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Aucilla Research Institute, Inc. along with our partners below are sponsoring another conference in The First Floridians Series. Speakers will be attending in person and online from around the country to share their studies and findings. Attendance is FREE and you only need to register. Registration Form
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Biography
Dr. Cronin has served in many prestigious positions including in the White House Office of Science, Technology and Policy (OSTP) (1996-97). Dr. Cronin's research at the US Geological Survey in paleoclimatology, sea-level change, biostratigraphy, geochemistry and ecosystems has led to co-authored more than 200 scientific articles in more than 50 journals, proceedings volumes, handbooks & encyclopedias. He has written two books and was co-editor of Global & Planetary Change. He has participated in numerous sediment coring expeditions including four to the Arctic Ocean. His research has been widely reported in the media including NY Times, National Geographic Society, New Scientist, Chesapeake Bay Journal, BBC, NPR, AP, Fox News. |
Dr.Tom Cronin speaking on the topic:
Sediment Record of Paleoclimate and Sea Level History of Chesapeake Bay |
Biography
Dr. Joseph Donoghue is a faculty member in the Planetary Sciences Program at the University of Central Florida. His research interests include the geology and geomorphology of coastal environments and continental margins, the causes and effects of sea-level change, and Quaternary geology and geochronology. He teaches both graduate and undergraduate courses in coastal processes, marine geology, Quaternary geology, and environmental geology. He is widely published. He is currently involved in a multi-year project examining the geologic and human history of coastal lagoons, and the extent to which human actions are affected by both long-and short-term natural processes. The work has the goal of developing methodologies to enable preparation and mitigation for the projected environmental changes resulting from global warming. |
Dr. Joseph Donoghue speaking on the topic:
Geologic Evolution of the Apalachee Bay Region, Last Glacial Maximum to Present |
Biography
Dan Worrall was trained as a regional geologist, holds a PhD from the University of Texas at Austin, and spent a career in exploration geology and research. In retirement, he has followed other passions in history and archeology. In 2016 he published an extensive history of the early settlers of the western part of Greater Houston. Curious about the world of yet earlier residents of his region, he then began to research and compile digital records from hundreds of archeological sites. At the same time, he worked to create a paleogeographic map record of the gradual inundation of Southeast Texas since the Last Glacial Maximum. Using ArcGIS, he integrated this archeological, geological, and historical information; a book, A Prehistory of Houston and Southeast Texas: Landscape and Culture is the result. |
Dan Worrall speaking on the topic:
Inundation of the Southeast Texas Coast since the Late Glacial Maximum (LGM), and its Effects on the Native American Cultural Landscape |
Biography
Debra Willard is a Research Geologist at the US Geological Survey in Reston, VA. After conducting graduate and postdoctoral research on palynological and paleobotanical records from Pennsylvanian-age peat swamps, she joined the USGS as a Research Geologist in 1991. Her research uses palynological evidence to document vegetational response to a range of environmental and climatic stressors in Paleogene, Neogene, and Holocene sediments. She coordinated the USGS Climate Research & Development Program from 2010–2021 before resuming a research role, focusing on the response of wetland systems to changing climate and land cover since the Last Glacial Maximum. . |
Debra Willard speaking on the topic:
Holocene History of Vegetation and Land Cover in the Chesapeake Bay Watershed |
Biography
Lee A. Newsom (Ph.D. 1993, University of Florida) served on the faculty of the Department of Anthropology and as a member scientist of the Institutes of Energy and Environment at The Pennsylvania State University from 2001 to 2016, now emerita with that institution. She served as Professor of Anthropology at Flagler College in St. Augustine from 2016- 2021, and currently holds courtesy appointments in the Department of Anthropology and the Florida Museum of Natural History, University of Florida. Newsom is an environmental archaeologist, specializing in paleoethnobotany, paleoecology and wood anatomy. The primary physical and intellectual foci of her research are the Caribbean islands and Florida, although her work extends also to other island systems, including Bermuda, Iceland, and the Pribilofs. Her research emphasizes human-plant interactions, domestication process, forest management and agrobiodiversity, human niche construction, behavioral ecology, and island biogeographic theory. Her (2004) co-authored book with Elizabeth Wing (University of Florida, emerita) concerns Environmental Archaeology in the Caribbean region. A new book, Wood in Archaeology, with Cambridge University Press, was just published (February 2022). In 2002 Newsom was named a MacArthur Fellow. |
