Dr. Murl Dirksen, center, is pictured here screening for artifacts at an archaeological site with Lee students Allie Webb, left, and Emma-Leigh Evors.
Lee Professor of Anthropology Dr. Murl Dirksen presented at the 47th annual meeting of the Anthropology-Sociology Kentucky Conference at Centre College in Kentucky. His talk, titled “Excavation of a 14,000 B.P. in Colorado: Using Undergraduate Students in Contract Archaeology,” focused on the excavation record of Eagle Rock Shelter since 2007.
Dr. Dirksen suggested that four important reasons to use students on a western archaeological site are that students can learn the uniqueness of human adaptation to a semi-arid environment over thousands of years; understand the importance of discovering artifacts from continual human occupation of 12,000 years; use personal skills of drawing, recording, photographing, and writing; and confront the legal and moral ramifications of working in an area where human remains have been unearthed.
Situated on a bench above the Gunnison River on the western slope of the Rocky Mountains, Eagle Rock Shelter is probably the oldest rock shelter (14,000 B.P.) in the United States and is under contract with Dr. Dudley Gardner, a Lee University alumnus from Western Wyoming College. Lee University is one of only five schools approved to work at Eagle Rock Shelter.
For more information about the anthropology program at Lee University, contact the Department of Behavioral and Social Sciences at 614-8125.