Phase III Data Recovery of a Multi-Component Archaeology Site
Marshall County, Minnesota
The Marshall County Highway Department needed to straighten a dangerous highway curve on County Road 114 crossing the Middle River valley, near Newfolden, Minnesota. Foth & Van Dyke was contracted to write a scope of work that would eventually be used to construct a Memorandum of Agreement between the Highway Department, the State Historic Preservation Office, and the Federal Highway Administration.
An ancient and important archaeology site (21MA33) was located in the area that required straightening. Foth & Van Dyke also had to excavate and collect as much data as possible within approximately one month's fieldwork time and a limited financial cap. The goal was to mitigate that portion, approximately 5 acres, of the site being affected by the highway realignment. Field and laboratory work identified hundreds of artifacts. The laboratory work and report were both completed before the start of the following year's highway construction season as promised.
Site 21MA33 is situated on what most scientists identify as part of the Campbell Beach Complex, which is topographically above the 20-30 foot Campbell Escarpment. Site 21MA33's vantage point above this escarpment allows a person to see more than 14 miles to the west across the Lake Agassiz plain, approximately one or more miles to the east, and down into the Middle River valley. This beach is a strand line of Glacial Lake Agassiz, which once covered parts of northwestern Minnesota, eastern North Dakota, and southern Manitoba during the late Wisconsinan and early Holocene. Site 21MA33's excavation yielded more Paleo-Indian diagnostic tools than any other diagnostic cultural period, however, more Middle Archaic features such as animal processing trash pits and fire hearths were identified through radiocarbon dating of both wood and animal bone (approximately 5,000 years before present). The generally accepted interpreted age of the identified Paleo-Indian artifacts is approximately 10,500-10,000 years before present. This time frame does not correlate well with the generally accepted age of the Campbell Beach Complex, which is approximately 9,900-9,300 years before present. Therefore, several hypotheses were proposed as a result of our work: (1) the younger cultures re-used and lost many of the older Paleo-Indian tools on this beach ridge while being able to conserve their own manufactured tools, (2) the artifact assemblage types are not accurately dated within this part of North America, and (3) the Campbell Beach Complex never reached to elevations above the Campbell Escarpment. Hypothesis 3 means that the Paleo-Indian tools are in situ, that Site 21MA33 is on an older Glacial Lake Agassiz beach, and that this hypothesis is worthy of as much consideration as either of the other two hypotheses.
