June 6th 2019 - And Then There Were Six.

Today was the last day of excavation in the field. Only six students hiked into the field today, while all others worked in the lab. Many began writing and drawing up reports for their final projects in the classroom, while students in the field focused more on finishing up excavations. On the McKenzie Creek site, we have a total of 7 open units. We wanted to be able to close all of them today, but before they're closed, we made sure the unit hit a sterile layer. When a unit is sterile, it means there is no more evidence of culture such as nails or glass. In the morning, Nikki, Karoline, Mitch and I took our buckets and trowels to our excavation units to get as much done as possible. Aza continued to work on her cedar plank road project, while Alyssa spent time measuring and finishing up sketches on the ofuro.

Mitch sifting dirt in a beam of light. Photo by Nikki. 

Nikki found a rock feature in her unit last week, and she spent a couple of days excavating around it. Today she had the chance to remove the rock feature from her unit, and surprisingly she found the tops of some bottles underneath it. She mentioned that they are likely the tops to bottles that she found a few days ago in the unit. She also got to remove some cans that Sepideh found in the unit next to hers, so that we could close it.

In the eastern units, Mitch found the cap of a tube of toothpaste 40cm below the pit datum. While he was sifting through the dirt from that area, he also found the rest of the tube rolled up in a tight cylinder. He also managed to find a complete aqua glass bottle with the stopper buried 60cm below the pit datum in his unit. He was on a roll today!

Top of a tube of toothpaste found by Mitch.

Bottle found by Mitch.

Karoline and I found almost 100 nails between 20cm and the sterile layer in our 2 by 2 meter unit. We also found an incomplete file, some broken pieces of glass and a large metal bolt with the nut still attached.

Four eastern units.

We also had some guests visit us in the morning. Lisa Uyeda and Trevor Wideman from the Nikkei Museum and Archives came by to visit the site. Bob was very excited to talk to them about what has been found on the site, and the insight they had to offer.

Bob, Lisa and Trevor looking at artifacts.

Lisa provided extremely useful thoughts about what may have been happening at the camp, such as it being mainly for women and children while the men travelled to work in the surrounding valley area. There is another Japanese camp about 4km away from the McKenzie Creek site that was shown to be occupied by mostly males, which fits perfectly with her suggestion. She also explained to Bob about how the Japanese prepared for internment, by telling him what items people would choose to take with them, and what they would decide to leave behind. If you want to follow her on twitter you can do so here. Trevor has been working with documents that were recently donated to the Nekkei Museum that belong to Tadashi (Jack) Kagetsu, who was the son of the person who established the McKenzie Creek camp. Bob was pleased when Trevor told him that he had letters and emails that were made between Bob and Tadashi before his death about 10 years ago. If you want to follow Trevor on twitter you can do that here.

After our lunch break, everyone went back to excavating with the exception of Aza, who continued to finish up her measurements of the cedar plank road. Alyssa joined us in the eastern units, finishing up excavating what was previously Phoenix's unit. She found a few nails and bits of glass along with a large piece of barrel ring.

Overall the day went quite well and we got lucky with sunny weather once again! Bob said that this is one of the driest field seasons he has ever had in the Lower Seymour Conservation Reserve, with a record of only ONE day of rain so far! On Monday we will all be in the lab, and everyone will be jumping into their projects to try and get them done.