Historical Archaeology of Mather Lodge By Sarah Anderson

Grand Island  A small island off the coast of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula in Lake Superior.  Known as one of the earliest contact spots between Europeans, Americans and Native Americans  Americans and American Indians to be connected through business and trade even before the first generation of permanent settlers on the island (Bayers; 5).

The Site’s Story  Each site varied in types of artifacts found, so each location will have a different story to tell.  The site story I will be telling is that of Mather Lodge, a dig which I participated on the summer of 2012 with Professor Skibo and other students of the field.

Mather Lodge  Mather Lodge was built after 1871  Mather was the President of Cleveland Cliffs Iron Company  Mather decided to buy the island and turn it into a game preserve.  The excavation site of the cabin was the one he privately owned during his ownership of the island.

Historical Glass  Glass fragments can be used as a temporal marker for archaeological sites (Branster 1996; 111).

Colors of Historical Glass  Over time various different chemicals were added to the glass in hopes that it will stay clear  1880 the two most common types of chemicals added were selenium and manganese  The added selenium in the glass turned it into a yellow or amber brown color, and the additional manganese made and amethyst or purple color.  Both of these types of colored glass were found within our dig

Nails  Wire nail, a type of machine made nail that was common for the era the lodge was built, after  This type of needle replace hand forged ones that were commonly made in the eighteenth century, but by the time technology advanced in the period this wire nail became more widespread.

Musket Ball  Common for firearms to be handled by settlers when living close to Native American lands  Grand Island was turned into a game preserve. It is possible that the musket ball could have been used in one of the hunts, or it could have been left behind.  The Great Lakes area around Michigan has always been a hub of trading and interaction between Native Americans and Euro-American traders.  Kind of conflict that happened in the area or it just fell out of the hand or gun that was supposed to hold and left behind forgotten.

Historical Metal  Iron was a common metal for various uses around any civilization  Small metal objects were commonly forgotten

Possible Contamination  Construction happened in the same area of our site  Large chance that the places where we found the artifacts were not their original resting places.  Resulted it the spread of the historical artifacts  Adding of objects that clearly came from the twenty-first century, such as a plastic razor and machine made beer bottles with brown glass.  Unknown how much of our site was contaminated by the garbage, but it was still possible to locate artifacts that would tell the story of the lodge.

Conclusion  Judging from the artifacts style and type of creation the people who lived in the lodge would have to be from the mid- to late nineteenth century, culture of origin from American society.