Ball State students will soon have the chance to survey a 900-acre plot of Blackford County land in return for hands-on experience in the field of anthropology.
University archaeologist Christine Keller said that a grant from the Division of Historic Preservation and Archeology of Indiana, part of the Division of Natural Resources, will provide the funds for the survey.
Blackford County was chosen because it's on a list of invaded efficient counties, which means it has a lower than normal number of archaeology sites, Keller said.
"That could be for a number of reasons, it could be that maybe there aren't that many archeological sites that are prehistoric, it could mean that there haven't been that many surveys there," she said. "In Blackford County, that's probably part of it, there's not many big towns there, you wouldn't have a lot of archeological surveys done because of highway building or federal money being spent."
The point of the survey is to discover different artifacts and analyze them for a report presented to the state of Indiana upon its completion, she said.
"An archeological site can be one stone artifact, one single flake, or it could be a huge historic farmstead," she said. "The students do all of it under the supervision of the archeologist in the applied archeology lab, which is in the department of anthropology."
The team will be specifically surveying areas in Blackford County close to creeks and will also include a ghost town called Bowser Station. These sites may yield more artifacts because people living there prehistorically might have lived closer to water sources out of necessity.
"When we pick up some spear points or arrowheads, we can tie that to the cultural time period so we can see tie those to particular time periods so then we can kind of see when people were living in what areas," Keller said. "You can kind of do that with ground stone tools, so we might able to learn more about when people were living there."
This isn't the first time Ball State has been awarded a grant to survey areas in Blackford County. Previously areas were surveyed in the southern part of the county around the Big and Little Lick's creeks.
This year Ball State was awarded two grants, one for Blackford County and another that will take place in Hamilton County.
"Hamilton County is a little bit different, we're surveying 600 acres and then we're also doing phosphate testing," she said. "We're tickled to get two this year, that's for sure."
Overall, these surveys have been successful in part to the hard work of the students involved, but also by the hospitality of the residents in Blackford Country, Keller said.
"One of the big things is the enthusiasm and the interest of the community in Blackford County has just been phenomenal," Keller said. "It's fun to go in an area where people are interested in what you're doing and they really want to learn. We appreciate all their help."
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