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KPVI Channel 6 reporter Aaron Kunz posted the following set of stories featuring the College of Social Sciences and Public Affairs Archaeology Department. Visit the KPVI site for videos and the complete series.

Unearthing Idaho Part 3
Reporter: Aaron Kunz
Posted: July 31, 2008 12:53 PM

In part three of our special series called “Unearthing Idaho”, Aaron takes us through a day in the life of field archeologist students at Boise State University.

Boise State University has dedicated years of labor, intensive research and resources to exploring the Snake River, but they do have funding limitations.

Dr. Mark Plew, BSU Professor: “Part of the gig is being able to live for six weeks in a camp situation where everything is not like home. Sometimes in very harsh conditions like we’ve had this summer.”

The dozen or so students in Dr. Mark Plew’s field class have built their own little makeshift town. Tents are what they call home for the six week course. They live here day in and day out, although they rarely spend time in their tents because they have lots of work to do.

Dr. Mark Plew: “It never quite ends, it’s a really full day and we’re working kind of a four ten’s situation so we can accommodate those students who need to work or have to work getting back to town after digging in the dirt for four days in the desert.”

Because Three Island State Park is remote, if they aren’t working or attending a class they are walking from the dig site to their next class. That means the day starts very early. On this day they began at 6 a.m.

Dr. Mark Plew: “Well, the day started a little earlier than that because I’m the cook on top of doing everything else, because we run these projects on a shoestring basically. We try to watch everything, maximize everything so I’m up at about five o’clock to get all that started. People are up and we’re eating by six o’clock in the morning.”

Aside from digging, classes include mapping areas using a decidedly low tech method. In this class, students are learning to count their stride so they can create grids for future dig sites.

The also have to be able to read a map and diagram the area for cataloging.

As for the actual dig site, while they are getting useful information….

Dr. Mark Plew: “The work has already determined that yeah, maybe the site isn’t as large as we would have thought. But that’s part of what we need to know as well.”

But at least they now know there is nothing here. That is all part of the job. It still gives them a lay of the land and paints a picture of what life might have been like in Glenn’s Ferry hundreds if not thousands of years ago.

Dr. Mark Plew: “If you go back two thousand years ago or maybe fifteen thousand years ago when this site was originally occupied by prehistoric people, it probably looks similar in some ways but the corridor would have been forested to a greater extent. The resource distributions would have been different if you went up and down the river.”

It also gives Dr. Plew an idea of how the Snake River has evolved and how it may end up over the next one hundred years.

Dr. Mark Plew: “I think we are able to bring something to the table that’s maybe useful in developing policies that may help offset some of the policies that relate to sustainability.”

All useful information for people like Rebecca Thorne-Ferrel at the Idaho Museum of Natural History, who uses that information to tell a better story.

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