Hello everybody.
How's it going? Good evening everyone and
welcome. Our community is filled with
diverse stories and we recognize that
our story begins with the Indigenous
Peoples of this land.
We would like to acknowledge that we are
broadcasting this lecture on lands that
have been inhabited by Indigenous
Peoples for millennia and we would like
to honor the centuries of Indigenous
People who walked on Turtle Island
before us. My name is Adrian and I'm the
Visitor Services Coordinator here at the
St. Catharines Museum and Welland Canal
Centre. Welcome to tonight's lecture:
Archaeology of a 19th Century Shipyard
with our very special guest Dr. Kimberly
Monk. We are now well into our lecture
schedule during our closure and we hope
these lectures provide a bit of
historical joy and also spark
imagination and exploration into our
city's rich history. Coming up in our
lecture series we are excited to present
a talk titled Racetracks and Runaway
Carriages: Life with Horses
in 19th century St. Catharines, n ext
week on June 16th at 7 p.m. with special
guest lecturer Dr. Keri  Cronin. O n June
23rd I'll be back with a talk about our
cities built heritage called
Lost and Historic Architecture of St. Catharines.
On June 30th we welcome back museum
curator Kathleen Powell for a talk about
the city's memorials entitled Holding
the Torch High: Remembering War in
St. Catharines. After that we're going to
take a bit of a break from the lecture
series for the summertime but don't
worry we will be back in the fall with
more great topics
some more special guests please stay
tuned to our social media channels for
more information. In the meantime we'll
be continuing on with a lot of other
virtual public programs including some
Facebook live hits here at the Museum a
few virtual guided hikes other tours and
of course our two podcasts Museum Chat
Live! and One Hour in the Past. Thank you
again to everyone joining us tonight
a quick note regarding interaction on
tonight's lecture. I f you have any
questions during the presentation you
can post them in the chat box to the
right-hand side of your screen,
in the browser.  There's lots of
conversation going on. Hello everybody!
You and if you are using a tablet or a
smartphone you might be only able to use
the comment section below and you're
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comment section below the video as well.
T here is about a 30 second to about one
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post it anyway and we'll go back and
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email after the presentation and we'll
get back to you. We hope this format
works well and we welcome any feedback
if you have any difficulty. T hank you
once again for joining us for tonight's
lecture and we are so excited to welcome
special guest Dr. Kimberly Monk to
tonight's program. Let me give you a
brief rundown of tonight's lecture
because it's a bit different from the
other ones that we've been doing. First
I'm going to talk about some a surprise
I'm going to talk about some of my
research into the 1861 Shipyard Strikes
in Niagara. Then I'm going to pass it on
to Dr. Monk to discuss her work at the
Shickluna Shipyard site - say that
five times fast - in Downtown
St. Catharines.
W e'll both take questions at the end of
the presentation. So enjoy. Okay
I'm just gonna get rid of my I know some
of you don't like it but I I don't want
to block any pictures so I'm gonna get
rid of my camera. Alright. A few years
ago I had a brief almost one-line
reference to a strike at the Shickluna
Shipyards.
I wasn't researching it at the time so I
pocketed it for another time.
The story continued to sizzle on the
back burner until last summer when I
finally had a chance to start digging a
bit. The research has been difficult with
many dead ends. The research is ongoing
and there are many gaps and many
questions remaining.
However by pouring over countless pages
of newspapers from the period, I was able
to piece together a sense of this
incredible story that has not been
shared until now. Before I jump into the
story I want to extend many many many
thanks to the kind folks at the Special
Collections at the St. Catharines Public
Library,  to local historian Dennis Gannon
who pointed me in the right direction
more than once and also to Dr. Monk for
sharing her knowledge and her material
with me. Thank you all for your help. In
early 1861 skilled laborers at Niagara
shipyards organized themselves into the
Welland Canal Ship Carpenters and
Caulkers Association. They went on strike
and demanded increased pay, regular pay
in cash, and the first right to work. The
strike lasted about five months and
resulted in the dramatic destruction of
one of the shipyards. The 1861 shipyard
strike is significant because it is an
early example of organized labor labor
action which included workers from
across the industry. There are few other
examples of similar labor action similar
labor labor action from Canadian history
during this time.
But how did the strike come about a
confluence of trends events and
pressures led to the 1861 shipyard
strike. By 1861 the Second Welland Canal
had brought significant industrial
wealth to the businessmen of Niagara.
Niagara was known across the Great Lakes
as an industrial powerhouse and
dominated early manufacturing milling
and shipbuilding. Because of the ease of
access to resources and ease of
transportation on the canal, numerous
shipyards were very successful in St.
Catharines, including the Muir Brothers
- number one - Muir brothers in Port
Dalhousie and Donaldson and Andrew in
Port Dalhousie - star number two. Louis
Shickluna - star number one and star
number two- fancy - in Downtown
St. Catharines along with Melancton
Simpson, one of my favorite names - star
number three. And, of course the Abbey
Brothers in Port Robinson - star number
one. I will go back to these map slides
if everybody wants to look at them a
little bit later.
At their peak between the 1850s in the
1860s the Niagara Yards employed between
500 and 800 men. Shickluna alone employed
300. Through the first
Industrial Revolution and beyond labor
under larger employers was reorganized
so that laborers were expected to attend
and work specific hours under specific
rules and participate in an hourly or
daily wage system, rather than a
fee-for-service system which some
specific trades might still have used.
The wage system under early capitalists
was unpredictable and put pressure on
families. Since only men were hired at
factories or shipyards only men could
bring income to this to the significant
income to the urban home. When men
weren't paid for whatever reason or paid
inconsistently it became impossible for
families to survive. Gender roles were
reorganized and redefined where women
rarely had any opportunity to supplement
household incomes as they may have done
in the past. Unions became the only
source of stability available to workers.
To steady cash flow capitalists use a
truck wage system basically paying their
workers on company credit which forced
workers to buy product from their
company stores at marked up prices with
unstable supply. T he truck wage system
meant that many workers had no money for
household expenses and often
kept workers in poverty and in debt to
the company.
If you aren't familiar with shipbuilding
from this time period I just want to
give you a rundown of what skilled
workers what the skilled workers were
and who went on strike and what they did on
their jobs first the carpenters are the
skilled workers who built and repaired
vessels at shipyards; caulkers were the
skilled workers who undertook the
caulking or waterproofing of the ships
along with some maintenance.
Steam engine technology was important to
shifting the shipbuilding and shipping
industries towards Inter-lake and
international routes. All the shipyards
were capable of retrofits and new builds
but some were more successful at
transitioning to steam than others.
Changes in design and technology put
pressure on shipyard owners and cashflow.
