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Title
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Cultural Resources in the Pickwick Reservoir
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Date
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1995
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Bibliographic Citation
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Meyer, Catherine C. (editor). 1995. Cultural Resources in the Pickwick Reservoir. Report submitted to Tennessee Valley Authority. University of Alabama, Alabama Museum of Natural History, Moundville.
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annotates
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• Multiyear project (1986-87, 1990, excavations 1980s-1990s), comprehensive archaeological inventory of the TVA-managed Pickwick Reservoir area (AL, MS, TN), assessing 832 archaeological sites through field survey (1986–1990), testing and excavations (particularly of cave sites), archival research, and collections analysis.
o Of these sites, 160 were determined NRHP-eligible, 25 potentially eligible, 344 undetermined (123 of which are inundated), and 303 not eligible.
o Major regional components include the Seven Mile Island Archaeological District, Dust Cave, Smith Bottom Cave, Kogers Island, and Archaic shell midden sites.
o Project included reexamination of the WPA-era archaeological assemblages.
• No tribal affiliations or ancestry are assigned to any components.
o The Mississippian Kogers Island Phase is thoroughly described in terms of mortuary patterns, copper and shell artifacts, and mound architecture, but not culturally linked to descendant communities.
o No identification of combed or other specified Choctaw ceramics, but shell tempered types are identified in assemblages.
• “Site 1CT189 is a large lithic scatter site having potential for subsurface features.”
o The site is reported to have Middle and Late Archaic and Mississippian components. However, it may be located in the vicinity of the late eighteenth-century trading town of Coldwater, established in 1770. Coldwater was occupied by French traders as well as Mvskoke, Cherokee, and Choctaw. “The town was burned in 1787 by James Robertson and a militia raiding party.” (Meyer et al. 1995:161).
• The report follows a conventional CRM format rooted in cultural history and processualist archaeology, with strong emphasis on typologies, settlement models, and artifact-based culture-historical sequences.
• Discussion of Indigenous perspectives, tribal identities, or descendant community engagement is absent throughout, as would be expected for this time.
• “Unknown Aboriginal” is a frequently used classification, reflecting both interpretive caution and a broader pattern of Indigenous erasure in TVA-era salvage archaeology. The ASSF perpetuates this phrase and should be revised to align with current frameworks.
• While the authors acknowledge the long-term complexity and occupation of the region, there is little engagement with Native persistence or survivance past 1500 CE.
o No mention of 19th-century removal, land cessions, or treaties despite the presence of historical sites, trenches, and structures dating to that era.
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owner
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sprice@wiregrassarchaeology.com