New Perspectives on Descendant Community Engagement: Research at the Catoctin Ironworks Furnace

Summary

This is an abstract from the session entitled "Archaeology of Marginalization and Resilience in the Northeast", at the 2024 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology.

The ongoing work at the Catoctin Furnace Historical Society offers a powerful example of the complexities of Descendant Community engagement. Biological descendants of the 18th and 19th century Black Ironworkers of the Catoctin Iron Furnace in Western Maryland have recently been identified using genealogy and genetic analysis. These newly identified descendants include both Black and White families across North America with varying ties to the contemporary Black community in the region. In this paper, I champion the importance of the New York African Burial Ground Project’s framework for Descendant Community engagement, which includes local Black communities with longstanding ties to the history of enslavement regardless of their ability to demonstrate direct biological or genealogical ties. By embracing an expansive notion of descendancy, contemporary researchers will be better suited to circumnavigate the marginalization 18th and 19th-century Black communities in the archival and archaeological record.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for Historical Archaeology 2024   •
• Archaeology of Marginalization and Resilience in the Northeast

Keywords

Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Nicole Haddow