Victoria Pagel

The Curation Crisis is partially defined by intellectually inaccessible archaeological material and the lack of resources for the proper care and management of these collections. This crisis has impaired collections use for research, education, and exhibition for decades. The University of Wisconsin-Madison originally curated collections recovered from the 1956 salvage excavations near Mobridge, South Dakota and exists as a case study of these issues. Rehabilitation efforts in 2014 integrated archaeological methodology with standard museum practices to rectify the deteriorating storage and inconsistent documentation of these collections. This project illuminates the value of rehabilitation efforts that increase the potential for future research and public outreach.

Tillmont is a deeply stratified multi-component site located in Crawford County, Wisconsin. The site is owned by the US Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) and was excavated as a university field school under the direction of Dr. James Stoltman in 1995.  In the summer of 2016, personnel at UW-Madison undertook an extensive re-curation of the Tillmont site collections under contract with the USFWS Midwest Regional Office. This poster provides an overview of the rehabilitation, including the processes, challenges, solutions, and end results. Furthermore, it illustrates the sub-standard state of many under-funded university field school collections and offers an effective process that may be used to curate collections long-term.