# Downright Archiness



## surfaceone (Jan 14, 2012)

Attention archeology observers: Last week in St. Augustine, Fla. there was some digging drama that played out in the newspaper:

 First there was this story about a Coming Reality Digging Program.

 I know, sounds pretty half-baked, but stay tuned for more...







 Next up is this Story of Detectorist Bob Spratley. Pretty positive story, Mr. Spratley sounds like a gifted detectorist, and a solid guy. Florida readers and those interested in Digging Laws that may be more on the horizon, might be interested in the plethora of "Comments" in the wake of this story.






 A predictable response, An Archeologist's Perspective, by City of St. Augustine archaeologist Carl Halbirt.

 Getting the latest last word, is Kathleen Deagan, *Veteran archaeologist takes issue with treasure hunters.* Listen up fellow "Looters," this trend to declare buried old stuff sacred "natural resources," and to paint anyone who stumbles across, or blatantly goes looking for old stuff as "destructive...looters" endangering the public trust, is getting louder and more strident. Of Mr. Spratley, she says, "This would be a national disgrace in Jamestown, Plymouth or Williamsburg."

 If you were paying attention to the article on Mr. Spratley, he claims to know the site of the Matanzas Massacre.






 "The Massacre of the French by Menendez and his men at
 Matanzas Inlet 15 miles south of St. Augustine" From.

 Seems that Mr. Spratley may have knowledge of this site or others that Ms. Deagan who has been searching for sites related to Mystery of Menendez, for the past 35 years or so, off and on. Apparently with not a lot of success.






 "Pedro Menendez de Aviles, sent by King Phillip II of Spain, Established St. Augustine in 1565" From.


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## rockbot (Jan 14, 2012)

Great story.

 I like he's closing

 "Freedom," he said "to be able to do what I want and share it with others"

 priceless!


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## Wheelah23 (Jan 14, 2012)

Wow, what an interesting discussion. Makes me glad I've never met an archy in person... [8D]

 I find it fitting that the elitist pig speaking from the archies' perspective, who is hogging the comments of the "Metal detectorist finds rare treasures under sands" article, is named "hearmeroar". All bark and no bite... His grandiloquent tirades and personal attacks on other posters, to me at least, show the true character of the archy vs. digger debate. We're all a bit biased here, but common sense should dictate archies have gone WAY overboard in their selfish zealousness. Nothing we diggers can do but make sure they don't grab up everything before we do... []


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## appliedlips (Jan 14, 2012)

Now, I agree the archie on the blog sounds very typical, all whine and no dig! But the debate don't get started if some blowhard with a metal detector doesn't brag. Let's face it that is why diggers talk about finds, I know, I know we are sharing the history, b.s. I say. We are human and its fun to show our finds,especially good ones, but responsibility comes along with it. This man was rubbing it in their face, and I wouldn't back him for a minute. If I lived in the area, I would be more disgusted with him than the archeologists who will use this to make more restrictions. Just because I could get away with digging a site of National importance because I found it, doesn't make it right and I hope I could resist. In my opinion the finds belong in a museum and his arrogance will get more roped off than one site.


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## appliedlips (Jan 14, 2012)

One poster backs him up by saying it is kept quiet for tax purposes, duh! Tax evasion is not a good defense in a moral debate. No, I dont pay taxes on my Lydia Pinkhams and wheat pennies I find either but try to stay out of these messes in the first place. Right or wrong, if we dare someone to respond they will. I know diggers always defend themselves by beating up on the morality of acheaologists. It makes us look like the shady ones, period. Not arguing is the best course, and saying look what I found while those lazy, cry baby archies were sleeping don't seem to be a good start.