For smaller yards it was difficult to
meet demands for multiple types of
vessels for larger yards it was easy to
overextend oneself. In early 1861 the
carpenters and caulkers at various
shipyards formed themselves
into a union called the Welland Canal
Ship Carpenters and Caulkers
Association. Other unions with similar
names popped up around the Great Lakes
in places like Oswego, Hamilton
and Kingston. A number of issues combined
to force the workers first to unionize
in late 1864 early 1861 and then demand
change to their relationship with their
employer. First the shipyards were very
busy at the end of the at the end of
1860 and into early 1861 and additional
laborers were needed to complete the
work A large number of temporary
unskilled laborers were brought in to
help these temporary workers were paid
in cash. The regular skilled workforce
was paid using the truck payment system
where instead of monetary compensation
workers were paid with credit to company
owned stores and supply chains. Now this
wasn't permanent but often it was sort
of you know 2 or 3 months on company
credit and then maybe some cash payments
and they'd go back and forth. Very
unreliable payment system. The workers
were only to spend there their credit to
company owned stores and supply chains
and while some lived in company owned
workers cottages
who had their own household expenses
would need to borrow money from the
company or from another source and
eventually work to pay off the debt. And
it almost became a form of indentured
servitude. The 19th century truck payment
systems notoriously marked up prices
and often lacked in supply. So the first
demand was to be paid weekly in cash.  The
second demand as you can see from this
ad or from this newspaper is for the
Union men to have a pay raise from one
dollar fifty per day to one dollar
seventy per day it was obvious that
unskilled workers produced lower quality
work from skilled workers.
But since the unskilled workers worked
more quickly it gave the appearance that
they were producing more. However the
union complained that not only did the
carpenters and caulkers have to do their
own work but they were then also
responsible for fixing the mistakes and
training up these unskilled workers all
while being paid the same amount. So the
second demand was an increase in pay.
Third, because of the high number of
orders the yards took on and because of
the appearance that unskilled laborers
were faster workers even though their
mistakes set the companies
back significantly, some Union men were
overlooked or replaced by non-union men
and out-of-town unskilled workers. So the
third and likely the most significant
demand for the history of the
labor movement was first right to work
for union members. This is significant
because it's a huge step in union
organization in this period and really
the beginning of the idea of solidarity
joining union members together for a
common cause.I just want to pause here
and talk about the early labor movement
quickly the labor movement was very very
young in 1861. A mere 30 or so unions
existed in skilled labor trades such as
engineering printing and shoe making
across Canada.
Unions or associations rarely
included unskilled laborers unions or
associations in the early 19th century
were not
what we know them to be today. There was
no Union office,
rarely a collection of dues and 
communication was limited. The first
examples of organized work action of
this kind in Canada were the printing
strikes that rocked Toronto newspapers
including George Brown's the Globe. In
1853 and 1854 the entire union of
printers and typesetters walked out on
strike against all the newspapers for
trying to reduce wages and flooding the
offices with unskilled and child labor.
There are plenty of other examples of
organized work action including
shoemaker strike in 1859, the Cooper
strike in October of 1861 both
for increased wages yet these deals were
short-term and had to be renegotiated
often. Without laws and protections
available for unions and workers owners
were free to not only go back on their
agreements but also lock workers out and
higher higher in unskilled labor to keep
their shops open. Union solidarity was
increasingly important to making the
negotiated demands stick. Back to the
strike. So, in March 1861 the union
communicates their demands to the
shipyard owners. After the owners do not
accept their demands, the Union men go on
work action unfortunately the sources do
not specify what work action means but
ships were still being built it was
immediately clear that the unskilled
laborers could not keep up where the
union work action left gaps and so the
owners and the Union eventually
negotiated a back to work settlement and
continued to negotiate their demands
through April and May. Again it's unclear
what work action means but they use
the word strike in the newspaper they
use the word action in the newspaper so
it's obviously their back to work but
it's unclear what that what that exactly
they're doing and what they're not doing.
By early May it was widely suspected
that owners were stalling and
negotiating in bad faith so that their
current ship orders could be completed
and filled. There is no evidence but this
type of suspicion appeared in multiple
editorials in this
I'm frame I should also note that it was
unclear how coordinated the shipyard
owners were. It seems likely that they
were in communication with one another
about the strike but it's doubtful they
worked together in a strategic way. It's
more likely that one followed the lead
of another. At the beginning of June the
union could not come to agreement and
the owners began locking out the union
members. Since they were effectively no
laws protecting laborers or unions
owners were free to dismiss workers and
higher in other skilled workers and
unskilled labor from wherever
available. Owners like the Muir Brothers
took out ads attracting workers from
other yards in Hamilton and Kingston and
the union's followed suit calling for
solidarity amongst all workers on the
Great Lakes. Donaldson and Andrews in
Port Dalhousie and the Abbey Brothers in
Port Robinson locked out their workers
between June 1st and June 10th and the
Muir Brothers, Shickluna, and Simpson
locked out their workers sometime
between June 12th and June 15th. The
strike came to a
dramatic and fiery head when the Abby
Brother's yard in Port Robinson was
completely destroyed by fire. On June
13th in 1861 three members of the Union
were arrested
Gus Lennon Mike Kuchar and John
Durrington. They had been dismissed two
weeks prior from the yard for being
members of the Union. I have yet to
discover what happened to them after
they were convicted.
Despite some public support for the
Union the yards were able to continue
working at ship repairs and the strike
did not seem to have an overwhelming
impact on the operations of the yards in
Niagara. A few examples of work include:
the schooner SD Woodruff was sent to
Shicluna's yard for repairs in April of
1861; the Canada was launched by
Shickluna's yard on June 1st 1861 and that
kind of added to the suspicion that
maybe they're just negotiating until you
know the Canada is launched;
so they launched and then they lock them
out so the added to the suspicion. A
really interesting story: the first Maid
of the Mist was launched in June of 1861
and when the captain took the new
steamer through the whirlpool and the
rapids on the Niagara River it was sent
to Donaldson and Andrews shipyards in
Port Dalhousie for repairs during the
strike. Of course you'd need repairs after that
trip. And then finally John Charles
Rykert, the MP for St. Catharines
began facilitating talks between St. Catharines and Toronto for ferry
service between the cities. The ship that
was going to be the ferry was going to
be built in St. Catharines in the
autumn of 1861. It's likely that by the
end of the summer of 1861 workers were
back on the job on November 21st 1861
the strike was certainly over:  two men
members of the Union were seriously
injured in an accident at
Muir's shipyard in Port Dalhousie. Union
men had returned to work. so did they win?
The results of the strike are still
unclear however it appears the Union won
their demands. In 1863 the owners were
looking to reduce the pay of union
workers from 1.75 to 1.50 per day
suggesting that the Union had
accomplished their goal at least back in
1861. The workers at Muir Brothers were
on strike again briefly in October 1863
because that yard wanted to return to
the truck wage system. Again another clue
that the Union had won their initial
demands. Laws protecting laborers and
unions did not exist. While the Union men
were back on the job with a new pay rate,
being paid in cash and having the first
right to work, it would be a temporary,
tentative, and tenuous deal that would
have to be renegotiated again and again
until the labor movement in the 1880s
secured more rights for workers and
protecting unions.
