Blog

2010 will be a busy year, with a lot of reconnaissance for the Maryland Historical Trust, and ground-truthing the sites we found in 2007 and 2009 in the Delaware for the Delaware Division of Historical & Cultural Affairs and the Archaeological Society of Delaware, and mapping the Quantico Creek site for the Marine Corps base, and perhaps doing some reconnaissance for the Virginia Department of Historic Resources in several rivers, and perhaps helping MHT survey some battlefield sites — plus giving Roper her biennial bottom paint, adding a small derrick to lift ballast stones at the St. Augustine site, and taking her to Florida for field work and a four-week field school at the St. Augustine Lighthouse & Museum.  Our grant proposal to MHT will cover two large areas of the Potomac, involving 70 or more days of scanning and as much diving as it takes to map whatever we find.  The areas range from Cobb Island to the Rt 301 bridge, and from Smith Creek to Point Lookout.

The February issue of Chesapeake Bay magazine will include a feature article on IMH’s work in the Bay.  Hopefully. the article will help recruit more members.

Adventure Scuba plans to offer more sessions of their exellent low-viz training course.  IMH may offer another four-day field school in low-viz site mapping if people want it.

The initial plan for the year is as follows:

date                  meet boat           area / job     notes
all January        Tall Timbers MD   SHIP        recon & map, finish SHIP 09 work
6– 9 Jan            Amelia Island FL Society for Historical Archaeology annual conference
6– 7 Feb            Tall Timbers       SHIP         get details on selected sites
13–14 Feb         ”                        fun            Valentine’s Day dives
20–21 Feb         ”                        SHIP         get details on selected sites
27–28 Feb         ”                        Roper        haul boat, scrub bottom
6–7 March         ”                        ”               fix, sand and paint boat
13 Mar               Crownsille MD     Maryland Archaeology Workshop
20 Mar               Ocean City MD   Middle Atlantic Archaeological Conference
20 Mar–4 Apr     Tall Timbers       Roper        fix, sand and paint boat
10–11 Apr          ”                       ”               launch, sea trials
17–18 Apr          ”                       U-1105      put mooring buoy on site
25 Apr-9 May *   ”                       SHIP         get details on selected sites
15 – 16 May       ”                       Roper        prepare for Florida trip
Sat. 22 May       ”                        LAMP        underway for Florida
26 or 27 May      ”                                        arrive St. Augustine
all June              Lewes DE          SHIP         ground-truth Delaware sites
Fri. 2 July                                     LAMP        fly or train to St. Augustine
Sun. 4 July         St. Augustine     ”               underway for Maryland
8 or 9 July                                    ”               arrive at Tall Timbers
17 July–1 Aug *  various             SHIP         map Potomac and Quantico sites
7 Aug – 30 Nov *                         ”               recon for MHT
20 – 21 Nov       Tall Timbers       U-1105      pull buoy for the winter  

Whenever:    Help MHT map battlefield sites in the Chesapeake.
                     Finish Gunston Hall reconnaissance!!
                     Scan and map Virginia rivers? *
                     Enter, plot, and reconcile site data for DE, MD, and VA.

*    scan during the week, dive on weekends

Schedule updates will be emailed to anyone who wants them.

PS — Please don’t forget your dues!  All this work takes money.

HMAP invites papers for the conference, Oceans Past III: Stories from the sea – history of marine animal populations and their exploitation. The conference will take place at Synge Lecture Hall, Trinity Long Room Hub, Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland, 18‐20 November 2010.

The first decade of international, multi‐disciplinary “History of Marine Animal Populations” (HMAP) research program culminates in 2010. At this juncture, it is appropriate to reflect on the project’s major achievements, to look ahead and consider the future of marine environmental history and historical ecology, and to consider how the knowledge assembled to date can be applied to marine resource management and conservation. Go to http://hmapcoml.org/oceanspast/ for additional information.

Dawn Cheshaek, CraigWhitaker, and I found a 20th century, 90-foot steel barge in the Potomac yesterday.  It is not likely to be historic, but will be a good training site for mapping.

In October, IMH’s boat Roper steamed from Maryland to Lewes DE and back, and scannned many potential sites along the way.  A summary report of the findings is attached in .pdf.  If you want more information on the sites, or want to dive them when we start working on them, please contact david.howe@maritimehistory.org

 

We got one full day and two half days of work at Lewes, but the seas were too rough to work on the other days.  We finished the small area left over from 2007, found two sites in the outer harbor, confirmed two others that appear on the nautical chart, and disproved two more on the chart.  We also confirmed a dozen charted wrecks in the Chesapeake and the Delaware en route to Lewes, including (I hope) the schooner Mary A. deKnight that foundered in 1870 near Annapolis.

On Wednesday, 14 October, we tried to bring Roper back to Maryland, but it was too rough for a safe trip so we turned back and will leave her there until the weather eases.

Roper had a bumpy trip up to Lewes but did finally arrive early on the mornign of October 3.

We participated in Lewes’ annual Boast the Coast day, wrapping up with an Honorable Mention for our entry in the Parade of Lights.

The following day, Roper was at the Coast Day event put on by the University of Delaware.  We shared space with the Lewes Fire Department’s spiffy new boat and had opportunities to talk to lots of folks that are interested in archaeology and history.  Not sure if we got any new recruits for the ASD but we did encourage a few divers to sign up.  We took tours and drooled over the R/V Hugh R. Sharp’s toys, navigation and space as well as the Delriver, which is a fuel spill clean-up vessel.  ASD had a neat display but their big draw was the ROV that the kids drove around the pool.

Monday we attempted to scan but it was just a bit too rough.  Lucky for us, Craig Lukezic arranged for us to visit the DeBraak warehouse and we got a fantastic lecture from Chuck Fithian about the ship’s history and modern challenges to the ship’s preservation after all of the damage done by the salvagers. 

Tuesday we did get out to scan and finished the final portion of the 2007 area!  Unfortunately, the weather is not cooperating and there will be no scanning for the next couple of days.

Debbie and Lee Nelson joined us for a couple of days; this will be our last chance to see Lee before he is deployed to Iraq for a year. 🙁

Many thanks to the Cape Henlopen State Park for allowing us to stay in the dorm again.  It is a great location, nice facility and very reasonably priced for volunters to use.