Nathan Odom, Parkin Archeological State Park, Park Interpreter. Nathan holds a Bachelor’s of History, a Minor in Philosophy and World Religion, and a Master’s of Teaching from Southern Arkansas University, Magnolia. Nathan has been with Arkansas State Parks for five years. 

One recurring theme in the de Soto Chronicles is that the Spaniards were militarily superior to the American Indians they encountered despite often being heavily outnumbered. Spaniards also noted the bravery of warriors. This program will feature a variety of replica weapons and armor described by the de Soto Chronicles and will provide a lesson on why they were so effective in battle. Students will be introduced to the importance of first-hand accounts and the role they have in the understanding of history.

Curriculum Frameworks:

• H.3.7.2 Examine economic, political, and religious reasons for European exploration in the Americas.
• H.3.7.3 Evaluate short and long-term effects of European exploration and settlement ventures in the Americans and Arkansas, including why some experience hardship and failure.
• H12.5.3, D2.His.4,10,14.3-5 Examine reasons for European exploration in the Americas from multiple perspectives (e.g., trade, religion, colonies, spheres of influence, wealth) / European exploration based on primary accounts.

Resources

First Encounters, Hernando de Soto in the Mississippi Valley, 1541-42, George Sabo III

The De Soto Chronicles, the Expedition of Hernando de Soto to North America in 1539-1543, Volume I

Knights of Spain, Warriors of the Sun: Hernando de Soto and the South’s Ancient Chiefdoms, Charles Hudson

Carl Drexler, Arkansas Archeological Survey. Carl works for the Arkansas Archeological Survey at the Southern Arkansas University research station in Magnolia. He studied at The College of William & Mary, focusing on comparing the ways different colonial groups interacted with Native communities.

This session will cover Southwest Arkansas as the homeland of the Caddo Nation and a place rich in natural resources, including trees, salt, furs, and other materials. The people who have lived here over the millennia all harvested these resources to feed their families, support their communities, and trade with their neighbors. How they harvested, how much they harvested, and what effects that harvesting had all differ between groups.

Curriculum Frameworks:

• G.1.5.5 (Spatial Patterns and Movement) Examine the relationships between American colonists and various Indigenous societies, considering the location and use of natural resources and changes to the physical environment. This may include pelt and fur trading, large-scale farming, use of timber, increased resource consumption, hunting and fishing, and differences on the view of land ownership.

Andrew R. Beaupré, Archeologist, Arkansas Archeological Survey. Andrew is the station archeologist for the Arkansas Archeological Survey at the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff. His research focuses on 18th Century French exploration and settlement of North America. He has excavated and published on research in Canada, Vermont, New York, and Arkansas.

Andrew will discuss the roles of canoes and waterways in trade and exchange between Native American groups as well as Native Americans and Europeans.

Curriculum Frameworks:

• G.1 (7th grade) Students will understand the purpose of geographic tools (e.g. maps, globes, charts, graphs) to understand, analyze, and explain human interaction with each other and with the environment.  This includes the spatial characteristics and patterns of human settlement and connections between global regions.
• G.10.5.2  D2.Geo.7.3-5  Examine effects of environmental and cultural characteristics (e.g., trade routes, water ways, geographic barriers, accessibility) on the distribution and movement of people, goods, and ideas.

Bob Scott, Archeologist, Arkansas Archeological Survey. Dr. Scott works with the Arkansas Archeological Survey and is the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff Research Station Assistant. Bob (MA, University of Alabama, 2004; PhD, Southern Illinois University Carbondale, 2018) has worked previously for the Illinois State Museum, the Center for Archaeological Investigations at Southern Illinois University Carbondale, and Panamerican Consultants, Inc. (Tuscaloosa). He worked as the station assistant at the Survey’s UAM and ASU research stations before transferring to UAPB in 2013. His research interests include Lower Mississippi Valley archaeology and ethnohistory, the archaeology of colonial-era Native Americans, material culture studies, faunal analysis, and applied zooarchaeology.

This session will cover how the shells of freshwater mussels or clams are commonly found at archaeological sites in Arkansas. Prehistorically, Native Americans gathered mussels for food and to use their shells as a raw material for making tools and personal ornaments. How mussels were used by past peoples, and the intensity with which they were gathered, varied by time period and place. The role mussels played in the diets of past peoples and other ways they were utilized is inferred from analyzing the shells found in archaeological sites. Analysis involves counting the number of shells found, identifying the genus and species of each shell, measuring the size of shells, and recording evidence of modification such as burning or use-wear. With this information we can estimate how much meat mussels contributed to the prehistoric diet, if people had preferences for specific species or mussels of a certain size, how they were cooked or processed for eating, and identify the kinds of implements and other artifacts that were made from shell.

