The WPA In Central Texas: Making 80 Year Old Records Speak Again

Summary

This is a poster submission presented at the 2020 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology.

In 2017 TARL received a Texas Preservation Trust Fund Grant to conduct a pilot program to digitize archaeological proejct records, create a searchable database, and create a finding aid for the Works Progress Administration's effort in the Colorado River Basin of Texas. This project was conducted to increase collection access and minimize the damage from direct handling of these 1930's primary documents and provide a foundation for the artifact inventory reconciliation and rehabilitation to follow. A total of 123 sites were recorded and 23 had some excavation. The reorganization of the records, removal of duplicate items and unnecessary packaging resulted in the reduction of the original records from six feet to three feet of records. This poster presents our methods, challenges, and results of working with 80 year old archaeological records, and provides some suggestions for others wishing to pursue the same exercise.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for Historical Archaeology 2020   •
• 2020 SHA Poster Submissions

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Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Society for Historical Archaeology

Record Identifiers

PaperId(s): 201