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## Wheelah23 (Jan 15, 2012)

> ORIGINAL:  appliedlips
> 
> Now, I agree the archie on the blog sounds very typical, all whine and no dig! But the debate don't get started if some blowhard with a metal detector doesn't brag. Let's face it that is why diggers talk about finds, I know, I know we are sharing the history, b.s. I say. We are human and its fun to show our finds,especially good ones, but responsibility comes along with it. This man was rubbing it in their face, and I wouldn't back him for a minute. If I lived in the area, I would be more disgusted with him than the archeologists who will use this to make more restrictions. Just because I could get away with digging a site of National importance because I found it, doesn't make it right and I hope I could resist. In my opinion the finds belong in a museum and his arrogance will get more roped off than one site.


 
 You make a good point there. I think the metal detectorist is making a bad decision by rubbing in the archies' faces the fact that he found that massacre site. Unforgivably, he isn't divulging the location of that and other historically important sites. There's bad people on both sides.


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## JOETHECROW (Jan 15, 2012)

Hmmm,...the comments section contains some pretty evident contempt for "pot stealing looters"...This is pretty much how we're viewed...I don't suppose much will change their outlook of bottle and artifact digging folk. Here's a quote from the comments section.

 "Diggers." NO. Pot-hunting thieves of time... time bandits. You're the enemies of history, in for personal gain. 

 P.S. Thanks for posting this Surf....good reading.


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## andy volkerts (Jan 15, 2012)

[] Yeah all the bottle diggers in Oregon know about it now being illegal to dig on even private property let alone national treasure sites or state property. We as bottle diggers have to protect our rights and not allow legislation in our states like Oregons. And it will be coming the Arkies are pushin it everywhere......


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## appliedlips (Jan 15, 2012)

The Oregon digger that went on T.V. didn't know, now he does and so do more property owners!


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## baltbottles (Jan 15, 2012)

You know I love how the Archaeologists believe they can do know wrong. I was talking to one of the Philadelphia archaeologists at independence park and she told me they excavated over 2 million artifacts from the federally owned part of old city Philadelphia representing 1/7th of the colonial city and that its the best sampling ever done of a colonial city in America.

 Then I asked about getting access to colonial slipwares for study and comparison to those which I have excavated in Baltimore. She said all the stuff is in storage and no one can have access to it... This really puzzeld me then she went on to tell me that they threw out over 500,000 artifacts because they didn't have the space to keep them. So then I asked why didn't they donate the artifacts to another museum or educational institution or auction them off to fund more archaeology.... Her answer was that the way the laws work the artifacts are public property and belong to no one and that no one can own them so redundant artifacts have to be destroyed....

 And they call us pot hunters.....

 At least we are not out destroying artifacts because of a poorly written archeology law.

 Chris


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## surfaceone (Jan 15, 2012)

> She said all the stuff is in storage and no one can have access to it... This really puzzeld me then she went on to tell me that they threw out over 500,000 artifacts because they didn't have the space to keep them. So then I asked why didn't they donate the artifacts to another museum or educational institution or auction them off to fund more archaeology.... Her answer was that the way the laws work the artifacts are public property and belong to no one and that no one can own them so redundant artifacts have to be destroyed....


 
 Hey Chris,

 This She Said, She Said Tale ending is really distressing. I was sadly aware of the millions of artifacts in storage across the fruited plain that will never again see the light of day. This destruction of redundancies is an alarming, I trust _new_ development. I wonder if they recycled...[8D]

 I've heard that some long term storage facilities were full. What job description would a Federal redundancy eliminator have? I think I would really like to  learn more about such a job.





From.


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## rockbot (Jan 16, 2012)

> ORIGINAL:  baltbottles
> 
> she went on to tell me that they threw out over 500,000 artifacts because they didn't have the space to keep them. . Her answer was that the way the laws work the artifacts are public property and belong to no one and that no one can own them so redundant artifacts have to be destroyed....
> 
> ...


 

 Sounds typical of such bureau. What a waste!

 A few years ago someone found glass photographic plates in a dumpster. It was later revealed that they contained many photographs of early Hawaii. Someone was "cleaning out" items they could no longer identify and decided to through it out.
 Makes we wonder how much of our history ends up this way.[]


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## sem_yeto (Jan 17, 2012)

If you want to keep digging, make sure you vote Republican.   The liberals (Democrats) will eventually take away all of our rights !  Permit for this, permit for that, cant take a crap without a permit.  Get it??  Only archs digging... even on private property.  Socialist liberal Democrat party agenda will destroy bottle digging and America !!