The 1861 shipyard strike is significant
because it is an early example of
organized labor action which included
workers from across the industry. More
than one yard owner.
There are few other examples of
similar labor action from Canadian
history during this time. There is little
to no historical study of these events
and only a few primary source documents
like the many newspapers we've been
reading, that document or mention the
strike in any form. The majority of this
story is pieced together from newspapers
with many gaps so while my research
continues many significant questions
remain. Please wish me luck as I
continue on my research. While the story
of the strike is exciting on its own a
rare opportunity came along that would
give the story and my research a little
bit more relevance and urgency. I was
taking my time after all but like most I
work better with a deadline. In October
of last year the drama students at
Governor Simcoe Secondary School were
looking for a one-act play to produce. I
have been volunteering with governor
Simcoe's drama program for five or six
seasons now in my own
capacity and I thought that the strike
story would make a great piece of
theatre for the students, so off we went.
I finished up my research and shared it
with the students and they began writing
and workshopping a play. It was a very
rewarding experience and we were just
finished the writing workshopping stage
just before March break. We had planned
to come back after March break for
rehearsals but you know everybody the
rest is history I guess and so we had
hoped to present it around actually this
time perhaps last weekend or this
weekend but like so many other important
cultural events will have to wait for a
safer time. Thanks to technology however
the students and staff at Governor
Simcoe were able to put together a
virtual performance of the opening scene
of the play which I am very excited to
debut here on tonight's lecture. I would like to thank Rassika Risko
Christopher Pierce sorry and all
the amazing students at Simcoe Drama for
jumping into this project with both feet.
I'm so sad we weren't able to do it in
person but maybe someday soon. I'm
pleased to present you I'm pleased to
present to you the opening scene of
Strike: 1861, starring the amazing
dramatic arts students at Governor
Simcoe Secondary School. St. Catharines
February 1861. The foundations of our new
country are about to be laid. This isn't
the St. Catharines our grandparents knew.
Where opportunity awaited in the fields
of Niagara. The work is different now. The
work is harder now.  Life is harder now
we begin our story in St. Catharines at
the famous shipyard of Mr. Louis Shickluna.
The most successful yard in Niagara. Yet,
I'm not alone in the business we boast
five other yards on the canal. Muir
Brothers of Port Dalhousie
Mr. Simpson of St. Catharines. Mr.
Donaldson and Mr. Andrews of Port
Dalhousie
Together employ over 1,000 men. Who work hard
keeping their yards open. Who haven't
been paid. Who can't feed their families. Day after, day, after day. Ain't right. Ain't right. A'int right!
Their workers are tired. Their workers are hungry. Their workers are fed
up. Yet we face incredible pressure to
meet demand to build the finest ships on
the Great Lakes amidst rising costs with
a civil war about to erupt in the United
States. Pay us in cash. Our
workers need to be patient. Give us the work first.
Our workers need to be patient.
We want a raise. Workers need to be
patient.
We need more capital. We need to build
more ships. We need extra laborers to
help the tradesmen. We'll have to pay the laborers in cash. The tradesmen can stay on credit.
There's talk of a Union. An association! A union can't protect them.
It would be optimal if workers would
remain patient.
I asked for your patience. Will you please
be patient. Please be patient.
You'll be paid. Just remain patient. Patience! Ain't right! Concessions must be
made. Ain't right! If you still want jobs tomorrow. And
so here we stand with our two sides at
odds ready for a fight. Spoiling for a fight.
okay at this point I'm going to welcome - well first of all a round of applause
for the students at Governor Simcoe, some of whom are watching
tonight Ithink so yay - at this point I'm
going to welcome in Dr. Monk.
to stop sharing and I'm gonna bring
Kimberly in. Hello Dr. Monk. Let's see if
we can there we go - Hello - Hi, Adrian!
Thanks so much for joining us.
Oh well thank you for having me and it's
great to see everybody on the chat board
and Bel and Colin and others so thank
you for attending this evening talk.
Absolutely. That was great work by the way
Adrian, I love that. Thank you yes we were
the story is fascinating but also the
play the it's just such a great story
you know I was thinking it could be
anything right, absolutely! The fire
in particular grabs the fire at the
Abbey Brothers grabs people so it's a it
was a anyway someday hopefully we'll get
to present the play and and yeah so
everybody cross your fingers for that
someday we'll be back in theaters and
and that kind of thing. Okay let me
introduce you and then I'll hand it over
to you if that's that's all right okay
everyone please welcome Dr. Kimberly
Monl.
Dr. Monk is an adjunct professor in the
historical and marine archaeology at
Trent University and at Brock University.
Trained as a maritime historian and
underwater archaeologist - probably the
coolest thing you put on your business
card - Dr. Monk holds a PhD in maritime
archaeology from Bristol University;
a master's in maritime history and
nautical archaeology from East Carolina University; 
and bachelor's degree in anthropology
from Western. Dr. Monk's research
focuses on historical ship types,
shipbuilding, which is really interesting
for today's lecture of course, and both
naval and merchant shipping. .
Dr. Monk has directed over two dozen
underwater field projects across North
America, the Caribbean, and the UK. She's
currently leading archaeological
investigations of a 19th century
shipyard in St. Catharines in addition
to directing maritime research conducted
with the historical naval establishment
at Penetanguishene. So Dr. Monk I'm going
to turn it over to you you should be
able to share your your PowerPoint okay
and I will turn my camera off. I'll be here but it'll just be you.
Okay well let me know if you can see that. Yes can you put it into a presentation. I will yeah perfect.
I can see it hold on we are just there
we go.
Amazing all right okay all right well
the biggest fear I have this evening is
of course as one of my favorite subjects
going over time so I'm gonna pop the timer on
and try and keep to keep to a nice fine
timeline. So this evening's
presentatio n will be of course on our
research excavations at the Shickluna
Shipyard in Downtown St. Catharines
which have revealed the later industrial
history of this one thriving port town.
The shipyard was the largest on the
Canadian Great Lakes as Adrian's able
students demonstrated and placing that
in the forefront of all other yards. Tt
constructed sail and steam vessels from
1827 through 1891. The site and buildings
later repurposed and manufactured boxes
and baskets for the carriage of local
produce.
In 2019 a team of academics, field school
students, and volunteers and recovered over
4,000 industrial and domestic objects
largely dating to the late Victorian
and Edwardian occupation of the site.
