Tuesday Podcast "Two Minutes"
From the Archives of Focus on History in the Daily Gazette: What they dug up in Amsterdam 2011
Episode 300
Friday, January 10, 2020
Montgomery County historian Kelly Yacobucci Farquhar discusses a historical audio tour along the Erie Canal Bikeway in that county. Bob Cudmore reads three vignettes—Fort Klock, the Noses and the Putman Canal Store.
What they dug up in Amsterdam
By Bob Cudmore, Focus on History, Daily Gazette, 04-23-2011
Last year, archeologists from The Louis Berger Group unearthed hundreds of historical artifacts on the north shore of the Mohawk River in Amsterdam in the general area of the mouth of the North Chuctanunda Creek. The dig was named the Chuctanunda Terrace Site. The artifacts include spearheads and arrowheads that are estimated to be 500 to 5,000 years old. The artifacts were found undisturbed and in chronological layers. The oldest items were on the bottom, the newer ones closer to the top.
Eight objects, including one of the oldest found, are displayed in the first photograph. Delland M. Gould, senior field supervisor for The Louis Berger Group, said these are projectile points that would have been attached to wooden shafts for hunting. The small projectile point at the far left of the top row is the oldest-estimated to date from 5,000 years ago. It is similar to projectile points found at the Brewerton Corner archeological site in Central New York. If the date estimate is correct, the people who used this projectile point were alive at about the same time as the Egyptians were building their first pyramid.
Gould said it is not known who the people were who lived in the area 5,000 years ago. It is estimated that humans first crossed into North America from Asia some 13-14000 years ago, possibly earlier.
Relatively speaking, the seven other projectile points in the picture are much newer. To the right of the Brewerton Corners object in the top row are two fish tail points estimated to be 2,800 to 3,000 years old.
The triangle shaped point at the upper far right is believed to be a remnant of the Mohawk culture from 500 years ago, before the encounter with the first European settlers. It is possible this point was an arrow head. The bow and arrow developed in North America about 1,500 years ago. The four projectile points in the bottom row are estimated to be 3,500 years old.
Most of the projectile points were fashioned from a kind of stone called chert, not found in the immediate area of the Amsterdam dig. Gould said the nearest source of chert was in the vicinity of Randall and Yosts at the Noses, where two hills come close to the opposite shores of the Mohawk River. Ancient people used antlers from deer to chip the chert to create the projectile points.
One reason that the Amsterdam find is especially significant is that the artifacts from the Mohawk Indian era were found along the river. Conventional wisdom has been that the Mohawks lived primarily in upland settings, not along the river, according to Gould.
The other picture displays three fragments or sherds of ceramics from the Mohawk era about 500 years ago. Gould said Native Americans developed ceramics about 3,000 years ago, learning how to make cooking utensils and other objects from clay which became hardened when subjected to fire.
Gould and his team found the ancient objects and other items from the 1800s while doing preliminary work for a planned pedestrian bridge over the Mohawk River in Amsterdam.
The artifacts already found are being studied at a facility in Iowa. More excavation will be done in Amsterdam. The New York State Museum in Albany, in cooperation with the Mohawk Nation, will have ultimate responsibility for disposition of the objects. The director of the Walter Elwood Museum in Amsterdam, Ann Peconie, is hopeful some of the items can be displayed there. Some have suggested a display be created at the city's Riverlink Park in conjunction with the pedestrian bridge.
Bob’s Mohawk Valley history books are sold at The Book Hound, 16 East Main St., Amsterdam; Mysteries on Main, 144 West Main St. in Johnstown; The Fly Shack, 28 East Fulton St., Gloversville; Open Door Bookstore, 128 Jay St. in Schenectady and on Amazon
To order a signed copy of one of Bob’s books, please send a check for $15 made out to Bob Cudmore to 125 Horstman Drive, Scotia, N.Y. 12302. The price includes postage, handling and sales tax if applicable. Copies are available of Lost Mohawk Valley, and Hidden History.
To invite Bob to speak to your organization, email bobcudmore@yahoo.com
Wednesday, January 8, 2020-From the Historians Podcast Archives- Episode 136, November 4, 2016-Annette Libeskind Berkovits is author of “In the Unlikeliest of Places.” Her father, Nachman Libeskind, survived the Nazis in Poland and the gulags of the Soviet Union, ending up as an artist in the United States.
Thursday, January 9, 2020-From the Archives of Focus on History in the Daily Gazette-Riding the F.J. & G.
A 1950 railfan excursion in the Mohawk Valley was enjoyed by all, even though some of the goings on would be frowned upon and perhaps grounds for legal action today.......
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