The Theatre of the Past: A History of Public Archaeology

The third act in the Shovel Ready symposium will turn to archaeological investigations of the New Deal itself. All three papers in this section will examine the material traces of CCC camps. Mason Miller and John Campbell will look at CCC camps in Texas that were instrumental in creating a state park. Mark Howe, Tim Kelly, and Karen Miller will combine archaeological investigations with oral history to show how CCC camps created the infrastructure for many National Parks and National Forests in California, while incidentally preparing the men to fight in World War II. Carole Nash will draw on modern archaeological testing and remote sensing as an exercise in archaeological methodology devoted to the investigation of ephemeral sites, such as CCC camps in Virginia.

The symposium will close with a discussion by Edwin Lyon, author of the acclaimed overview of Depression-era archaeology, A New Deal for Southeastern Archaeology (1996: The University of Alabama Press). The overall goal of the session is to show that New Deal archaeology is not simply a relic of the past, but that current American archaeology continues to rely substantially on the results of Depression-era projects, and will clearly do so into the future. Perhaps by the SAA's One Hundred Years Anniversary we will see as well even more excavations of sites associated with New Deal endeavors.

VIII. Report on research project
The Theatre of the Past: A History of Public Archaeology

Gabriel Moshenska
Institute of Archaeology, University College, London (gmoshenska@yahoo.co.uk) The following is an overview of a research project on the history of public archaeology, supported by the Leverhulme Trust and located at University College London for three years from October 2009. The project is still at an early stage and I would therefore welcome comments, suggestions and (constructive) criticism from colleagues around the world. In Renaissance Italy, Andreas Vesalius pioneered the modern science of anatomy by dissecting executed criminals in front of an audience of students, local dignitaries and the public. Robert Boyle's groundbreaking studies of gases, in the seventeenth century, were witnessed by the aristocratic patrons of the Royal Society. While in the nineteenth century Michael Faraday used public lectures at the Royal Institution to showcase his discoveries in electronics and chemistry. Only in the last hundred years have research processes disappeared almost entirely from the public's scrutiny. Archaeology is a notable exception to this rule: excavations commonly remain visible and accessible, allowing public attention and curiosity to play an important and often forgotten role in the development of the discipline.
This project will examine the history of public audiences at archaeological sites in Britain from the mid-nineteenth century until the present. This period witnessed the emergence and growth of modern archaeology as well as the rise of leisure tourism and the popular media. The relationship between archaeologists and the public combines intellectual, economic, social and political elements. The aim of this project is to examine these connections and to evaluate the role of public audiences in the intellectual history of British archaeology, building on my previous tentative work in this area (Moshenska 2009).
The project will focus on several historical case studies. Public visitors are rarely mentioned in site reports or as a factor in the history of archaeology, due at least in part to intellectual and social snobbery (cf. Wheeler 1955), but a few examples illustrate both the diversity and the profound importance of these interactions. In the 1930s Mortimer Wheeler welcomed thousands of visitors to his digs at Maiden Castle, funding his fieldwork with the sale of postcards and souvenirs. In the 1950s London archaeologist W. F. Grimes was horrified by the crowds that flocked to his excavation at the Mithraeum, and had police eject them from the site. This project will examine some of the best-known sites in Britain, such as the prehistoric earthworks at Cranbourne Chase; the Roman town of Verulamium; the deserted medieval village of Wharram Percy and Wroxeter Roman Baths. The clearly defined geographical and temporal scope of the project will enable a detailed and coherent comparative analysis. This will focus on the varying importance of social, political and economic factors in the relationship with public visitors and the media, as well as with theories of archaeological knowledge and intellectual history.