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## glass man (Jan 19, 2012)

When I saw this topic I thought it was gonna be about two gay guys getting married in the new ARCHIE comic book...now I understand why JUG HEAD never had a girl friend![]JAMIE


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## surfaceone (Jan 26, 2012)

The latest on St Augustine:

Anti - Digging Resolution...


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## Wheelah23 (Jan 26, 2012)

Ugh, those people... Once again, glad I don't deal with archaeologists... The elitism is horrible! This has been an interesting saga, for sure.


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## surfaceone (Jan 26, 2012)

> Once again, glad I don't deal with archaeologists...


 
 Hey Connor,

 While digging _my very first site,_ one of the local archeologists stopped by to find out what I was doing. It was a very cordial meeting, He is one of the nicest and most knowledgeable guys one could hope to meet. He was curious about me because he had done a prolonged dig in the immediate area a couple years before.

 We made a date for the following day at the saloon that was just across the street from the site. They serve a world class Patty Melt. He brought one of his assitants and some previous area finds. I brought some shardage and assorted goodies I had dug up. We had some adult beverages and talked it all over for the better part of 2 hours. It was a great learning experience for me

 His graduate assistant was a oh-so-very cute young lady who harbored a certain bottle lust herself, that was an appreciation of and, desire to have more of these old vessels we're so fond of. She told me of a drive-by raid she did on a construction site, upon which she spied a bisected cistern. She said she just pulled over, dashed across the street and grabbed an armful of bottles. She told me this while her boss was in the loo.

 I've got very mixed feelings about the archies. I haven't the patience for the painstakingly slow methods they employ. I've got little tolerance for their position that all old stuff buried in the ground should be the exclusive domain of Archidom. But, I do love a good dig story, and the history that comes outta the ground. I thank them for what they have taught me. Especially this one guy.


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## luckiest (Jan 26, 2012)

I wish there was some sort of communication, they don't have the time/space to dig up all the bottles, I respect their respect for history and they should respect mine.


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## Wheelah23 (Jan 26, 2012)

There is a certain merit to their work. I think diggers and archies have opposite aims, however. We are interested in finding the objects of history, while they are interested in using the objects to find the history of whatever they're excavating. Archies don't really emphasize the objects themselves, at least from what I've seen. They are more concerned about us diggers disrupting the context of the objects we're after. We both agree, however, that the disruption and destruction of potential dig sites by industrial buildup is wrong.

 I've never been on an archaeological dig; I don't know if I could deal with the slowness, either. But Tom told me a funny story about an archaeological dig. He was driving around an old area in Paterson, which was being leveled for construction. The archies had the place roped off, and were allowed to conduct "archaeological investigations" of the privies for a certain amount of time. The ground was all cleared, and they were trying to find the privies. They did this by using trowels to go down, inch by inch, across the whole place, until they found the privy. This would've obviously taken months. At that rate, they'd have been lucky to fully dig one or two of the privies. So Tom walks over, and tells them, "You're looking for privies? Here, let me find 'em." So he goes into his car, gets his probe, and proceeds to find five privies in a few minutes. "There, go ahead and dig," says Tom. Right afterwards, the archies ask to buy the probe. So Tom sells them one for $50. He saved them months of work by giving them a simple tool which we diggers have used forever. The archies were grateful, and got Tom's contact info down. Fast forward ten years, and Tom gets a phone call out of the blue. The head archie from that dig had remembered Tom, and called him up to let him know they didn't finish digging all the privies. He told him to go ahead and dig the place out, as the place would've been inaccessible otherwise. Tom dug a couple privies there, and ended up getting some nice pontils. Just goes to show, not all archies are bad, and when us diggers help 'em out, good things can happen.


