Main MenuNEWS RELEASE
Contact: David West (west@alpha.nsula.edu
)
News Bureau
Northwestern State University
Natchitoches, LA 71497
(318) 357-6466
2/7/2001
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
NATCHITOCHES - Northwestern State University is hosting the 27th Annual Meeting of the Louisiana Archaeological Society Feb. 9-11. Activities will take place at the Ryder Inn on the Highway 1 Bypass and in Kyser Hall on the NSU campus.
The conference starts Friday at the Ryder Inn with registration, meetings of the Louisiana Archaeological Conservancy and the Society's executive committee and a reception.
Presentations will begin Saturday at 8 a.m. The program will begin with presentations in memory of William George "Bill" Haag, a retired alumni professor of anthropology at Louisiana State University. Haag, who died last year, was the first official state archaeologist in Louisiana and a noted expert on prehistoric man and domestic animals. He was considered the foremost expert on Poverty Point.
The conference's keynote speaker will be Ian W. Brown of the University of Alabama. Brown will discuss research conducted at Avery Island, La. A team from the Alabama Museum of Natural History spent four weeks excavating a site where Tobasco brand pepper sauce was originally produced.
Brown specializes in Indians of the Southeastern United States, historical archaeology, ethnohistory and acculturation theory. He is the curator of Gulf Coast Archaeology if the Alabama Museum of Natural History and a professor in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Alabama.
Archaeologists from throughout the state and region will make presentations throughout the day Saturday. Northwestern will be represented by Regional Archaeologist Jeffrey S. Girard, Rolanda Teal, a junior anthroplogy major from Many and Tommy Ike Hailey and M. Scott Faris of NSU's Cultural Resource Office, who will report on research to their peers.
Girard's presentation is "Conly and Three Creeks: Summary of Two Recent Projects in Northwest Louisiana.
According to Girard, the Conly Site in Bienville Parish contains the richest record of human lifeways pertaining to the early half of the Middle Archaic period (5500 to 6000 B.C.) yet discovered in Northwest Louisiana. The Three Creeks site is a major mound group in northern Claiborne Parish that includes four flat-topped mounds and one conical mound, all in remarkably good condition.
Teal will present "Saline: An Early African-American Community in Sabine Parish." In her research, Teal discovered information about one of community's founding members, Edmund Belton, who was from North Carolina. Teal said Belton's descendants became crucial figures in the development of this community. She also will discuss factors that led to creation of the Sabine Normal and Industrial Institute and provide insight into the community's daily activities.
Hailey and Faris will deliver a preliminary report on an ongoing archaeological project at Fort Jesup State Historic Site near Many. Fort Jesup, a 19th-century frontier fort, has become a major focus of continuing archaeological investigation for the NSU Cultural Resource Office.
The Fort Jesup Archaeological Project was conceived from the beginning as a means not only of acquiring data to answer questions about Fort Jesup's past, but also as a training ground for undergraduate and graduate students and as an avenue for developing and strengthening partnerships between NSU and other agencies, including the National Park Service, the USDA Forest Service, the Tunica-Biloxi Tribe of Louisiana, and the Louisiana Department of Culture, Recreation and Tourism. Preliminary results of historical research, geophysical and visual pedestrian survey, aerial reconnaissance and excavation will be presented.
On Sunday, participants will have an opportunity to visit the Cane River National Historic Park, Fort St. Jon Baptiste State Historic Site, Fort Jesup or Los Adaes State Historic Site.