Lee A. Newsom speaking on the topic:
Florida Vegetation History - Extinct Palms, Exotic Fruits and Unique Late Glacial Forest |
Biography
Bruce M. Albert, Ph.D. is a palynologist presently a research fellow at the Department of Archaeology at the University of Durham and previously at the University of Texas, Department of Geography Department of Geography. Doctoral work based upon comparative palynology and archaeology at multiple sites in the Czech and Slovak Republics, examining human impact on environment. Further work on a contract basis has further been achieved using alluvial pollen techniques in Texas and Mexico. He has also served as a post-doctoral research fellow at the Czech Life Sciences University, Department of Ecology and in multiple post-doctoral appointments including the Mesolithic-Neolithic transition (UK) project, the Star Carr (UK) assessment and most recently the Nebelivka mega-site project (UA). Florida archaeo-palynolgy work has included the Mastodon Vickerage Site, the Vero Old Man Site and sites at Eglin Air Force Base and JFK Space Center. |
Bruce M. Albert is speaking on the topic:
Botanical Record of the Texas Coastal Area, Late Pleistocene to Today |
Biography
Ralph Eshelman was a Research Associate in the Department of Paleobiology at the National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, from 1975 until 2005. He is currently a Research Associate with the Maryland Paleontological Collections and Research Center at the Calvert Marine Museum. Ralph specializes in the study of Neogene mammals, concentrating on the mid-Atlantic and Caribbean. He is currently working on an update of the Irvingtonian Cumberland Bone Cave fauna of Maryland, and the mammalian fossils the Miocene to Pliocene Chesapeake Group as well as an overview of the Quaternary vertebrates of Maryland. |
Ralph Eshelman speaks at the ARI 2022 Conference on the topic:
Pleistocene Vertebrates in the Chesapeake Bay Region |
Biography
Bruce MacFadden is Distinguished Professor at the Florida Museum and Director of the Thompson Earth Systems Institute, University of Florida. On the UF faculty since 1977, Bruce is the author of 200 peer-reviewed articles primarily focusing on fossil mammals in the Americas. He also has authored two books on Fossil Horses (Cambridge 1992) and Broader Impacts of Science on Society (Cambridge 2019). He was the President of the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology (1986 to 1988) and the Paleontological Society (2018 to 2020). His current passion is promoting science through education and outreach, particularly in Florida. |
Bruce MacFadden speaking at the 2022 ARI Conference on the topic: Ice Age (Pleistocene) Megafauna of the Big Bend Area, Florida
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Biography
Dr. Hemmings received his short stack of Anthropology degrees from the University of Arizona and the University of Florida (BA, and MA, Phd's respectively). A post- doc at the University of Texas insured he could finish memorizing every mile of I-10 from Tucson to Jacksonville. His primary research interests are focused on the Pleistocene landscape of North America when people first arrived; the plant and animal life they would have encountered; and how they flourished in that New World. He is an avid collector of beer cans, breweriana, and Native American postcards, photo's, etc. |
Andy Hemmings speaking at the ARI 2022 Conference on the topic: Post Glacial to Modern Fauna of the NE Texas Coastal Plain Region
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Biography
Emily Klipp with Alvan “Al” Karlin, Ph.D., CMS-L, GISP. Emily Klipp is a project manager with Dewberry and has more than 14 years of experience working with topographic and topobathymetric lidar data. She specializes in geospatial project planning and management, QA/QC of topographic and bathymetric data, vertical and horizontal accuracy assessments, and creation of a variety of digital mapping products using various software platforms. She currently manages projects for USGS, NOAA, USACE, SWFWMD, SRWMD, and other state and local governments, including aerial lidar acquisition, remote sensing, photogrammetry, and map production. |
Emily Klipp speaking at the ARI 2022 Conference on the topic: What Else Can I Do with Topobathymetric Data?
