Citizen Science in Action: Preserving the Ray Robinson Collection from the Safford Basin, Arizona

Summary

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

In 2015, centenarian Ray Robinson wanted to find a permanent home for thousands of artifacts he collected from numerous sites in the Safford Basin, Arizona during the late 1950s and 1960s, including items from the Bonito Creek Cave Cache. Through a collaborative effort between Archaeology Southwest, Northern Arizona University and the Arizona State Museum (ASM), Ray’s desire was realized shortly before his death. In 2018, Archaeology Southwest assembled a team of over 30 citizen scientists to prepare the collection and process the artifacts to a “repository-ready” state for permanent storage at ASM. During 2018/2019 lab sessions, the Robinson Collection Team, with the assistance of Archaeology Southwest’s Preservation Archaeologists, inventoried and identified artifacts from the “Cork Site”, a previously undocumented Salado site in the Safford Basin. The Safford Basin was a vibrant cultural crossroads in the late prehispanic era (1200–1450 C.E) and there are few documented collections from this region. Collections from this site and others represented in the Robinson Collection fill an important gap in Salado knowledge. This paper will give a brief overview of the history of the Ray Robinson Collection, the importance of citizen scientist participation, and the preliminary results of artifact processing of the “Cork Site” assemblage.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 86th Annual Meeting, Online (2021)   •
• SAA 2021: General Sessions

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 32074