Results from the first field season
highlight advantages of
multidisciplinary frameworks for
interpreting urban sites toward a
cohesive understanding of the historic
landscape. The site's location also
increased opportunities for public
archaeology raising much-needed
awareness of this forgotten space. The
presentation will present a selection of
project results and illustrates the
historical value of the site. So for
those who may be who may not be joining
us from St. Catharines, just a little
spatial recognition so of course in
St. Catharine situated between Lake
Ontario and Lake Erie along the second
the course of 12 Mill Creek and located
adjacent to the current Burgoyne Bridge
and basically downtown St. Catharines.
So when we start looking at the site one
would actually start to think that it's
a foreign landscape. I mean it looks like
a completely isolated abandoned plot in
downtown St. Catharines. Our VP of
Research at Brock had related as
being akin to walking on the moon. The of
course the span of the property and the
fact that there hasn't been development
perhaps is thanks to the City of St. Catharines, of course as you can see the
only two buildings on the site presently -
are the maintenance sheds and the
wonderful pink fire training tower that
you can very visibly see when you're
coming down on the 406 but other than
that you would forget that this was part
of a major industrial site and not only
just an industrial site but of course a
particular context of industrial site
whereby we understand a very unique
system within the industrial complex.
Shipyards were important and few
opportunities to study them exist simply
because of development or due to their
central location which meant that they
were often bulldozed in early
development or in dated as a result of
changing shorelines so this will be one
of the very first investigations and
preferably more complete excavations of
a shipyard.
There have been examinations previously
in the United States but certainly none
within Canada and none that had such a
recognizably important history so again
we are really taking on not only new
methodologies with regard to the
archeology itself but of course a really
a spectacular historical site. So but of
course it wasn't the only settlement of
the property and we have to remember
that over the course of history sites
were part of a larger historic landscape.
We have to examine the rivers and the
lakes and the arable lands and the
connections that they provided to
communities and why basically geography
plays such a critical role in
understanding human settlement. To
examine of course the location of the
Shickluna Shipyard along Twelve Mile Creek
in its interconnection of rivers of two
major lakes and the abundance of natural
resources that would have been available
through history.
So certainly while the site we are
focusing on is primarily what we can see
from the historic record, we recognize
and appreciate the earlier histories the
Indigenous histories and the earlier
Settler histories of the locations. So
just I've tried to begin at
timeline of sorts and it is a work in
progress I have a very capable
historical team who are working ahead to
assist us to fill in some of the gaps of
that history. Yes I'm looking at you
Bel and James, James Laird if he's out
there but part of this history is again
recognizing this historical environment
recognizing certainly that Indigenous
Peoples were the first settlers of this
area and certainly with the retreat of
the last ice-covered from Niagara around
fourteen thousand years ago the first
recorded humans entered Lake Ontario. The
Lake Ontario region arriving but 9,000
years ago when the environment trends
was transitioning from a spruce to a
pine forest as a result of the changing
climate.
While few paleo-indian sites have been
identified and part due to their
location along shorelines which are now
submerged, I'm confident that with
commitment by various Ontario agencies
we will better understand this important
history and better understand the human
landscape prior to European settlement.
Certainly archaeological evidence
indicates existence of neutral Indian
villages in the Niagara region from at
least the 14th century. Certainly the
abundance of resources as previously
mentioned for fishing hunting and
agriculture and its locations at the
crossroads of north-south and east-west
trade networks resulted in settlement
expansion across the peninsula. Certainly
the Iroquois Trail located beneath
regional Road 81 - St. Paul - serving as one
of those key connections for indigenous
peoples. So we have more to do to try and
reconstruct this early period but it's
certainly important to us as part of the
larger understanding of this environment.
From settler communities we start to
reconstruct some of the individual and
the individuals who owned or leased the
property. John Hainor who was one of the
Butler Rangers Butler's Rangers who
returned from the War of American
Independence and had bought the property
in order so that he had area for farming.
There is some
question as to whether George Adams was
the owner and again these are some of
the more particular details that we're
trying to reconstruct. Who owned what
part of the property and when. But again
we do know that there were a number of
settlers on the property certainly prior
to its use later as a shipyard. Of course
the first ship only to arrive at the art
was Russell Arlington and we know that
he had at least leased in the property
from as early as 1828 and through to his
death in 1837. And of course having
launched a number of ships from the site
at that time contemporary of Russell
Arlington was the Hayward distillery. And
we have recently encountered a number of
documents relating to where that was on
site so we have another side project
potentially in the future to look at
certainly not shipbuilding related but
certainly regarding the industrial
constructs within the site perimeter. A nd
of course the eponymous Louis Shickluna
who from 1837 until 1880 would
settle the property and of course when
on to build and rebuild and numerous a
number of vessels. We'll talk a little
bit more about him in a few minutes of
course. Unfortunately Louis Shickluna's
passing in 1880 resulted in his son
Joseph Shickluna taking over the
property and going on to continue with
shipbuilding, constructing a total of
about seven propellers and tugs over his
period at the yard. Many of them were
iron framed wood plank essentially
meaning composite built ships and
ultimately as iron predominated we see
the landscape of the shipyard change and
illustrated by the increased number of
chimneys for forges and furnaces
certainly by unfortunately 1891 Shickluna
was out of the shipbuilding business. I
found a few references however to him
doing some buildings to constructing it
a number of houses in places such as
Port Colborne, so again we have a little
bit more to dig up on Joseph and what
happened to 
him but in any case he he left the
business leased the property to the St. Catharines  box and basket company who
were engaged in supporting the
construction of containers for the
agricultural industries fruit and veg
veggies essentially from 1891 until 1901
at which point the business moves
locations and essentially from what we
see or from what the record suggests the
site was abandoned. Now I have some lots
of lots of questions about this of
course we we know that it was there was
no other occupant official occupant on
the site but we can't really say it was
abandoned. I say D D and D because it was
basically demolition because most of the
buildings we know were raised at that
point and ultimately there was some
development because by 1915 of course
we see the new Burgoyne bridge and of
course looking at a further dumping at
the site as a result of our
archaeological fieldwork
last summer we it's certainly plausible
that the site was used as a dumping
location and which would explain some of
the materials we were finding in one of
our excavation areas along the creek. So
whether the site was abandoned or just
repurposed for a number of other
processes and applications I think we
still have a quite a lot to fill in this
period but this evening you'll see quite
a few of the objects from the site that
characterized this period and which are
quite exciting. They did do tell us a
great deal about Edwardian and late
Victorian Edwardian St. Catharines so
again we'll get to that in a bit of
course. By 1932, well by the 1930s, the
descendants of the
Shickluna family sold the site to the
City of St. Catharines.and the ship
basin was actually filled in shortly
thereafter. Of course the site was later
used by the Sea Cadets and we've got
some great imagery of the Sea Cadets
practicing a number of drills on the
property from the 1840s. We also of
course, I remember in my early days
visiting the site where there was a
small trailer not positioned on the site
as one of the Sea Cadet buildings but at
least certainly by the 1950s the city is
building modern modern infrastructure on
site including maintenance sheds and by
1974 the wonderful pink fire-training
tower. Certainly by the you know by the
2000s we then see of course the new
Burgoyne bridge constructed and it was
actually with the new Burgoyne bridge
development in 2014, the explanation for
the bridge footings revealing a
significant amount of historic material
and it was the impact from the
construction that led me to resume my
work at the shipyard and to seek funding
from SSHRC to enable the excavation of
this nationally significant site. So of
course we have to have a visit from our
dear ship builder and just a brief
biography for those who haven't caught
the previous lectures by me.
