The study of history through the excavation of discarded items, exploring people's attics, flying drones, and stuff….
This weekend we went and picked up the old dinner bell from the old Sweet Chalybeate Springs resort, or as it was also called, Red Sweet Springs. We also picked up a load of antique handmade bricks from the remnants of the old Crow’s Tavern, in Crows, Virginia – which was just down the road from Sweet Chalybeate.
Some recent finds we acquired from the coastline of Michigan in the areas surrounding Fort Michilimackinac and L’ Arbre Croche. These are all from 18th and early 19th century American Indian village sites within the territory of the Ottowa tribe, which was heavily engaged in the fur trade with both the French and the British …
The M1841 U.S. percussion rifle, manufactured in Harpers Ferry, (West) Virginia, is one of the best-looking U.S. military issue rifles in our nation’s history. You may know it by its other name – the “Mississippi Rifle,” or by its characteristic brass hardware, short length, and walnut stock. But did you know how it obtained its name, given that it was made in West Virginia?
A popular tool in the days of the 18th century North American frontier was the “fire striker, or “strike-a-lite,” or “fire steel” or, well there are a number of names for these things. The purpose is obviously to start a fire. The design is simple: a piece of carbon steel, which is struck against a piece of flint, chert, or similar rock, thus making sparks, which would then fall onto some sort of tinder, thus creating fire.
But if we dig deeper, we find out that Logan’s subsequent murder spree in Virginia included Logan leaving “calling cards” with the dead bodies – one of which survives today; and one of which uncovers what I think is a bit of lost history tied to my little county – Monroe County, West Virginia.
Most trade axes found on French influenced archaeological sites were manufactured in France. The sites where trade axes were found coincides exactly with the areas where French influence was felt : Saint-Lawrence valley, the Richelieu and the Lac Champlain region, the Great-Lakes region, south of the Mississippi, etc. In isolated cases, a few French style axes have been found on the east coast of the United States. Some east coast areas must have had provisional, or secondary, trade routes for the French trade goods.
A list of known marks on French Fur Trade Axes in the 17th and 18th centuries.
This is an old log cabin located in the vicinity of Pickaway, Monroe County, West Virginia, on the site of what is believed to have been called “Thompson’s Fort,” on an early large plantation. This is on the “Pickaway Plains” of the Greenbrier Valley – so named by the 18th century frontiersmen who fought in …
Read moreOld log cabin preservation project from the site of “Thompson’s Fort”
I found this large blade buried this weekend, which appeared at first to me to be a small-ish blacksmith made forged iron brush scythe blade. We have plenty of existing 19th century factory made scythe blades at the fort, and this looks nothing like those.
The French folding knife, a.k.a., “clasp knife” imported into the North American Fur Trade was one of the earliest known type of knife to be introduced to the New World – dating back to the 1600’s, possibly earlier. These blades have been recovered from French influenced sites throughout the territory of New France, which extended from Louisiana to Canada.