Archaeological mussel shell can also be used to reconstruct the characteristics of past aquatic environments and how they may have changed over time. A number of species have particular habitat preferences or tolerances. Using our knowledge of the habitat preferences of different mussel species today, it is possible to reconstruct past aquatic environments based on the species represented and their relative abundance in archaeological assemblages. Using mussel shell excavated from a prehistoric shell midden site located on the Little Red River near Heber Springs, AR, I will show students how we identify the genus and species of shells, how to recognize shells that were used as tools, and where measurements are recorded and why. The presentation will conclude with a summary of what has been learned from the analysis of mussel shell from the Heber Springs site.

https://archeology.uark.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/Native-American-Food-Color-2020.pdf

Curriculum Frameworks:

• H.3.7.1 (Era 1: Beginnings to 1620)  Research and compare cultural characteristics of major pre-Columbian Indigenous societies within North America through a variety of artwork, journals, archaeological findings, and other artifacts.
• G.10.5.1  D2.Geo.8.3-5 Examining relationships between human settlements and movements and the location and use of natural resources in the early Americas.

Paige Ford, Archeologist, Arkansas Archeological Survey. Dr. Ford is the Station Archeologist at the Arkansas Archeological Survey’s research station at Plum Bayou Mounds Archeological State Park. Her research focuses on reconstructing the relationships past peoples forged and maintained with one another by looking at how they made and decorated their ceramic vessels. She is passionate about public education, outreach, and advocacy, creating programs that teach the importance of archeology, cultural heritage, and collaboration with descendant communities. At Plum Bayou Mounds she conducts new research as well as consults and advises Arkansas State Parks on site preservation and management.

Through a historical and archeological perspective, this presentation will compare and contrast the histories and practices of pre-contact Native American groups. Dr. Ford will use archeological data from cultures like Mississippian peoples, some Plains groups, and Plum Bayou peoples to show how diverse the perspectives and practices of these groups were prior to European contact.

https://archeology.uark.edu/artifacts/quartz-crystal-plummet/

https://archeology.uark.edu/artifacts/owl-effigy/

Curriculum Frameworks:

• G.1 (7th grade) Students will understand the purpose of geographic tools (e.g. maps, globes, charts, graphs) to understand, analyze, and explain human interaction with each other and with the environment.  This includes the spatial characteristics and patterns of human settlement and connections between global regions.
• H.12.5.2. D2.His.13, 14.3-5 and H13.6.1 D2.His.1,2,3.6-8 Compare characteristics (e.g., dwellings, culture, beliefs, land use, food, clothing) of major pre-Columbian people groups within North America using a variety of sources (e.g., mound builders, cliff dwellers, Southwest, Great Plains, Pacific Northwest, Woodland peoples); and compare hunter-gatherer and agrarian societies (e.g. tools, shelter, diet, use of fire, cave paintings, artifacts, clothing, rituals, daily life, gender roles).

Gillian Steeno, Arkansas Archeological Society. Gillian works with the Arkansas Archeological Society and its volunteers to put on statewide events throughout the year like our Annual Training Program, Annual Meeting, and Archeology Month. She received her master’s degree in Anthropology in August 2023 from the University of Arkansas. Her research project focused on how the amount and type of artifact classes differed in three Native American houses at a site where groups were coming together from different places.

This presentation focuses on three houses and artifacts excavated at the Carden Bottoms site in Yell County, Arkansas. Similarities and differences in architecture, pottery, and stone tools will be explored along with the broader context of how distinct Native American groups came together at this site only for a brief period of time.

Curriculum Frameworks:

• G.3.5.2 Change Over Time: Investigate and draw conclusions about the causes for migration in and out of a region (i.e., push-and-pull factors) and the impact migration has on a region; Arkansas examples might include settlement of Arkansas by early American settlers and Indigenous migration out of Arkansas due to the Indian Removal Act and other federal Indian policies.
• G.4.5.1 Environment and Society: Human Impact on the Environment: Examine ways people and cultures depend on, adapt to, and interact with the physical environment over time (e.g., technology, habitation, transportation, agriculture, communication).

Emily Beahm, Station Archeologist, University of Arkansas Winthrop Rockefeller Institute Research Station. Emily’s work stations her at beautiful Petit Jean Mountain. She is originally from eastern Tennessee and graduated from the University of Georgia. Her research interests include foodways and rock art. She manages the Teaching Gardens at the WRI Station.

Emily will discuss how archeologists study plant use through time. Plants have always been an important part of daily life. Archeologists use a variety of methods to study how people used plants in the past for food and for raw materials to make tools and houses.