Certainly Shickluna was born in Malta in 1808
and and later emigrated to Canada  in the
1820s working in Quebec in New York
before settling in the Niagara region. He
first developed his skills as carpenter
under his father at Valletta
constructing ships for the rural Navy
during the Napoleonic Wars. After working
in the Atlantic trades for a short time
he later took jobs at shipyards building
sailing and steam ships and later boats
for the Erie Canal. He then served as an
apprentice to Youngstown New York a ship
builder where he was trained in drafting
before receiving invitation by local
businessmen Henry Mittleberger and
William Hamilton Merritt  to set up his own
shipyard in St. Catharines in 1837 with
the passing Russell Armington of course the
property on Twelve Mile Creek would
become a key location
was was already a key location on the
First Welland Canal and positioning 30
year-old Louie to situate his skill and
enterprise and support shipping and
trade over the next 40 years. Shickluna
was an innovative and industrious
businessman. He was a ship build or ship
owner. city councilor. philanthropist and importantly a citizen of St. Catharines. He was admired appreciated
for his skill and goodwill and was
frequently mentioned in contemporary
papers and other representations
highlighting his historical importance
to Canada. It's that legacy which we are
trying to capture with this project and
which makes this study ever more
important. The archaeology of course is a
testament to the man and his business
and and what he contributed to Canada. Of
course he's credited with building over
a hundred and fifty ships and infusing
nearly two hundred million dollars into
the Canadian economy.  Demand for skilled
into a workforce at the yard of up to
sixty men per job and the establishment
of drydock and the our yards height
between 1846 and 1877 where he was
launching between five and seven ships
per year. I n this very now quite famous I
suppose for the Shickluna Shipyard 1864
photo
you know we with the amount of time that
we have for this evening's presentation
this really captures the breath of his
shipbuilding certainly in his heyday.
With four ships under construction in
the yard the Perseverance a propeller
which would have been launched on July 6
1864. She was built for the grain trade
unfortunately she was lost by fire in
New York in 1868, so she didn't have much
fun, she didn't have a great long career
but in any case her role within the bulk
cargo trade was was critical. The
Enterprise which is so sorry the
Perseverance is the vessel to at the
back behind the building. The enterprise
in front of the building on the Left
hand-side
and this propeller of course again was
had an incredibly long career having
been launched in 1864 and having
continued in service of the bulk trades
until 1917 she had been later renamed
the Norseman and ultimately had
performed a great service over that
duration. So again some of these ships
having a very very short career very
short and sometimes quite fiery career
and others have been quite successful
lengthy and quite ambitious careers. So
the another vessel here the Samson over
to the right which also unfortunately
was taken by fire in 1894 when she was
docked at the Sault but she as a tug of
course would have been critical in the
rolls all along the canals and and
further afield towing vessels aid coming
to the aid of vessels and eventually in
the later period chunks were of course
used to tow a line of up to five or six
canallers making them more of an
economic value rather than paying men to
sail them by towing them with one steam
ship or a propeller you were able to get
a lot more shall we say bang for your
buck. So ultimately in the foreground we
see the Valletta. A beautiful and very
typical canaller of the period sailing
canal over the period. The sparking team
was unleashed on the Chicago trade and
would be carrying anything from grain to
corn. Unfortunately docked at the port of
Chicago in 1871 she again succumbing to
fire has a result of the Great Fire of
Chicago. S o I mean we're looking at a
number of ships here in the foreground
under varying stages of construction and
it really gives you a sense of the
activity and the encouragement to study
a site like this with the number of
ships and the nmber a number of
industrial activity going on on the site
we are
minded of just how important and how
valued it was to St. Catharines and to
Canada during the 19th century.
So archaeology of historic shipyard what
we know is that what we are going to
find evidence for are any one of these
types of buildings of course we are
working on two of those right now. The
boat manufacturing which produced these
small boats and related equipment and of
course the laborers houses to the south
of the main shipbuilding complex where
Shickluna housed a number of his
workers. So this is why we are so excited
there is an expanse of structural
evidence for the shipyard itself and
then of course to document the process
of shipbuilding is part and parcel of
what we will be doing. So what happened
in 2019.
Of course we with are very capable crew
you'll see in a moment managed to
excavate a large three large sections of
the site and encountering 4,000
artifacts from household to domestic
material to building materials
industrial materials again such a range
of refuse and critical to our
understanding of certainly the later
period the shipyard but also of the
later settlement of the site. Of course
we managed to do this in 22 days. The actual field work took place between
July 15th and August 18th
but between wind and weather days and
other requirements for our field school
or historical archaeology
field school we managed 22 full days on
site. The actual combination of hand and
mechanical excavation was undertaken to
a maximum death of between 60 and 80
centimeters which was achieved across
all three areas so that was quite an
accomplishment in such a short period of
time and we had very 15 very brave crew
members all
which receive extra gold stars for their
hard work and especially in the early
days of working on the operation area
one which was rather a bit of a mud pit - welcome to archaeology - and and of course
in the heat and the quick disassembling
of the site when we saw storms coming
again they were an amazing field crew. By
the way I wanted to point out here we
are using the wonders of Colleen Beard's
who is librarian emeritus at Brock our
SHRRC co-applicant and very much map with
using her maps to to visualize this and
I recommend looking at the URL situated
below field crew if you'd like to see
more and layer different periods across
the site. It's a great map program and
again we'll be using it more effectively
in future as we progress. So this was our
very able and active crowd or at least
some of them for the project and for the
duration of the project. Of course we
were running it as a field school all
the while also providing an opportunity
for community archaeology, to involve
members of the public who had previously
had archaeological training with our
dig. Again we had so many different
layers to the project from our original
launch with the shovel ceremony to our
open days which allowed public to come
and visit us. It was it was a whirlwind
it really was but it was exciting and we
accomplished so much so for you out
there
my my my weary crew, or perhaps me were
rested now, thank you because we this
project wouldn't have happened without
you. So of course - a few snapshots of the
actual dig and then we're gonna go into
talk about certainly some of the
materials from the site. Excavation work
of course at OA3, up in the upper
left corner are
which is of course boathouse which I
should mention, we can see intact
structural posts along the line which
again really bode well for preservation
for this site and as you'll see from one
of the objects impresses upon us the
potential of conservation on this plot
of land. OA1 which were the
laborers dwellings up in your upper right
hand picture up in the upper right hand
corner and again providing again an
opportunity to have an examination of
one of the houses at least that were
situated on the property. Amazing crews
screening away fines and helping to make
sense of the piles and piles of dirt and
of course our wonderful crews both from
the library, the volunteers from the
library, and our research assistants who
aided us to process the finds. Again an
exceptional team all who work together
to make this a reality. Of course when we
look at historical archaeology it's not
just about the artifacts. The value of
historical archaeology is that we use a
range of sources documentary sources,
historic maps, ships plans, individual
biographies, company records when they
are available, to more fully reconstruct
how shipbuilding and shipping impact the
local historic landscape. Unfortunately
there are few records regarding the
shipyard regarding the business affairs
at the shipyard. We've been fortunate to
have access thanks to the st. Catharines
Museum, to this James Norris
papers which have provided at least some
information about the shipyard and some
of the receipts from the shipyard that
were held within the accounts for
James Norris. Also the National
Archives of Canada holds a number of
documents relating to construction of
Defence ships such as gunboat such as a
gunboat that Shickluna was
commissioned to build. So there are
wealth of resources that we have
and of course we're reading landscapes
were reading objects and they themselves
are helping us to better understand the
complex of the  site and site area. Of
course an important aspect of what we
are doing is connecting. We are
connecting what we find in St.
