Hello everyone, For the past week we have gone to the Barrow Arctic Research Center (BARC) to work in the Ukpeaġvik Iñupiat Corporation (UIC) archeology lab run by Dr. Anne Jensens (UIC Senior Scientist). We were each given samples (midden) from the Utqiagvik complex of mounds located in the city of Barrow. The samples were collected in 1981 and have remained frozen ever since. The sample I was given first needed to be thawed and then washed in a warm bath of dawn dish washing soap to help loosen the soil and wash away some of the seal oil that had coagulated the material together.
After washing the sample, I began to separate the material into similar pieces such as drift wood, grass, hair, feathers, and fish scales. Other members of the team found items such as bones and food in their samples. After the samples have been separated, they will be refrozen until a material specialist in archeological wood, fauna, flora, etc. can analyze the samples.
The bluffs where these samples were taken are threatened by storm surge and erosion. If it isn't salvaged and studied, prior to being eroded away, then we will never know what existed here. Because It is a threatened traditional heritage site it has received funding from NSF to be studied and preserved under the Salvage and Processing of Samples from Utqiagvik, Barrow, Alaska grant. Tomorrow I hope to visit the actual site where these samples were collected.
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