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Biography
Jim received a BA from the University of Florida and his MA and PhD from Florida State University. He began work for the Florida Bureau of Archaeological Research in 1976 and retired in 2011. He participated as co-principal investigator on the Paleoindian components of the Page-Ladson in the Aucilla River and the Alexon Bison and Ryan-Harley sites in the Wacissa River and was principla investigator on the Wakulla Springs Lodge site. The results of research at the Page-Ladson and Wakulla Springs Lodge sites indicate that the Big Bend area of North Florida has some of the oldest evidence of human activity in the Southeast US. He is a board member on Panhandle Archaeological Society at Tallahassee (PAST) and one of the founders and current board chairman of the Aucilla Research Institute. His research interest include Paleoindian archaeology as it relates to resources, habitats, climatic change and Paleoindian culture. He is author of the book Paleoindian Societies of the Coastal Southeast. |
Jim Dunbar speaking at the ARI 2022 Conference on the topic: The Aucilla River, Older than we Thought with its Wealth of Untapped Information about the Pleistocene
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Biography
Shane Wellendorf is the conservation coordinator with Tall Timbers Research Station and Land Conservancy, an accredited land trust active throughout north Florida and south Georgia. He works on land conservation project development, conservation easements, and stewardship of conservation easements. Prior to joining the land conservancy, he worked as a research biologist with Tall Timbers. Shane holds a Bachelor of Science Degree in Wildlife Biology from Iowa State University and a Master of Science Degree in Wildlife Science from North Carolina State University and is a Certified Wildlife Biologist with the Wildlife Society. |
Shane Wellendorf speaking at the ARI 2022 Conference on the topic: Land Conservation in the Red Hills, the Aucilla River Watershed and Beyond: A Win for People, Natural Resources and Archeology
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Biography
Dr. Margaret (Pegi) Jodry is an archaeologist and Research Associate in the Department of Anthropology of the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of Natural History. Working in partnership with her late husband, Dr. Dennis Stanford, for forty years in the Paleoindian/Paleoecology Program seeking a greater understanding of Early Peoples in the Americas and their changing lifeways through time in the Rocky Mountains and Plains, Southwest, Alaska and Russia, Chesapeake Bay, and Basque Country. Her academic training at the University of Texas (M.A. Anthropology) and American University (Ph.D. Anthropology) is greatly enriched by ongoing learning with Indigenous Elders and Healers of different Nations since the 1980s. She is interested in what it means to be human both in the deep past and in today's world. |
Pegi Jodry speaking as the Keynote Speaker at the ARI 2022 Conference on the topic: Mother Waters Nourishing Life for All Relations - Human Reciprocity Through Gratitude and Caretaking
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Biography
Doctor Lowery's family has resided on the Delmarva Peninsula since the mid-17th century. His archaeological and geological began in his youth with many excursions inspecting the eroding shorelines of Chesapeake Bay. He has conducted archaeological investigations along 3,000 linear-mile section of the bay and recorded about 1900 sites, spanning the region's prehistoric and historic intervals. He received a Masters degree from Temple University and a Ph.D. in Geology from the University of Delaware. He had both a pre-doctoral and post-doctoral fellowship with the Smithsonian Institution. He is a Smithsonian research associate and a cultural resource professional with FEMA. He has published over fifty journal articles, book chapters, monographs, and syntheses about the archaeology of the Chesapeake Bay. Recently, his focus has been on site losses due to coastal erosion. |
Darrin Lowery speaking at the ARI 2022 Conference on the topic: Coastal Erosion and Sea Level Impacys to Archeological Resources in the Chesapeake Bay
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Biography
Dr. Glowacki is Principal of Coda Research Group, LLC, and Pre-Columbian Archaeological Research Group, Inc., a non-profit foundation. For more than twenty years she worked for the Florida Division of Historical Resources, Bureau of Archaeological Research, half of which she served as Bureau Chief and State Archaeologist. Her duties included archaeological research permitti ng for state lands, and oversight of Underwater Archaeology, State Conservation and Collections, and the unmarked human remains programs. Mary’ research interests include the exploration and colonization of the Americas, the prehistory of North Florida, art imagery of the pre-Columbian Americas, and early complex societies, particularly, Wari culture of the Peruvian Middle Horizon. |
Mary Glowacki speaking at the ARI 2022 Conference on the topic: Archeology of the Apalachee Bay - Societies of Florida's Early Riviera
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Biography
Ervan Garrison is currently Professor of Geology & Anthropology at the University of Georgia (UGA)(1992- present). He holds a doctorate from the University of Missouri (1979) and a B.S. and M.A. from the University of Arkansas ('71, '73). From 1990-1992 he was Deputy Historic Preservation Officer and Marine Archaeologist for the National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Although he left NOAA for UGA in 1992, he continued to work with the agency at Gray's Reef National Marine Sanctuary from 1994-2013. He taught and conducted research at Texas A&M University from 1979-1989. During that time, he worked on Texas coastal and submerged geoarchaeology. |