Catharines on a global scale. So for
example the upper left-hand picture
shows the elder works at Cobridge
Stoke-on-Trent which housed Henry Alcock
a Potter there from 1861 to 1910. And
when of course these potters were
sending their goods off to
the other end of the world they were
shipping them off on to canal boats
which would make their way up the Trent
-Mersey to ports such as Liverpool where
then they would be shipped on
ocean-going vessels to places such as
either Montreal or Kingston where they
would then be sent aboard a canal ship
especially if they were transiting the
Welland Canal and ultimately ships such
as Shickluna's propeller, propeller America
was one such ship on that run
transporting earthenware in its cargo
during the 1860s. And then of course for
the benefits of the local occupants or
the local citizens of St. Catharines
particular wares that would appeal to
their interest in ceramic
patterns or in this particular case of
course various subject material
relating to of course - oh it's use in as
a -  I've just forgotten the name can you
imagine that - ah well let's just say for
an evening your evening duties anyway so
let's leave it at that. Kimberly - do you mean Chamber Pot?
Thank you that name just escaped me. Thank
you thank you thank you and then of
course from chamber pot, 
to archaeological artifacts from which
of course is
that's part of it. I say that as an
archaeologist of course but again we see
this these objects and we have to
consider the larger spans of their
histories and where they come from and
how they've gotten to where they are. So
of course when we look at some of the
early period of material that we located
on site we come across a number of
different patterns and including Thomas
Furnival who operated a pottery in Cobridge between 1851 and 1967 he like
many others would eventually be
succeeded by Wedgwood later on and
ultimately this particular pattern was
quite interesting it stumped me for
quite some time I actually reached out
to the potteries if anyone wants to look
at potteries and all the different
prints I would recommend you go and
visit the potteries.org in fact you will
see this particular piece on their on
their website. So we were famous of
course it presents an opportunity to
share our information with them and and
again they've assisted us with a couple
of identifications. W e look to different
types of transfer prints as a
representative of particular choices and
tastes of the period and the scenic
vignette in the upper right hand corner
which again dates to approximately 1832
to 1847 and then located down
located at Operational Area 1 by
actually none other than Allen
was this lovely piece of blue edge where
it gained dating between 1847 and 1884.
So we've got a real expanse of 
Victoriana on the site and again a few
other objects which I'll show you here
we found three patterns from the Meakin
potteries from both Alfred and his
brothers James E Meakin which again
provide us an opportunity to look at
this particular pattern.
It's seen over time preferences for
patterns by a particular pottery and
their export trade. It becomes an
important part of our understanding of
material and preferences within
Victorian St. Catharines and certainly
the later Edwardian period. Certainly
we're looking also at the nature of
production, distribution, consumption when
we're looking at materials so for
example wooden sons who produced a
number of patterns for the firm of
Gowans, Kent & Company a wholesale
distributor in Toronto manufactured for
a lot of the hotels and shipping lines
within the Great Lakes. So he really had
a period where he flourished doing so
where the ceramic would be sent over to
him they they would put the individual
stamp for the specific line or hotel and
then they would export that to the
specific location. Again this particular
piece that we found in Operation Area 3
done by the boathouse was of course a
fantastic day I remember that and and
ultimately indicates some of the
clientele where some of these ceramics
were employed. And of course how can we
forget about that old boot? One of the
terrific finds of last year was of
course this really remarkably preserved
lace-up either a youth or a lady's lace
up boot manufactured by Goodyear. It
dates circa
1898 but more importantly it illustrates
the preservation on site and the
potential for any uncovering other key
organic materials you know a few of you
are waiting on a particular ship so this
in itself bodes very well for the
preservation of timbers and other
organics. And again it also stresses some
of the tastes some of the uses in terms
of fashion and clothing within St. Catharines
in that period. The wonderful
branding of Goodyear, we're very
fortunate and we're very recognizable
from its website. Of course everybody
loves it before and after. Come on. So a
few of the finds that I've done a sort
of before-and-after for the first was a
porcelain oyster plate that was produced
in Austria by a company called  Merkelsgrun and stamped with
this green clover. The clover back stamp
was used between 1912 and 1918 so we
had a really fine
timeline for this piece of ceramic. Again
what of course not only does it tell us
about this what the preferences were in
the ceramics but of course what they
were eating.
So the wonders we did find number shells
on-site mussel shells and an oyster
shell so again we get an idea of the
diet of the occupants certainly within
but the laborers, labourers houses but
also perhaps within the shipyard context.
