Hopewell Furnace National Historic Site (hereafter Hopewell Furnace) is an iconic representation of the early American industrial landscape, nestled in the picturesque rolling hills of Pennsylvania. Operational between 1771 and 1883, the Hopewell Furnace iron plantation played an integral role in shaping an emerging United States. Throughout its history, Hopewell Furnace’s preservation and conservations efforts by the 1930s Recreational Demonstration Area (RDA) and Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) work programs, and subsequent archeological excavations through the 1980s, have resulted in substantial archeological accessions referred to as “legacy” collections.

This paper highlights key lessons learned from management practices employed for these legacy collections. Focusing on storage capabilities, decision making processes, and the impacts of a rotation workforce, this study explores the challenges of safeguarding historic resources. Ultimately, this paper contributes to the broader conversation surrounding the curation of historical sites and their associated collections.

As a response to New Deal construction, the Archeological Research Unit (ARU) was largely created to conduct salvage archeology in the Southeast. Since forming out of the ARU in 1966, the National Park Service’s Southeast Archeological Center (SEAC) continues to provide curatorial support for legacy collections created through Depression-era work programs. Following these 1930’s excavations, pedagogies surrounding archeological field methods and analysis have drastically changed. Witnesses to these shifts, collections can tell us a lot about how archeological and curatorial practices developed. This paper explores SEAC’s legacy acquisitions and loans to better understand early collection priorities, shifts in curatorial approaches, and evolving collection policies. When collections change hands, they become prone to the loss of both physical records and institutional knowledge, and by revisiting the origins of SEAC’s archeological legacy collections, we are implored to identify more meaningful ways of dealing with these gaps in the record.

Archeology is considered a subject of science. Therefore, as scientists, are we not required to replicate our work, theories, and basic assumptions in order to ensure that our past work and interpretations about the past remain true? While this seems like a basic and logical step to take, we as archeologists rarely do this as we are often in the field creating these collections and interpretations. By rehousing, reorganizing, and reviewing older archeological collections (and their associated documentation), archeologists are able re-excavate a site, test its standing interpretation against updated methodologies and using modern day technology. To illustrate the utility and importance of processing and studying “legacy” collections, I will be examining and “re-excavating” the Great Island Tavern collection originally excavated by James Deetz and Eric Ekholm in 1969/70 on Great Island in Cape Cod Massachusetts.

The National Parks Service has numerous legacy collections from archeological excavations put in place by programs under Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal. The two that are most prevalent in the National Parks museum collections are from the Works Progress Administration (WPA) and the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC). Both programs employed workers on federal public projects and early excavations of National Parks. Included in the National Parks Service collection are photographs–many of these photographs depict citizen workers conducting archeological fieldwork.

This paper explores the National Parks Service’s collections of Works Progress Administration and Civilian Conservation Corps era photographs of archeological fieldwork, shedding light on this period of early archeological fieldwork for the National Parks Service, specifically, people of color and women will be focused on. The question of how such photos can be used for future archeological research and interpretation to the public will be raised and discussed.

Throughout the years the methodology and technology associated with curating archeological environmental samples has changed. Samples are often collected with specific research goals in mind (pollen, soil chemistry, starch analysis, phytoliths, macrobotanicals), while others are taken as a precaution. A common problem is that these environmental samples are then de-prioritized and overlooked once the report has been written. These factors feed into the curation crisis we see today. Looking across two National Park Service affiliated archeological collections, the Boston African Meeting House collection and the Carns Site collection, this paper discusses the curation of legacy environmental samples, as well as methods used at the Northeast Museum Services Center to evaluate these samples over 30 years later.

Oftentimes, archeological collections will pass through multiple hands, multiple labs, and multiple instances of processing before their final curation. The 1975 to 1986 Boston African Meeting House excavation produced a large-scale collection of over 78,000 artifacts that has been cataloged in different stages since its excavation. The most recent cataloging effort sought to update and standardize the artifact information, not only making the collection compatible with the adjacent Abiel Smith School, but also making it more accessible for future researchers. This most recent effort makes an interesting case study of the hurdles encountered and lessons learned from one collection over time. From the larger scale issues like changes in staff and worldwide events, to the small-scale minutiae of catalog quality control, legacy lessons from the Boston African Meeting House project can help professionals across the discipline better steward multigenerational collections.