Erv Garrison speaking at the ARI 2022 Conference on the topic: The Archeology and Geoarcheology of Galveston-Trinity Bay
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Refining Florida’s Chert Quarry Clusters: New Methods, New Research, and New Results through Geochemical Approaches to Chert Provenance Toolstone quality and availability represent the first limiting factors in lithic technological industries, and determining toolstone provenance can shed light on past human mobility patterns and raw-material use. Despite the ubiquity and variation of chert resources across Florida, past research has largely focused on Ocala and Tampa cherts in the central part of the state, leaving other areas of Florida understudied.
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Modern Techniques and Technologies in Surveying While the underlying principles of measurement and mapping are still the same today they were in the past, surveying tools and techniques have changed rapidly in the past few years. The advancement of new technology means surveyors can now take measurements and report data with increased speed, accuracy and formats they were not possible before. This presentation will cover how these new systems affect surveying and provide an overview of what can be done with the latest technology. The class will also touch on systems like LiDAR, laser scanning, drones, AI, photographic surveying and viewing systems.
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Indigenous Seminoles: Connecting Florida’s Modern Indians with the Time Before Memory This paper extends the history of the Seminoles, deeper into the historical record by reexamining the coalescence of the Seminole its connections to the Calusa, Tequesta, Ais, Apalachee, and other Indians of sixteenth and seventeenth century Florida. Rather than treating ancient Florida and modern Florida as two distinctive phases, many scholars now emphasize a long continuous history of Indigenous communities. This approach contrasts sharply with earlier academic works that tended to treat Seminoles as
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What have the Bones to say? Vertebrate Remains from Aucilla & Wakulla River Paleoindian Sites An incredible array of Terminal Pleistocene vertebrate remains have been recovered at numerous underwater Paleoindian loci within the Aucilla-Wacissa and St. Marks-Wakulla River drainages over nearly 200 years. Their importance to the development of American Paleontology and the human inhabitants of this landscape at the very end of the Pleistocene are discussed with special emphasis on how all of these finds are improving our understanding of what specific taxa were available to the earliest human arrivals, and how these early people interacted with them.
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Plant genetics in prehistory and the human connection Relatively new to researchers is an understanding of paleo-genetics and its implications for understanding past human lifeways. This presentation will explore some of the discoveries that have taken place and the promise for research into the future.
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New Windows Into the Past: OSL Ceramics Dating and pXRF Studies of Protohistoric and Early Contact Sites From the Eastern Fort Walton Cultural Area Finding protohistoric and early contact sites in Florida and the greater Southeast has long been a goal of historical archaeologists. New techniques for dating ceramics using OSL, in conjunction with pXRF studies of ceramic paste composition, provide more precise dates for site occupation as well as a better understanding of where ceramics were made. This paper will discuss the results of archaeological study of sites on the Wakulla River and
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Moore, Sellards, and Simpson: Early Archaeology in the Big Bend of Florida Although a lot of undocumented archaeology has been undertaken in the Big Bend area in the past, the most significant early work (late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries) was carried out by three men: Clarence B. Moore, Elias H. Sellards, and J. Clarence Simpson. These researchers brought some professionalism to the work, and made efforts to disseminate the results of their excavations and other studies. They also ensured that archaeological collections were deposited in museum collections where
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A tale told…signifying nothing Submerged prehistoric archaeology by its nature depends intensively on natural science methods, particularly where topics such as submerged site formation processes are concerned. As such, it offers potential to advance the state of the art in both methodology and interpretation but must be applied with due care. I present here a case study that demonstrates this concern. In the search for a non-destructive, cost-effective method to “fingerprint” geochemical signatures in lithic corrosion created by submerged contexts, limitations in the methods were
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Archaeology in the wetlands is spectacular Archaeologists can still be surprised by finds, so me of which can be many thousands of years old. We have the basic prehistoric outlines for much of the world but in special preservation situations archaeologists can still be amazed by what Mother Nature has managed to save. This global tour will illustrate some of the things and sites that still have the power to leave us shaking our heads. In extremes of climate, hot, cold or wet even the most delicate organics can survive. In typical ‘normal terrestrial sites’ stone and ceramics dominate.
