Wood Preservation Dilemmas of Florida's Prehistoric Saltwater Sites: Famous Key Marco and Recent Weedon Island

Summary

Almost 120 years has passed since Frank Hamilton Cushing recovered hundreds of wood artifacts from a peaty muck lagoon at Key Marco, Florida. Relatively few of these extraordinary, fragile wood specimens remain in existence today due to difficulties with excavation and preservation methods in the late 1800s. In 2001, at Weedon Island Preserve, another mangrove peat saltwater site was discovered containing an ancient waterlogged canoe and pole. The salvage of Florida’s longest and only maritime prehistoric dugout in 2011 proved to be a pioneering effort in conservation and, perhaps through the lessons learned, a standard for future saltwater finds.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 81st Annual Meeting, Orlando, FL (2016)   •
• The Archaeology, Art, and Iconography of Florida’s Watery Landscapes

Keywords

Spatial Coverage