The second image of course is a
wonderful Ponds Cream milk glass
container. And of course Ponds was
developed as a product as a company in
the US in 1846 and became the world
for a skincare brand. Of course the
importance of the Ponds cream was that it
didn't require refrigeration which
helped also of course to enable the
beauty of St. Catharines ladies to
retain their great softness and
femininity as we start to see their
changing roles during the Edwardian
period and of course you can still buy
ponds today which you know it's always a
bit amusing when the same product that
you found on your archaeological site is
still in circulation. And of course the
next piece here is a example of
depression ware. So depression ware
essentially was a blasted - you know with
basically - glass that was cheaply
produced but companies such as Anchor
Hocking which produced this
in the Mayfair pattern and as an open
basically handled serving bowl were
important because they allow those who
were suffering through the depression to
still have beautiful ware. They would be
able to reach out to different sections
of the community and still be no more
than a cost of a loaf of bread about a
nickel and it would be a cheerful
reminder that you know things were not
always perhaps so bad if you could serve
in such a beautiful bowl. So I think
these were a few of the objects that we
were able to ascertain specifics on
there were of course many others which
tell us the story of Edwardian
medicine cabinet so for example Kruschen
salt containers which were mixture salts
and citric acid used for a digestive
cleanser. Mentholatum actually which the
company is just in Fort Erie and settled
in about 1905 down there but mentholatum
was of course used as any number of ways
to improve health. Again applied and for
first aid and so forth and so on and of
course one of the very cool objects that
we did find was this shaving cream tube
and it was still rolled up. So again it's
not only showing the process of what we
do when we're actually maybe trying to
get the toothpaste out of the toothpaste
roll but again also shows a very early
product by Rexall drugs. Again this would
have been probably in around 1905-1910
but again demonstrates the wide reach of
Rexel when the Union and United
drugstores basically became cooperative
and helped to produce a mass manufacture
different products. So very quickly run
through those objects but again a real
taste of what's to come and they are
certainly only
fragment of the material that I'm
working through. Of course what are we
doing as we move forward? At Shicluna Shipyard we will continue of course
in Operation Areas 1, 2, and 3 and
hopefully be able to extend those areas
with permission of the City. We do plan
to look at the Twelve through both
underwater and terrestrial
archaeological approaches. Again much of
the relics of the shipyard and of course
of the use of the Twelve will be vital
to telling the story of this important
River and its use during the industrial
period. And of course we're going to be
looking at the Shickluna drydock
which again through geophysics and
hopefully later test excavation we can
open up a little bit more information
about the construction of the dry dock
and about Shickluna's complex there.
This summer we're working towards
completing our Welland Canal registers
I'm taking volunteers so anybody who
wants to do a little transcription you
are very welcome to join us. They are the
most value one of the most valuable
pieces of information about the Welland Canals
telling us about the goings and
comings of ships but the cargoes where
they're from and where they're bound.
It's a it's an exciting and you know
history is not boring to me so clearly
I'm a willing subject but oops sorry see
I got so excited there - but these really
are they tell so much about
St. Catharines history and of course Lock
Three just located in the lower right
hand corner is where these remarks were
taken from. And a little sort of canaller
doodles up in the upper right-hand
corner that was held in one of the
registered books again it's a it's a
wonderful record that will complement
our work. And of course we are running an
online program so we have taken our
field school and again compacted it into
an online form. So you those who took our
field schools some of them
actually joining us again on this course
and what they will get from it will be
more on the background to the
archaeological legacies of Niagara. Not
only the methods but also more on the
historical source material, built
heritage methods, and other aspects of
the environment, and material culture.
It's exciting, it can be done at home, we
are still taking student,s so sign up
folks. Let me know if you have any issues
but we can try and get you sorted and
introduce you to our fabulous University
Department administrative assistant
 who will get you aboard in
record record time I'm hoping. So of
course this work is never done alone it
takes a cadre of many many people, many
committed individuals so again call out
to those of you who've joined us this
evening and of course to those here on
the list we had great support from Brock
University and also from our community
sponsors who again made this happen.
Our grant funds alone could not have
supported the work. We definitely need
community support for this project for
it to continue. So thank you to everybody
who actually made that made last summer
happen. My only regret is of course we're
not out there this year but it will
happen again I promise you. So if you
would like to learn more about the
project please we are going to relaunch
the website I promise you by the end of
August and it will have all sorts of
blogs from last year's field cores and
images our timelines will be a bit more
worked out. Of course we have a Facebook
page Archeology of a 19th Century
Shipyard and our Instagram account and
of course if you would in fact like to
volunteer
contact me at shipyard@brocku.ca or of
course reach out on and Twitter. So that
is me done and a little over time.
Thank you Dr.Monk.
I'm so glad that I was muted
because there were so many enjoyable
stories and and the anecdotes that I was
laughing. I could talk on and on and
on and it was really difficult to choose
what artifacts to share but hopefully
that gave a sense of a few of these sort
of interesting ones. Yeah absolutely!
I'm just going to try and oh can you can
just press stop sharing oh yeah I sure can
[technical difficulties]
We'll leave it like this so while we
just there are some questions coming in
and I'm going to I'm going to give them
some more time because there's a bit of
a lag to ask some questions. So folks so
go ahead and ask your questions
and I'm going to just quickly do a
little bit of a wrap-up and Kimberly I
found a really fun newspaper article you
will really enjoy so as a teaser
everybody stick around because there's
there's a funny story about poor Louis Shickluna
that I want to share from 1863.
Yeah okay so thank you very much for
everyone for attending tonight's lecture.
If you have any questions about
tonight's lecture you can post them in
the comments. As I mentioned I'm just
gonna try [technical difficulties]
lectures coming up in the next three
weeks:
Dr. Keri Cronin will be here to
talk about her talk Racetracks and Runaway
Carriages: Life with Horses in
19th  Century St. Catharines and that's
going to be very enjoyable and then
we'll have myself I'll be back to talk
about Lost and Historic Architecture in
St. Catharines and then and that's one
June 23rd and then on June 30th
Kathleen Powell will be back to, our
curator, to talk about the city's
memorials and title with her talk
entitled Holding the Torch High
Remembering War in St. Catharines. we've
had a lot of significant war
anniversaries recently so that will be a
really interesting discussion of some of
the memorials in the city. And then after
that again we're going to take a bit of
a break from the lecture series it's a
lot of work as I'm sure you appreciate
and understand but don't worry we'll be
back in the fall with more great topics
and some special guests so please stay
tuned for our social media channels for
more information and maybe we'll be back
again with Dr. Monk after after your
summer course you might have more to
report. I know you're not out digging but
you might have more research to report
so we'll have to have you back to give
us an update. Good
and then also ladies and gentlemen don't
forget our two podcasts Museum Chat Live!
and One Hour in the Past. You can catch
our podcast on iTunes, SoundCloud, Spotify,
and Google Podcasts and in fact a new
episode of One Hour in the Past will be
out this Friday. It's about the Family
Compact so that is a very interesting
political discussion of Kathleen and I's
research that we only have one hour to
complete our research so that's a lot of
fun. I'd also like to remind everyone to
give us a like and a follow
and and also like and follow to all Dr. Monk's
social media as well so we're on
Facebook at St. Catharines Museum and
then also on Twitter and Instagram at
STC museum and of course most of our
material lives on our blog at stcatharinesmuseumblog.com. I'm
just waiting for a few more
questions hopefully but I wanted to
share this really neat anecdote with you
because during my research in the strike
for the strike material I came across
this newspaper article from 1863 from
the Evening Journal in 1863 it is
October 1863 so here's what it reads:
Accident: we are sorry to learn that Mr. Louis Shickluna, the eminent ship builder,
was thrown out of his buggy last evening
near the cemetery on his return from
Niagara -  have you heard this one before
okay -  I'll finish reading it for
everybody where he had been to purchase
timber for the new steamer he is going
to build for Captain Molloy and
sustained some serious but not fatal
 injuries. His face inside were
bruised but not his but not no bones
were broken. And so my question for you
is did was it actually being was the
ship actually being built for Captain
Molloy and do we maybe know could we
sort of guess probably I could probably
look into our our database on Shickluna's
ships and and and ascertain that fairly
soon but not immediately not tonight
unfortunately that's okay but in my head
it's interesting is that picture of the
shipyard that we were talking that's
1864 is that correct if yeah so it's
possible October 1863 maybe he was
bringing some wood back for one of those
ships that was in the shipyard that
would be so cool.
