March Monthly Meeting of the Panhandle Archaeological Society at Tallahassee (PAST)

Please join us at Goodwood Museum and Gardens Jubilee Cottage as we welcome Dr. Jeffrey Mitchem who will be discussing an important site that was located at St. Marks.  Reception begins at 6:30 pm with presentation beginning at 7 pm.

THE ST. MARKS WILDLIFE REFUGE LOOKOUT TOWER BURIAL MOUNDJeffrey M. MitchemAbstract: In the 1930s, three Tallahassee boys were given permission by the Supervisor of the St. MarksWildlife Refuge to camp and dig into some mounds near the fire lookout tower at the Refuge. In thesummers of 1937, 1938, and 1939, the boys dug and surface collected at several localities, including onearea that was a burial mound. The collection that they amassed attracted a lot of attention fromarchaeologists and collectors, because it included lots of European trade material from the burial area.Word of the glass beads and metal objects attracted attention of archaeologists and collectors in thestate, and soon the boys were being visited and offered money for many of the things they unearthed.Artifacts from the mound were purchased by Clarence Simpson, Montague Tallant, David True, JohnGoggin, and others, and most ended up in museum or private collections around the state. Although wehave few records or photographs of the excavations, the European artifacts offer clues to the origin ofmost of the objects, but a few are puzzling. Most of them are probably from the ill-fated expedition ofPánfilo de Narváez in 1528.