Ever wonder just who might have inhabited areas in Colonie in years gone by? Binghamton University Project Director for the Public Archaeological Facility Laurie Miroff will tell you at the William K. Sanford Library on Sunday, March 13.
Artifacts from the early 19th century were discovered by the organization on Troy-Schenectady Road when the facility was hired to check out the parcel after it was purchased by the state as the new site for the Troop G headquarters for the state police. Whenever a state or federal entity looks for funding for a site, it needs to make sure the historical and cultural resources are preserved. What Miroff found were pieces of Colonial and Native American history.
The Native Americans probably had a lot of stone tools and a lot of waste from making stone tools, which we call flakes, she said of what was found.
The process of searching for artifacts is done in different stages, beginning with digging holes every 50 feet on the 40-acre parcel. At the Troy-Schenectady Road parcel, Miroff said, there were two Native American sites concentrated in one area. The next phase was to dig 3-by-3 feet right next to the original holes, expanding the shovel test pits.
`There were lots of pieces of broken dishes, smoking pipes, glass bottles, window glass and nails,` she said.
After the facility made the recommendation to preserve the site, the state said it needed to build on top of the densest part of the historical site, which would essentially destroy it so, Miroff said, archaeologists needed to preserve as many of the artifacts as possible.
She said, it’s not only the artifacts themselves that are important, but also the stories behind them.
`We carefully excavated and recorded where they came from,` she said. `If we do this right, we could put the site back together.`
Some of the artifacts Miroff said she will be focusing on at the event on Sunday are items that tell a bit about a family who formerly occupied land on the parcel, the Orlops. The materials dated back to the 1800s up until the 1830s. Miroff said the daughter of the Orlops’ had married one of the Hocknells, a descendent of one of the first Shakers to live in the area.
From the artifacts discovered, she said, she could tell the family was not extremely wealthy but since they lived in such close proximity to the city of Albany, they had access to many food items such as clams, and ceramic plates they possibly displayed at the dinner table.
`For some reason, there was also an unusual amount of smoking pipes,` she said. `They were just tobacco pipes. We did find one fragment of a Native American smoking pipe.`
A lot of the fact-checking was done by looking at the deeds for the house and censuses from the time period. A census from the 1800s showed the Orlops had a slave living in their home, but the following decade showed that had changed. It also revealed the family was a part of the Rensselaer Militia during the Revolutionary War.
Miroff said they even discovered projectile points from spears that dated as far back as 6,000 B.C.
`With the size and shape, we were able to compare those to others found during that time period,` she said. `It showed there was hunting, collecting of wild resources and processes. They were moving and not staying there for too long at the site.`
There is also another site at Normans Kill that dated back to 2,000 B.C., which had several different projectile points.
The house that was built by the Orlops disturbed the site greatly, making it harder for Miroff to tell its native history.
`It’s hard to provide a context because of how disturbed it was by the historical site,` she said.
The library talk is free and will begin at 2 p.m.
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