Curriculum Frameworks:

• H.3.7.1 (Era 1: Beginnings to 1620)  Research and compare cultural characteristics of major pre-Columbian Indigenous societies within North America through a variety of artwork, journals, archaeological findings, and other artifacts.
• H.13.6.1  D2.His.1,2,3.6-8 Compare hunter-gatherer and agrarian societies (e.g., tools, shelter, diet, use of fire, cave paintings, artifacts, clothing, rituals, daily life, gender roles).

Jessica Kowalski, Research Station Archeologist, Assistant Professor, University of Arkansas. Jessica is a Research Station Archeologist for the Fayetteville Station of the Arkansas Archeological Survey and a Research Assistant Professor in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Arkansas. She studies ancient settlement patterns and ceramics in Northwest Arkansas.

This session will cover how Native Americans organized themselves on the landscape in different ways through time. She will discuss ancient settlement patterns using examples for Arkansas, represented by maps created in a geographic information system (GIS). By examining these maps, we can begin to make inferences about certain aspects of Native American culture, including social and political organization, while also looking at evidence for migration.

Curriculum Frameworks:

• G.1.5.2 (Geographic Representation) Analyze human movement and economic activities over time using maps and other geographic representations, including Pre-Columbian Indigenous Nations’ settlement patterns.

Mel Zabecki, Arkansas State Archeologist. Melissa (Mel) is the Arkansas State Archeologist. She received her BA in Anthropology from Mount Holyoke College in Western Massachusetts and her MA and PhD from the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville. She began her career as an ancient Egyptian bioarcheologist, working at various cemeteries around Egypt learning about past lifeways while adjunct instructing at a few different universities. Then she became a Park Interpreter for Arkansas State Parks, where she not only became well-versed in educating the public, but learned about American archeology. Mel joined the Arkansas Archeological Survey as their Education Outreach Coordinator in 2018 and then moved into the State Archeologist position in 2021.  As State Archeologist, Mel collaborates with the Arkansas Archeological Survey station archeologists, multiple federal and state agencies, as well as private citizens to help spread awareness of the rich history of Arkansas and the importance of protecting archeological sites from destruction.

See how different tools were made and used during this demonstration session with replicas of hammerstones, spears, knives, scrapers, drills, arrows, and adzes. Most people know about arrowheads, but there were many other types of stone tools used by Native Americans for hunting and other activities. Think about all the tools people use today to complete everyday tasks: hammers, knives, chisels, awls, axes, drills. All of these tools were needed and used by Native Americans and they were all made of stone and other materials that can still be found in Arkansas today. Some of the tool parts, like wooden handles, do not often preserve in the archeological record, but thanks to the dry bluff shelters of the Ozarks, we are lucky to know how the Native Americans in this region created these objects because they are often preserved for thousands of years. Through experimental archeology, archeologists recreate tools based on the originals and use them to understand what life was like years and years ago.

https://archeology.uark.edu/sloan/

Curriculum Frameworks:

• H.3.7.1 (Era 1: Beginnings to 1620)  Research and compare cultural characteristics of major pre-Columbian Indigenous societies within North America through a variety of artwork, journals, archaeological findings, and other artifacts.
• H.13.6.1  D2.His.1,2,3.6-8 Compare hunter-gatherer and agrarian societies (e.g., tools, shelter, diet, use of fire, cave paintings, artifacts, clothing, rituals, daily life, gender roles).

Michelle Rathgaber, Educational Outreach Coordinator, Arkansas Archeological Survey. Michelle (PhD, University of Arkansas, 2019) has worked in archeology in Arkansas for the past twelve years studying earthquakes and their effects on people living in the New Madrid seismic zone in northeast Arkansas.

Michelle will discuss the large scale earthquakes that happened in northeast Arkansas in the early 1500’s and how the Mississippian people in that area reacted to them. She will talk about how people responded to the sand blows caused by earthquakes as well as ideas about how people understood these earthquake events and the threat that they posed. This will be contrasted briefly with how people responded to similar earthquakes in the region in 1811 and 1812.

Curriculum Frameworks:

• G.4.5.1 (Environment and Society: Human Impact on the Environment) Examine ways people and cultures depend on, adapt to, and interact with the physical environment over time (e.g., technology, habitation, transportation, agriculture, communication).
• G.3 (Change Over Time) Students will understand the characteristics of different physical and cultural regions and how they change over time (through demographic changes, migration, settlement, and conflict). This includes the impact physical geography has on human systems, including politics, culture, economics, and use of resources and how a region or culture interacts with itself, the environment, and other regions and cultures.

