Conducting Archaeology in the Public Eye: Strategies, Logistics, and Lessons Learned – Alamo Public Archaeology 2006-2022

Summary

This is an abstract from the session entitled "Mission San Antonio de Valero and the Alamo – A Construction History from Mission to Military Fortress, Texas, United States", at the 2025 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology.

In 2006, the University of Texas at San Antonio with the Daughters of the Republic of Texas hosted a field school at the Alamo (41BX6), one of the first excavations at the site to occur in a decade. Another decade passed before additional excavations occurred, with a “Dream Team” of archaeologists assembled in 2016 to kick off the development of a masterplan for the improvements on the Alamo grounds to assist visitors in better understanding the site. Once the Master Plan was established, the State of Texas’s first focus was the preservation needs of the historic structures, requiring significant archaeological investigations of the Church and Long Barrack, opening areas that had not been seen since initial construction. This presentation examines different ways that the archaeological investigations were presented to the general public, stakeholder involvement, and the committees, plans, and outreach produced as a result making the investigations more accessible to the public.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Mission San Antonio de Valero and the Alamo – A Construction History from Mission to Military Fortress, Texas, United States   •
• Society for Historical Archaeology 2025

Keywords

Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Nicole Haddow