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## cyberdigger (Jan 26, 2012)

I wonder if the difference between diggers and archaeologists lies in the difference in the ways they become what they are.. in other words, they went to school for it, we learned in the field.. I bet there's tons that could be learned on both ends if Dig'rs-n-Archies  could cooperate on bottle-era digs.. I could grill hot dogs & burgers for everyone..


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## AntiqueMeds (Jan 26, 2012)

The best archaeologists I have met were self trained and collectors themselves. 
 There seems to be a lot of ignorance on this site about archeologists. 
 People seem to lump them into an homogeneous mass and assign that the traits of the most outrageous few.
 Unfortunately many of them probably judge bottle diggers in a similar way.
 Makes me sad. Both sides have merits.


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## bostaurus (Jan 26, 2012)

I think I have mentioned this before but I remember a fellow from a museum, not sure if he was an archeologist, that came to club meetings.  Another member dug a lot of native american mounds and middens, usually just ahead of the bulldozers.  They had a deal where the digger would bring in interesting finds and show them to the museum guy.  Whether  he donated items to the museum I don't know but it was a great compromise between the "official' guy and the digger.  It would be nice if there was more cooperation between the two.


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## surfaceone (Jan 27, 2012)

I wish we still had the insight of ole bearswede on this topic, Mr. Lobey, too.

 Here's an old thread that features both, started by the story of the first Oregon Illegal Digging Dust Up:  https://www.antique-bottles.net/forum/m-133684/mpage-1/key-archeology/tm.htm  & Here's another: https://www.antique-bottles.net/forum/m-40213/mpage-1/key-archeology/tm.htm#50964

 I think Mike Russell / CWBookAuthor can give some views across the abyss, should he care to engage.

 The St. Augustine Resolution is the first step, to a codified law. This is something to worry on, were one a Florida digger. The newspaper account of Ms. Deagan's gauntlet throwdown, 

 "...Nobody who has taken the time to look at Florida Statutes â€” especially archaeologists â€” would challenge the statement that objects found in the earth belong to the owner of that earth. That is the law. But St. Augustine is an extraordinarily unique and special historical place, and it has been my experience that the great majority of St. Augustine citizens are eager to protect and contribute to our real history, and to share the revelations about history that are contained in their property with the whole community, rather than keeping the information secret and wearing it around their necks.

 St. Augustineâ€™s economy depends to a great extent on its history. Yet these articles seem to imply a certain eagerness to toss aside what make artifacts into history, and instead embrace what reduces them to fun and profit for a few individuals. This would be a national disgrace in Jamestown, Plymouth or Williamsburg. Come on, St. Augustine, we are better than that!" From.

 doesn't use the accusatory "looter, pot hunter" invective, but "selfish treasure hunters" sounds so very Obamaesque. Good political move on her part. Were I Spratley, I'd be thinking of making a gift of knowledge to just about any archeologist or museum not affiliated with Ms. Deagan.


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## dirtfoot904 (Nov 27, 2020)

My family came here from england to farm for spain (land grant) so i get what you are saying about keeping historical artifacts public domain for generations of future residents to admire and learn from. However after seeing what the city does with these priceless artifacts is terrible. My friend Bob who passed recently lived in old town in a very old spanish home. his house was like a museum with artifacts from every civilization that ever called st aug home. after talking to him about the things he found over the years i was amazed to learn that the majority of all the cool stuff is sitting in a storage building in daytona, never to see the light of day or the public eyes ever again. Also the company "old town trolly" buys every historic building and its contents using about 1/100th of it in their exhibits. sadly most of the things on display are the rejects that the collectors didnt want. the rest is put into storage to be forgotten about forever. I believe that if the city is going to claim ownership of these items, then they need to do something useful with them. I always dig on private property with permission from owners. this city is no longer interested with history, only making money from crappy tourists from yankee states. If i found anything of historical significance id 1000% be keeping it for my enjoyment, and since my family has been here longer that about 95% of people "from St. Augustine" i dont feel the least bit bad about it.


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