Madelyn Rose, Assistant Registrar, Arkansas Archeological Survey. Madelyn graduated from the University of Arkansas with a Bachelor’s degree in art history and cultural anthropology in May of 2018. She is the Assistant Registrar at the Arkansas Archeological Survey. Madelyn works with collections care, preservation, access to records, and digitizing collections. For the past three years she has been helping to develop a computerized database inventory system for the survey. She also creates 3D scans and prints of artifacts for educational outreach purposes.

Madelyn will go over how in 2018 the Arkansas Archeological Survey purchased an Artec Space Spider 3D handheld scanner to further fulfill the Survey’s mission. Since then, Teka McGlothlin and Sarah Shepard have been working to develop a standardized approach to digitally document and virtually curate artifacts from across the state. Once processed, these files produce a manipulatable and interactive 3D image that can be accurately measured, rotated for easy viewing, and analyzed. Later in 2018, the Survey acquired a standard FDM 3D printer. Paired with that technology, the artifact can be replicated and refinished for use in situations like public display, demonstration, or educational outreach.

3D scans are used for virtual curation through a variety of applications. A collaboration between the University Museum, the Arkansas Archeological Survey, and the Center for Advanced Spatial Technologies (CAST) is ongoing to create a virtual museum that can allow researchers and schools to access collections without having to visit the facilities. This method can help keep the artifacts and researchers both safe, which as we know right now can be invaluable. The scans produced by the Space Spider are accurate to 0.1 millimeter and can allow for very specific analyses to take place. This accuracy provides limitless research potential and can breathe new life into collections that have not been visited for many years. Having digital access to collections from other institutions also allows researchers to compare a wider range of objects instead of only focusing on a smaller sample provided by local resources. Additionally, digital curation is beneficial for collections that might no longer be in an institution’s physical possession, as in cases of transfer or repatriation. 3D images can additionally be used for public outreach in applications such as interactive models of parks as well as allowing access to artifact collections through kiosks at numerous educational and research facilities.

University of Arkansas Virtual Museum

Curriculum Frameworks:

• H.3.7.1 (Era 1: Beginnings to 1620)  Research and compare cultural characteristics of major pre-Columbian Indigenous societies within North America through a variety of artwork, journals, archaeological findings, and other artifacts.
• H.12.5.1   D2.His.1,4,9,10,16.3-5   Explore evidence of early societies in NWA by analyzing digital data and artifacts to “develop claims about pre-Columbian societies in North America.

Jennifer Frazee, Director, Fort Gibson Historic Site. Jennifer is director of Fort Gibson Historic Site, a property maintained by the Oklahoma Historical Society.  Jennifer works with staff to develop living history programs, events, and educational tools that introduce students and visitors to the history of the region in fun and engaging ways. She enjoys sharing information about our past with people she comes into contact with and helps them to make connections between past and present as well as pick up patterns occurring in history that help us to better understand the events and technologies of today.

Jennifer will present on Choctaw pre-contact twining (Na Tvnna). Though we often imagine those indigenous to the Americas to have dressed in buckskin before colonization brought in clothes, many of the Nations had a rich culture of pre-contact cloth making. The people of Choctaw Nation made textiles with a wide variety of plant matter such as nettle, dogbane, or the inner bark of some trees. They also used animal hairs. They did not shear animals as we do sheep for example. They collected the fur after the bison shed their winter coats. These materials were annually harvested and processed to form the fibers that could be spun. They were then dyed and woven into cloth through one of several different processes to make cloth that could be as soft as cashmere or as sturdy as canvas.

Because we have so far only learned information from the point of view of the Europeans who colonized the Americas, we have an incomplete history. The trauma of colonization caused some of the skills, crafts, and trades of the indigenous population to be suppressed or disappear but we are constantly discovering new evidence of how people did things in the past and learning from that. By examining the evidence of these practices and listening to the stories of the Nations in their voices, we are able to get a better understanding of the history of this continent. Even something as small as the clothing they wore can have a big impact on our understanding of different peoples.

In this demonstration, we are going to focus on the process of twining. With twining, you have a sort of warp and weft as with most modern weaving, but the weft or cross fibers are doubled to be twined around each individual strand of the warp. There are different techniques that bring out varying designs in the fabric, but the easiest is the twist method. This is where the weft is twisted around each strand of warp, passed to the next strand and twisted in the opposite direction. This process is carried out back and forth until the end of the weft. If the weft ends before the project does, we simply tie that end off, tie a new weft on, and continue the work.

Curriculum Frameworks:

• H.3.7.1 (Era 1: Beginnings to 1620)  Research and compare cultural characteristics of major pre-Columbian Indigenous societies within North America through a variety of artwork, journals, archaeological findings, and other artifacts.
• H.13.6.2  D2. His.3,10,16.6-8  Representation by area Native American Tribes to help construct arguments about lasting achievements of early civilizations using multiple sources.