Very very very possible. I like to
imagine him to as a sort of a hands-on
kind of guy a lot of the... he's in that
picture I forgot to point out he's in
that picture by the way. Oh is he really
yeah he's on the
standing on the deck of the Samson.
I have that picture my side - yeah it's such a yeah
there you go there you go so he is right
up here right up in the bow sorry the
image the image of the Samson the tug
which is on the far right okay let me
see right this right there
yep that's the one yeah yeah so he's up
there.
That's incredible. Checking, checking the
workmanship making sure that you know
fair pay, I, it's hard to it's
hard to reconcile that sort of the the
you know capitalist of the time period
he wasn't like that at all from every
description that we have about him he
wasn't sort of a hard-line capitalist or
anything like that and so it's really
hard to reconcile the okay it's really
hard to reconcile the you know that sort
of evil mustache twirling capitalist
with the the man who fell off his wagon
on his way back from Niagara on the Lake. Poor Mr. Shickluna.
I get the idea he was very fair but you know he
also knew the value and craftsmanship
that he was putting out and actually in
the in the correspondence that I'd
mentioned earlier that's held at the
National Archives in which they are
trying to bargain the the government is
trying to bargain with him to build a
gunboat and they're not having any of it.
They think well so so down you know down
the river can build it for so you know
so much cheaper so yeah anyways
ultimately I think they did go with him
but it was not without some terse letter
writing between Shickluna and the
government because he actually had if
they had to sort of meet a particular
deadline he had to avail himself the
materials and the men and he needed to
set that in schedule so and I mean he
was a success right most successful
shipyard on the Great Lakes in the time
so of course he was a you know he's
gonna do what he's got do.
That's hilarious - I could just again I
could just imagine some of these
personalities we do have a couple
questions: okay so James asks the
artifact share today were mostly China
ware, can you give us a sense about
other categories of items you recovered.
So as I mentioned earlier we did find of
course industrial materials build bricks
and nails - oh my god the nails- of course
we found other other materials that
would have been used for equestrian use
so we found some leather bridlery
among the finds in OA3 and we
found a lovely figurine again which was
exported from Germany again
demonstrating these wonderful global
connections and this little figurine
dating to about 1900 would have been on
the counter of a you know refined lady.
Used as a pincushion or as a tea cosy.
We found a thermometer, a mercury
thermometer, I'm always amazed the glass
survives
you know when it's sort of thrown into a
pit with all sorts of other things but
but three-quarters of this mercury
thermometer produced by the Factney
company down I think is in New
York, Watertown, New York, anyway so that
again was among the finds. TAons again of
course ceramic made up a huge quantity
of the assemblage but we found glassware
found at Niagara - oh what is it -  the
Niagara Soda Company -  I think anyways
again other types of bottle we're Vicks
vapor rub, so a 1920s Vicks vapo-rub
salve and yeah I think I made a mention
on our Facebook site early in the
pandemic about of course the use of
these in with the Spanish pandemic and
how they really they sold out because
everybody was putting it on them hope
it would stay the virus. Oh gosh what
else for 4000 worth 4,000 artifacts I
mean it just the list goes on but again
the between the organics we found coins
we found some cutlery but from a later
period probably 1930s-1940s, of course we
found just a lot of refuse. They've
been dumping on the site for years and
with that comes a lot of mixed context
material. Fertilizer pellets on OA1 in the
laborers houses which
first looked and it really did look like
glass beads and so there's some excitement felt - oh, fertilizer beads.
and it was I mean just the 
quantity of finds and the diversity of
finds and the different patterns of
ceramic again it's really it was
exciting. I didn't expect it to be quite
so quite so in our first season because
it takes time to obviously get to depth
and - of course excavate the material
that would have been corresponding or
contemporaneous with the find. I'm glad you did
mention in your talk to that the leather
boot sort of gives you as a
archaeologist a good sign about that
maybe the crossing fingers the condition
of the hull that maybe you know what is
it is it 20 feet down or so - Probably
probably yes that's so everybody cross
your fingers then yeah exactly across
your fingers indeed that's so
interesting to like think about organic
material that way and so that's that's
really cool. Now well I've had it just a
quick question and I think that's about
in we're gonna wrap up unless you have
anything else but my one question about
what you were talking about with the
garbage was or sorry refuse or whatever
the technical term is - does it take a lot
of detective work to you know tell
what's garbage and tell what's artifact
like how much sifting and processing do
you have to do to determine what's
artifact and what's garbage. Well you know some
people call it garbology
the study of garbology that yesterday's
rubbish is today's you know you know
valuable find but you know of course
when we speak about the historic period
you know for me there's a line and and
well obviously our contemporary
histories at contemporary archaeology is
valuable area of study certainly many of
my colleagues are involved in it usually
because of certain types of production
the materials and the actual patterns we
can generally tell fairly quickly if
it's more historic of course or a more
contemporary type pattern but inevitably
we have mixed context when we do this
type of work and we're going to come
across the McDonald straw in combination
with an 1840s ceramic shard so it's the
it's the nature of environments and the
nature of how sediment how how
landscapes change over time. So we really
wear a lot of hats as an archaeologist.
You do need to know the modern period. I
spent a lot of winter actually
researching everything from GM and Ford
signs to other plastic objects that we
found on site that again date to a much
later period but we're introduced in
dumping on site. So yeah it takes time
you know as if you're a detective you
have to look at the historical materials
you have to look at the materials
themselves and of course there's a lot
of web research involved unfortunately
we live in the age of the World Wide Web
and and you know we have access to
contacting companies to find out about
the materials that may have been lost. So
it's um it's extraordinary historical
archaeology is a you know fascinating
area and hopefully I can introduce a few
other people to it over a summer course.
All of the information on our panels and
I'll send out the information in the in
the next email up to the lecture folks
as well. Thank you so so so much that was
a fascinating talk
best of luck this summer with the course
thank you yeah all the best thank you
very much everyone for tuning in and
we'll see you next for our next chat.
Thanks very much everybody, bye! Bye!