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A Puzzle in Time: The Wakulla Lodge Site another North Florida Pre-Clovis Site Archaeological investigation just north of the Wakulla Lodge on high ground overlooking Wakulla Springs has identified a Clovis level and at least two levels below Clovis. Just how old the pre-Clovis levels are remains a mystery. Geoarchaeologist Chris Moore and Mark Brooks have identified several paleo-land surfaces below Clovis, but more importantly the location of a rare earth platinum (Pt) anomaly in the sediment column that marks the Clovis level. The Pt anomaly took place when an environmental shift took
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Surveyors of Old North Florida The discussion will concern the primary surveyors of Florida in the area of Leon, Jefferson and Madison Counties. It will also note the differing surveys of the Florida-Georgia line and the differences thereon. I will discuss the accuracy of these works and those of the surveyor of the era and their relation to the environment of that day. The conditions of the territory at the time of these surveys were greatly different than those we see today. These conditions dictated much about the surveys and how and when they were done.
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Exploring the First European Settlement on the Northern Gulf Coast In 1559, a fleet transporting 500 Spanish soldiers and 1,000 other settlers including families, servants, slaves, and some 200 Aztec Indians landed in Pensacola Bay and established the first European settlement on the northern coast of the Gulf of Mexico. Designed to be a port from which to traverse the interior Southeast and eventually provide New Spain with direct terrestrial access to the Atlantic Ocean, the Luna Settlement lasted just two years after a hurricane destroyed most of its fleet and food stores just a month
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Building a New Understanding of the First Americans through Discovery and New Methodologies The field of the first Americans is undergoing rapid change with long-standing beliefs being upended. No longer can it be believed that Clovis were the first people to enter the Americas 13,500 years ago and that their descendants reached the southern tip of South America 800 years later. Instead, new methodologies for preparing samples (especially bone) and better AMS age measurements show that Clovis only ranges from 13,000 to 12,700 years ago.
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Enough Guesting: What Does the Silver River Say About The First Floridians? In several ways, the Guest Mammoth site in the Silver River of Central Florida is one of the oldest stories of underwater precontact archaeology in the Americas. The Guest Mammoth site was the first submerged precontact site in the Americas to be professionally excavated in 1973, one of the first megafauna exploitation sites reported in the southeastern United States, and was the foci of the first submerged prehistoric archaeology field school ever conducted. The original excavations of the site produced
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The Quarry Cluster Approach to Chert Provenance Studies The Quarry Cluster concept was first developed in the early 1980s as a way to visually assign lithic artifacts to geographic localities where chert outcrops share similar geological characteristics. It has been used in Florida nearly 40 years and has proven to be a robust method for determining chert provenance. In this presentation, I review the concept and how it has been used (and abused), discuss refinements and improvements, and provide some examples of the method’s use in addressing archaeological research questions.
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The Franciscan-Indian Missions of Northwest Florida In the mid-to-late seventeenth century, Jefferson and Leon counties had a dense array of Franciscan-Indian missions. Beginning in the early 1980s, several long-term projects have investigated some of these mission sites. This presentation examines our understanding of the mission system at the beginning of these projects, considers what we have learned, and proposes goals for future investigations.
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Detection Dogs in Searches This presentation will consist of a discussion of the use of Human Remains Detection Dogs in Archaeological Searches.
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The ARI website was funded in part by a grant from The Perkins Charitable Foundation. |
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