It is the second building constructed at Michigan State University and the first dormitory. The name, Saints’ Rest, was a nickname from the students to the building more commonly known as the ‘hall’ or ‘home’. It was named 

What do you do with melted glass?

What do you do with melted glass?

Artifacts cleaned and ready for cataloging

Down in the Campus Archaeology lab we are dealing with an interesting problem. Two of our volunteers, Katie and Dana, have been diligently cleaning and cataloging artifacts from the work we did this past Fall. As most of you know, we excavated the Northwest portion of Saints Rest, the first dormitory. Since the building burned down,  numerous artifacts were affected by the fire. This complicates the identification process, especially when it comes to identifying the glass. Usually differentiating between window glass and bottle glass isn’t difficult. You place the piece on a table, and see if it has any curve to it. Window glass is completely flat, bottle is not.

Warped and burnt glass from Saints Rest

 

So what do you do when your glass sherds are warped out of shape, color is changed due to the fire, and there are no clear indicators as to what it may have been? That is the question we are dealing with. We are currently examining the glass to try to make sense of the bending and warping in order to better interpret it. Hopefully we will be able to organize some of it.

Anyone know of any resources on identifying burnt artifacts? Any tips for identifying warped glass?

Author: Katy Meyers Emery

Saints’ Rest Sidewalk Project

Saints’ Rest Sidewalk Project

Over the past week, the Campus Archaeology team has been busy excavating beneath the sidewalks that were laid above Saints’ Rest. The building was first erected in 1856. It is the second building constructed at Michigan State University and the first dormitory. The name, Saints’ 

Maps and Mysteries

Maps and Mysteries

About three weeks ago we learned that MSU Landscaping was going to be re-doing the sidewalks above Saints’ Rest, the first dormitory on campus. While we’ve had a number of excavations near this area, we never got the opportunity to see what was underneath these 

What’s for supper?

What’s for supper?

Students outside Saints’ Rest ca. 1857. Image from MSU Archives.

If you missed my poster two weeks ago at the Midwest Historical Archaeology Conference hosted at MSU, I’m also going to share my research here on the CAP blog.  The poster, entitled “What’s for Supper?  Food preferences and availability at the Agricultural College of the State of Michigan”, was a summary of my faunal analysis of the Feature 125 remains associated with the all-male Saints’ Rest dormitory (Boarding Hall, 1857-1876).  We believe this feature to be kitchen refuse because it contained animal bones with butchery marks, ceramics, and glass.

With this project, I attempted to answer the following question: During this period, were students able to select preferred meats or were they limited by availability?  President of the College, Lewis R. Fiske, wrote in his personal report on February 26, 1862 that “so much animal food is consumed in the Boarding Hall”, a comment supported by the variety of beef cuts CAP found in the feature.  This is not a surprising discovery—a group of young men doing farm labor every day in addition to studying would get very hungry indeed!  Archaeological and documentary records also show, in addition to beef, pork, mutton, chicken and wild game were consumed by students.

This chart shows cuts of beef found in Feature 125. All parts of the animal were being eaten.

The results of my research were skewed in favor of beef because cow bones are large and dense, making them more likely to survive in the archaeological record.  Approximately fifty cows are represented by the sample from the feature, but only one pig and one sheep could be found, despite large numbers of them recorded in President Fiske’s papers.  Of all the animals found in the feature, 73% were juveniles, showing a clear preference for young meat.  Older stock were usually kept for breeding and milk or wool.

The role of availability is less clear.  While the College did kept their own stock, I was unable to find out if animals were being butchered on campus between 1857 and 1876.  Also, there are financial records showing that beef, pork, mutton, and chicken were being purchased from local butchers for the students to eat.  Further research needs to be conducted on the placement and construction date of the campus slaughterhouse, and also on the names and roles of the individuals selecting meat for Saints’ Rest residents.

Author: Grace Krause

Beneath the Ivory Tower: The Archaeology of Academia

Beneath the Ivory Tower: The Archaeology of Academia

A new book is out, examining the recent archaeology that has been completed on college campuses. Most importantly, the book is co-edited by one of MSU’s Anthropology professors, Dr. Kenneth Lewis, and has contributions by MSU President Louanna K. Simon and professor of Anthropology Jodie 

Grandparents University recap

Grandparents University recap

Grandparents University Last week, MSU hosted their fourth annual Grandparents’ University. Campus Archaeology hosted a two-day workshop for grandparents and grandchildren…needless to say, we had a wonderful time, and got wonderful feedback. Day 1 was an introduction to archaeology and a walking tour of the 

Grandparents University and Saints’ Rest

Grandparents University and Saints’ Rest

Saint's Rest Boarding Hall circa 1865. Image courtesy of MSU Archives & Historical Collections
Saint’s Rest Boarding Hall circa 1865. Image courtesy of MSU Archives & Historical Collections

Next week, the Campus Archaeology Program will be taking part in Grandparents’ University, an event at MSU where alumni grandparents and their grandchildren sign up to take various courses throughout campus. The objective is to have a fun and interactive workshop about a topic…in our case, archaeology. We will have a two-part workshop: the first will be a walking tour of the old campus, where we will discuss a variety of elements about how MSU’s campus has evolved over time, and the second will look at artifacts in the lab that have been excavated at MSU. The tour will include stops at Laboratory Row, Morrill Hall, Linton Hall, Faculty Row (now West Circle Dormitory Complex), College Hall (now Beaumont Tower) and our recently excavated area at Beal Street. One of the most exciting stops along the tour, however, will be at Saints’ Rest, where we have decided to open up a unit for excavation and to demonstrate just how archaeology is done.

Saints’ Rest, as many of you know, was the first dormitory at Michigan Agricultural College, built in 1857. A three story building, it served as the primary dorm until 1871, when Williams Hall was built, and then burned to the ground in 1876. In 2005, a field school was held at the site, where MSU was first introduced to the material culture of our past. This site is recognized, in some sense, as the Campus Archaeology Program’s birth place, and is our most intact campus structure so far discovered at MSU.

Excavations in 2005 uncovered much of the northern portion of the structure, and captured very fully the final moments of the structure’s demise: the building’s cellar was full of brick from the collapsed building; charred wood beams were strewn about; stoves were stacked on top of each other. Very little household or daily use items were discovered, in part because the building had caught fire during the winter break, but also because the dining facilities had moved to Williams Hall in 1876.

Saints’ Rest has been revisited twice since 2005. In 2007 more of the building interior was investigated as the sidewalks were realigned in that area. In 2008, during the year’s first snowfall, archaeologists returned to the site to investigate artifacts that had been discovered while planting a tree. Further investigation revealed artifacts that had never been found at Saints’ Rest: ceramic whiteware, glass tumblers, and cut animal bone, all dating to the 1860s and 70s. We had struck archaeological gold: the refuse pile behind Saints’ Rest.

Erica D. excavates the trash pit found behind Saints Rest.
Erica D. excavates the trash pit found behind Saints’ Rest in November, 2008. Not pictured: Snow.

This coming Tuesday, Campus Archaeology will return yet again to Saints’ Rest to continue excavating this unique and important feature. Last November we had only hit the edge of the pit; we hope to get deeper into the feature with past and future MSU alums watching. Another element of Grandparents’ University is a “Discover MSU” scavenger hunt, which we are a part of. Hopefully, this will drive more people to the site to engage with our cultural past. Please feel free to stop by and ask questions!

Visit the photo gallery from Saints’ Rest excavations last fall.

Visit the Online Exhibit about the 2005 archaeological excavations.

Author: Terry Brock